Posts
12 The sixth poured out his bowl on the great river, the Euphrates. Its water was dried up, that the way might be made ready for the kings that come from the sunrise. 13 I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon, and out of the mouth of the beast, and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits, something like frogs; 14 for they are spirits of demons, performing signs; which go forth to the kings of the whole inhabited earth, to gather them together for the war of that great day of God, the Almighty.
The sixth poured out his bowl on the great river, the Euphrates
The sixth angel sounded. I heard a voice from the horns of the golden altar which is before God, saying to the sixth angel who had one trumpet, "Free the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates!" (Revelation 9:13-14)
The name of the third river is Hiddekel: this is the one which flows in front of Assyria. The fourth river is the Euphrates. (Genesis 2:14)
In that day Yahweh made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates: (Genesis 15:18)
Every place whereon the sole of your foot shall tread shall be yours: from the wilderness, and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even to the hinder sea shall be your border. (Deuteronomy 11:24)
I have given you every place that the sole of your foot will tread on, as I told Moses. From the wilderness, and this Lebanon, even to the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and to the great sea toward the going down of the sun, shall be your border. (Joshua 1:3-4)
Now Solomon had 4,000 stalls for horses and chariots and 12,000 horsemen, and he stationed them in the chariot cities and with the king in Jerusalem. He was the ruler over all the kings from the Euphrates River even to the land of the Philistines, and as far as the border of Egypt. (2 Chronicles 9:25-26 NAS95)
Because this people have refused the waters of Shiloah that go softly, and rejoice in Rezin and Remaliah's son; now therefore, behold, the Lord brings upon them the mighty flood waters of the [Euphrates] River: the king of Assyria and all his glory. It will come up over all its channels, and go over all its banks. It will sweep onward into Judah. It will overflow and pass through; it will reach even to the neck; and the stretching out of its wings will fill the breadth of your land, Immanuel. (Isaiah 8:6-8)
It will happen in that day, that Yahweh will thresh from the flowing stream of the Euphrates to the brook of Egypt; and you will be gathered one by one, children of Israel. It will happen in that day that a great trumpet will be blown; and those who were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and those who were outcasts in the land of Egypt, shall come; and they will worship Yahweh in the holy mountain at Jerusalem. (Isaiah 27:12-13)
Is Israel a servant? is he a native-born slave? why is he become a prey? The young lions have roared on him, and yelled; and they have made his land waste: his cities are burned up, without inhabitant. The children also of Memphis and Tahpanhes have broken the crown of your head.
Haven't you procured this to yourself, in that you have forsaken Yahweh your God, when he led you by the way? Now what have you to do in the way to Egypt, to drink the waters of the Shihor? or what have you to do in the way to Assyria, to drink the waters of the [Euphrates] River? Your own wickedness shall correct you, and your backsliding shall reprove you: know therefore and see that it is an evil thing and a bitter, that you have forsaken Yahweh your God, and that my fear is not in you, says the Lord, Yahweh of Armies.
For of old time I have broken your yoke, and burst your bonds; and you said, I will not serve; for on every high hill and under every green tree you did bow yourself, playing the prostitute. Yet I had planted you a noble vine, wholly a right seed: how then are you turned into the degenerate branches of a foreign vine to me? For though you wash yourself with lye, and use much soap, yet your iniquity is marked before me, says the Lord Yahweh. (Jeremiah 2:14-22)
Why have I seen it? they are dismayed and are turned backward; and their mighty ones are beaten down, and have fled apace, and don't look back: terror is on every side, says Yahweh. Don't let the swift flee away, nor the mighty man escape; in the north by the river Euphrates have they stumbled and fallen. Who is this who rises up like the Nile, whose waters toss themselves like the rivers?
Egypt rises up like the Nile, and his waters toss themselves like the rivers: and he says, I will rise up, I will cover the earth; I will destroy cities and the inhabitants of it. Go up, you horses; and rage, you chariots; and let the mighty men go forth: Cush and Put, who handle the shield; and the Ludim, who handle and bend the bow.
