Revelation 8 The Seven Trumpets

In book 6,

The Seventh Seal 

Next, John sees the Lamb open the seventh seal. Nothing happens. There's just silence. But don't get too hopeful. It's just the calm before the storm. After about a half hour of quiet, John sees seven angels with seven trumpets standing in front of God. This silence is a ceasing of praising, of rejoicing, or preaching. The story is about to be told again with even more details. Told through seven trumpets. Now the story of the church’s history will be told with details about what will happen to the Roman Empire, and their battles which are not against Christians alone, but also involving other religions. 


Blow, Angels, Blow 

John sees seven angels with seven trumpets standing in front of God. The silence is broken to angels which all start to blow their trumpets one by one. It is a prophecy of the destruction of Eastern and Western Rome in the 5th Century A.D. We here enter upon a series of prophecies developing fully the successive steps in the decline of the Western Roman empire, by which it finally tottered to its fall. It was necessary that this persecuting, tyrannical government should be subverted in order to give opportunity for the establishment of apostate Christianity in the form of the Papacy, as it constituted the "let" or hindrance to the full development of the "man of sin" mentioned by the apostle in 2 Thess. 2. That persecuting, Pagan Rome was a serious obstacle confronting the development of apostasy was recognized even by the early Christians. 


When the first angel trumpets, hail and fire mixed with blood starts to rain down on the Earth. This is a prophecy of the terrible ransacking of Rome by Alaric in A.D. 410. The result was the decline of Imperial power in the West. 


The second angel blows his horn and a burning mountain falls into the sea. So things are getting worse. Much worse. This is a prophecy of the terrible ransacking of Rome by Genseric in A.D. 429. The result was that “VANDALS” as they were called became Emperors over the people in the Roman Empire. Before he died, in the fullness of years and glory, he beheld the FINAL EXTINCTION of the empire of the West." Gibbon, Vol. III, pp. 497, 498. 


The third angel takes his turn blowing and a star named Wormwood falls from the sky and pollutes the water even more. The quickness of its fall and disappearance in the waters would direct us to an agent who would appear suddenly and soon disappear, and whose career would leave bitter results. The direct effects of this meteor were experienced by the rivers and the fountains of waters, which bear an analogous relation to the sea that bordering tribes and nations do to an empire. The heart of the empire, or "the sea," was directly affected by the burning mountain, under the preceding trumpet; while the tributaries of the sea, or the bordering tribes, are made the subject of direct attack under this symbol and the poisonous qualities of their waters carried to far distant points. Under this striking symbol we have a description of the third important step in the downward course of Rome—the short but eventful career of Attila, with his terrible Scythians, or Huns. Singularly, Coming from the remote solitudes of Asia under the leadership of their fierce king, they poured like a tornado, first upon the inhabitants of the Eastern empire (in 442, 445) and then turned their attention westward. Attila ruled over "nearly all the tribes north of the Danube and the Black sea." 


In 451 he led his forces, seven hundred thousand strong, through the center of Germany into the heart of Gaul, where he was met at Chalons by the combined forces of the Visigoths, Alans, Franks and Romans, and was defeated, with the loss of one hundred and seventy thousand of his men. This was one of the most gigantic as well as one of the most important battles of history. A rivulet flowing through the field of battle is said to have been colored and swollen by the blood of the slain. The next year, however, with a greater force at his command, he fell with headlong fury upon northern Italy; but he did not attack Rome. Suddenly and seemingly without cause, he withdrew his army; and this peculiar action of his has been the wonder of historians ever since. According to the prophecy, he was to fall upon the "rivers and fountains of waters" only. A short time later, in 453, he died, and "the vast empire over which he had ruled broke up immediately after his death, no one chief being powerful enough to seize the supremacy." Thus his short but wonderful career of about twelve years ended suddenly, like a meteor falling into a river. But the effects of this invasion were far-reaching. Rome in her declining strength was obliged to accept the bitter consequences. Under each of these first three trumpets the extent of destruction is indicated by the expression "the third part." Since the successive steps in the downfall of the empire is the subject under consideration, this expression as here applied doubtless has particular reference to the loss of political power and life, rather than referring directly to the loss of human life sustained. With this thought in view, it is evident that the political importance of the empire was entirely destroyed by these desolating incursions. Of the truth of this fact all historians agree. Nothing of Rome remained, except the semblance of a government, when the time arrived for the sounding of the next trumpet. 


The symbol of this trumpet is that of an eclipse of sun, moon, and stars, so that they shone not for a third part of the day and night. Under the sixth seal we showed that these luminaries of heaven are taken as symbols of rulers and princes; for the latter bear an analogous relation to the empire that the former do to the earth. In the darkening, then, of the sun, moon, and stars, we are to look for some disastrous change or overthrow in the imperial government. Such an event occurred only a few years after the events described under the preceding trumpets. With her political strength and resources exhausted, Rome could no longer maintain a separate existence, and Odoacer, king of the Heruli, overthrew Momyllus Augustulus, the last of the Roman line of emperors, and caused himself to be proclaimed king of Italy in A.D. 476. This terminated the Western empire; and thus was the Roman sun eclipsed in darkness. In a subsequent chapter, however, we will find the eclipse lifted at a later period and New Rome enjoying all the power and authority lost in her predecessors of the old Augustin line.