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Rev_8:7. “When the first angel sounded the trumpet, “there followed hail and fire mingled with blood, and they were cast upon the earth.” The plague is like that of Egypt, Exo_9:24 sqq., only that with the hail and fire, i.e., masses of fire,[2464] there is no lightning;[2465] nor is there any thing said of a wind, as perhaps the Prester of Plin., H. N. ii. 49,[2466] but blood[2467] is to be added, with which both the hail and fire are mingled.[2468] The ἐν with αἵματι enables us to see the original meaning still more clearly, as, e.g., Rev_6:8 : the blood appears as the mass wherein hail and fire are found.[2469] The expression μεμιγμ . ἐν αἳμ . does not give the idea of a “rain of blood.” Entirely distorted, however, is the explanation of Eichh.: “While the hail was falling, a shower also poured in the midst of flashes of lightning so rapidly following one another, that the shower itself seemed to be red with the reflected flames of the lightning.” The plague in this passage differs from that described in Exo_9:24 sqq., also in the fact that there the devastation was wrought by the hail, but here by the fire: κατεκάη .
τὸ τριτον τῆς γῆς . De Wette properly thinks only of the surface of the earth, with that which is upon it. Yet neither the especially prominent trees,[2470] the third part of which are consumed, nor the green grass all of which is burned, are to be regarded upon only that third part of the earth; but besides the τρίτον τῆς γῆς , also ( καὶ ) the third part of all the trees, and besides ( καὶ ) all the grass (upon the whole earth).
To explain what is here beheld by John as in any way allegorical, and thus to bring out the assumed “meaning” of the whole, and of its individual features, is an undertaking, which, since it has no foundation in the text, can lead only to what is arbitrary. Beda, according to whom there is described in Rev_8:7 the destruction of the godless in general, refers the entire portrayal to “the punishment of hell.” Luther, who begins in general with chs. 7 and 8. the prophecy of spiritual tribulations, i.e., of heresies, and then progresses to the Papacy, thinks here of Tatian and the Encratites. Grotius says, “The first trumpet explains the cause of the rest,” and explains χάλαζα = “the hardening of the hearts of the Jews;” πῦρ μεμ . ἐν αῖμ . = “sanguinary rage.” “Civil insurrections”[2471] and wars are suggested, not only by those who everywhere find the Romano-Judaic disturbances, but also by Beng.[2472] and Hengstenb.[2473] Vitr. refers to the plague and famine in the times of Decius and Gallus.[2474] Stem explains persecutions of the Church by the heathen, erroneous doctrines,[2475] and worldly wars in the Roman Empire. Ebrard understands the spiritual famine as it occurs in such Catholic lands as have rejected the light of the Reformation.
[2464] De Wette.
[2465] Ebrard.
[2466] Ew. i.
[2467] Cf. Joh_3:3.
[2468] The var. μεμιγμενον of à is not a bad interpretation, since the hail does not appear mingled with fire in the blood, but only the fire is combined with the blood. The effect also, which is ascribed only to the fire, corresponds well with this. But for a change of text the authority of à is insufficient.
[2469] Cf. Mat_7:2. Winer, p. 363.
[2470] Cf. Rev_7:1; Rev_7:3.
[2471] Wetst., Herd., etc.
[2472] Wars under Trajan and Hadrian. The “earth” is Asia, as Rev_7:1; but the trees,” not as Rev_7:1, Africa, but eminent Jews. The “grass” designates ordinary Jews.
[2473] Who interprets the “trees” and “grass” just as Beng.
[2474] “Globes of fire mixed with hail prefigured the plague enkindled among men from the sulphurous material of the atmosphere.”
[2475] By which the trees themselves, i.e., bishops and priests, were injured.