For that day is a day of the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, a day of vengeance, that he may avenge him of his adversaries: and the sword shall devour and be satiate, and shall drink its fill of their blood; for the Lord, Yahweh of Armies, has a sacrifice in the north country by the river Euphrates. Go up into Gilead, and take balm, virgin daughter of Egypt: in vain do you use many medicines; there is no healing for you. (Jeremiah 46:5-11)
It will be a day when they will come to you from Assyria and the cities of Egypt, from Egypt even to the Euphrates, even from sea to sea and mountain to mountain. And the earth will become desolate because of her inhabitants, on account of the fruit of their deeds. (Micah 7:12-13 NAS95)
Its water was dried up
The children of Israel went into the midst of the sea on the dry ground, and the waters were a wall to them on their right hand, and on their left. (Exodus 14:22)
It happened, when the people removed from their tents, to pass over the Jordan, the priests who bore the ark of the covenant being before the people; and when those who bore the ark were come to the Jordan, and the feet of the priests who bore the ark were dipped in the brink of the water (for the Jordan overflows all its banks all the time of harvest), that the waters which came down from above stood, and rose up in one heap, a great way off, at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan; and those that went down toward the sea of the Arabah, even the Salt Sea, were wholly cut off: and the people passed over right against Jericho. The priests who bore the ark of the covenant of Yahweh stood firm on dry ground in the midst of the Jordan; and all Israel passed over on dry ground, until all the nation were passed clean over the Jordan. (Joshua 3:14-17)
Fifty men of the sons of the prophets went, and stood over against them afar off: and they two stood by the Jordan. Elijah took his mantle, and wrapped it together, and struck the waters, and they were divided here and there, so that they two went over on dry ground. (2 Kings 2:7-8)
He took up also the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and went back, and stood by the bank of the Jordan. He took the mantle of Elijah that fell from him, and struck the waters, and said, Where is Yahweh, the God of Elijah? and when he also had struck the waters, they were divided here and there; and Elisha went over. (2 Kings 2:13-14)
He turned the sea into dry land. They went through the river on foot. There, we rejoiced in him. (Psalms 66:6)
He said to me, "The waters which you saw, where the prostitute sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. The ten horns which you saw, and the beast, these will hate the prostitute, and will make her desolate, and will make her naked, and will eat her flesh, and will burn her utterly with fire. For God has put in their hearts to do what he has in mind, and to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God should be accomplished. (Revelation 17:15-17)
Cyrus diverted the Euphrates river, drying it up in order to capture the impregnable city of Babylon by entering through the left-open 'under-water' gates. Similarly during final events, the exposure of all the fraud and deception relied on by the throne of the beast that manipulates the whole earth, prepares its seat of power for its final collapse described in chapters 17 & 18.
As noted in passages we just considered, the Euphrates was intended to be the boundary between the promised land of Israel and Babylon. With this boundary dried up, the distinction between the two becomes nebulous, leaving spiritual Israel open to amalgamation with Babylon. The principles of Satan's kingdom that were refined in Babylon, have infiltrated beliefs taught in popular Christianity, blurring the distinctions between the light of truth and darkness of superstitions about God. This drying up of the boundary line between the two is the goal of modern symbolic Babylon, yet it ends up precipitating the complete collapse of that system of control in self-destruction.
Euphrates river was called Judgment River by the Canaanites and was viewed as a god of judgment in ancient times. This may represent the total loss of justice and true judgment in the world, unleashing a reign of terror.
Euphrates represents the support provided to Babylon by the deceived masses of people on earth that shield it from being exposed by the light of truth. When the truth of God's glory and character publicly exposes the dark lies that have blinded the inhabitants of the earth to the corruption really going on, the support, sympathy and cooperation of the public are dried up.
A river implies waters. As we read from chapter 17, water in prophecy represents peoples in various descriptions of cohesion. If this is what water represents, what would drying them up represent? What about a drying up of public support for the mayhem, immorality and agenda promulgated by the woke movement, opening the way for a violent reaction of the opposite extreme? The parallel to this in the sixth trumpet implicates a reign of terror and forced compliance in the name of law and order and in the n a name of 'social justice' to curb the corruption and breakdown of society experienced under the fifth trumpet. This could be orchestrated and manipulated by Babylon the Harlot. When public support for the woke crowd dries up and people become outraged with all the violence, deception and immorality, the way is opened for the kings of the east represented in the sixth trumpet.
