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Rev_9:4-5. There is here a further description as to how this plague of the locusts, proceeding from the abyss, is entirely different from that which the ordinary earthly locusts bring.
καὶ ἐῤῥεθη αὐτ ., κ . τ . λ ., cf. Rev_6:11. The ready recollection of the Egyptian plague of locusts[2539] makes the plague here appointed appear the more wonderful and dreadful. Not the grass and all the fresh verdure of field and trees, which are elsewhere devoured by locusts, are now regarded,[2540] but only[2541] men, those, viz., ὍΙΤΙΝΕς ΟὐΚ ἜΧΟΥΣΙ ΤῊΝ ΣΦΡΑΓῚΔΑ , Κ . Τ . Λ . Only as those without the seal,[2542] are they subjected to the plague proceeding from the abyss. The allegorizing interpretation of Beda and many others, according to which the rage of heretics (locusts) against the orthodox is regarded as here represented, miscarries—even though in its individual features it is refuted—chiefly in that, according to this exposition, the godly (the sealed) must appear as they who suffer. The explanation also which refers the entire trumpet-vision to the Jewish war, and understands by the locusts the Zealots, is also embarrassed on this point, so that Heinr. must remark: “We are unwilling to inquire here whether the Zealots were really grievous and pestilential to the better or the worse part of the race. The poet certainly imagines the latter.”
The injury which, in Rev_9:4, the locusts were commanded to inflict upon men, is more precisely defined in Rev_9:5; viz., that they are to torment men with the scorpionic power given them, but are not to inflict death.
ἘΔΌΘΗ ΑὐΤ . ἽΝΑ , Κ . Τ . Λ . Cf. Rev_9:3. That the not killing is to be strictly taken, but that it is not to be said that “only the not killed draw attention to themselves, because their number is the greater, and their lot the harder,”[2543] is shown by the tenor of the words, the antithesis ἈΛΛʼ ἽΝΑ ΒΑΣΑΝΙΣΘΉΣΟΝΤΑΙ , and the further description, Rev_9:6.
ΒΑΣΑΝΙΣΘΉΣΟΝΤΑΙ . It harmonizes well with the change of subject, that the indic. fut. now follows ἽΝΑ . Cf. a similar change of inf. and indic. fut., Rev_6:4.
ΜῆΝΑς ΠΈΝΤΕ . The allegorizing explanations depend, as always, upon extreme arbitrariness. Beda: “That heretics temporarily attack the good. For by five months it signifies the time of a generation, on account of the five senses which we use in this life.” Others reckon five mystical months, as 5 × 30, i.e., 150 mystical days; i.e., ordinary years, which time is referred by Vitr. to the dominion of the Goths, and by Calov. to the duration of Arianism. Bengel fixes five prophetic months as equal to 79 ⅓ years, and proposes the sufferings of the Jews in Persia during the sixth century, which were of that length. Utterly out of place is the reference to Gen_7:24;[2544] or that to the five sins, Rev_9:20 sqq.,[2545] for even if the number of sins were marked there in any way as five, it would nevertheless be preposterous if an entirely special feature of one vision found its significance not within this itself, but only in another. Yet the five months are not to be passed by as “mystical” without an explanation, as if this must be actually given only by its fulfilment.[2546] Besides, Hengstenb. says, arbitrarily, the number five “is absolutely the sign of the half, unfinished, as the broken number. Five months are mentioned, because only the five, in its relation to the twelve months of the year, gives the idea of relatively long duration and dreadfulness;” against which Ebrard already replies that to this sense the number six, the half of the twelve months, would most simply correspond. Eichh., Ew., De Wette,[2547] have properly recognized the designation of the five months as a feature in the vision, which is derived from the popular idea that the locusts usually appeared during the five months from May.[2548] As generally the entire description of visionary locusts, however supernatural they appear, depends upon the basis of a natural view, so, also, that natural conception lies at the foundation of the period given; yet even in this point the natural relation is heightened, as the locusts remain out of the abyss for fully five months, while, naturally, it is only within this time that occasionally a swarm of locusts may come.
ὁ βασανισμὸς αὐτῶν . The ΑὐΤῶΝ is the gen. subj., as in the corresponding Ὡς ΒΑΣΑΝ . ΣΚΟΡΠΊΟΥ . The subj. again is the ἈΚΡΊΔΕς , and ΒΑΣΑΝΙΣΜΌς has an active sense, as the form corresponds.[2549]
ὍΤΑΝ ΠΑΊΣῌ ἈΝΘΡ ., when he shall have struck a man.[2550] The correct Greek mode of expression regards a case naturally possible as having already occurred. Significant is the expression ΠΑΊΕΙΝ , which in the LXX., besides ΠΑΤΆΣΣΕΙΝ ,[2551] corresponds to the Heb. çÄëÌÈÉä .[2552] The Latins also speak forcibly of the scorpion’s stroke.[2553]
[2539] Exo_10:12-15. Cf. also Joe_1:2.
[2540] Cf. also Rev_8:7.
[2541] εἰ μή . Cf. Mat_12:4; Gal_1:19; Gal_2:16.
[2542] Cf. Rev_7:1 sqq.
[2543] Heugstenb.
[2544] Züll.
[2545] Hofmann.
[2546] Ebrard.
[2547] Cf. already Calov., Vitr., etc.
[2548] Cf. Bochart, Hieroz. ii. 495.
[2549] De Wette.
[2550] Cf. Winer, p. 289.
[2551] Jon_4:7.
[2552] Num_22:28; 2Sa_14:6.
[2553] Plin., H. N., vi. 28.