A side note to just mention here. This river might be a counterfeit of the river of life Revelation 22:1-2.
When you pass through the waters, I will be with you; and through the rivers, they will not overflow you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned, and flame will not scorch you. (Isaiah 43:2)
that the way might be made ready
Generation, see the word of Yahweh. Have I been a wilderness to Israel? or a land of thick darkness? why say my people, We are broken loose; we will come no more to you? Can a virgin forget her ornaments, or a bride her attire? yet my people have forgotten me days without number. How trimmest you your way to seek love! therefore even the wicked women have you taught your ways. Also in your skirts is found the blood of the souls of the innocent poor: you did not find them breaking in; but it is because of all these things.
Yet you said, I am innocent; surely his anger is turned away from me. Behold, I will enter into judgment with you, because you say, I have not sinned. Why go you about so much to change your way? you shall be ashamed of Egypt also, as you were ashamed of Assyria. From there also shall you go forth, with your hands on your head: for Yahweh has rejected those in whom you trust, and you shall not prosper with them. (Jeremiah 2:31-37)
For my people have forgotten me, they have burned incense to false gods; and they have been made to stumble in their ways, in the ancient paths, to walk in byways, in a way not built up; to make their land an astonishment, and a perpetual hissing; everyone who passes thereby shall be astonished, and shake his head. (Jeremiah 18:15-16)
for the kings that come from the sunrise [east]
Yahweh put a word in Balaam's mouth, and said, Return to Balak, and thus you shall speak. He returned to him, and behold, he was standing by his burnt offering, he, and all the princes of Moab. He took up his parable, and said, From Aram has Balak brought me, The king of Moab from the mountains of the East: Come, curse me Jacob, Come, defy Israel. How shall I curse, whom God has not cursed? How shall I defy, whom Yahweh has not defied? (Numbers 23:5-8)
So it was, when Israel had sown, that the Midianites came up, and the Amalekites, and the children of the east; they came up against them; and they encamped against them, and destroyed the increase of the earth, until you come to Gaza, and left no sustenance in Israel, neither sheep, nor ox, nor donkey. (Judges 6:3-4)
Then all the Midianites and the Amalekites and the children of the east assembled themselves together; and they passed over, and encamped in the valley of Jezreel. But the Spirit of Yahweh came on Gideon; and he blew a trumpet; and Abiezer was gathered together after him. (Judges 6:33-34)
The Midianites and the Amalekites and all the children of the east lay along in the valley like locusts for multitude; and their camels were without number, as the sand which is on the seashore for multitude. (Judges 7:12)
Throughout biblical history it was often kings from the east who were allowed by God to bring judgments against Israel or Judah when they chose to alienate from God. Assyria and Babylon were among these. This idea also resonates with the armed forces described under the 6th trumpet. In this case it may appear that the stringent imposition of law enforcement and severe punishments in the name of restoring morality and to regulate social order may be carried out in the name of God, but under a very different sort of justice mentality than how God defines justice.
Keep silent before me, islands, and let the peoples renew their strength. Let them come near, then let them speak. Let's meet together for judgment. Who has raised up one from the east? Whom called him to his foot in righteousness? He hands over nations to him, and makes him rule over kings. He gives them like the dust to his sword, like the driven stubble to his bow. He pursues them, and passes by safely, Even by a way that he had not gone with his feet. (Isaiah 41:1-3)
I have raised up one from the north, and he has come; from the rising of the sun, one who calls on my name; and he shall come on rulers as on mortar, and as the potter treads clay. (Isaiah 41:25)
Remember this, and show yourselves men; bring it again to mind, you transgressors. Remember the former things of old: for I am God, and there is none else; I am God, and there is none like me; declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times things that are not yet done; saying, My counsel shall stand, and I will do all my pleasure; calling a ravenous bird from the east, the man of my counsel from a far country; yes, I have spoken, I will also bring it to pass; I have purposed, I will also do it. (Isaiah 46:8-11)
