And the second angel sounded [his] trumpet and as a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea, and the third part of the sea became blood;
The second trumpet does not strike solid ground. It falls on open water, and what lands there is something like a burning mountain. The picture raises two questions at once: which power is falling, and why the damage stops at a third.
The verse does not say a mountain, but something like one. One writer sets the first two trumpets side by side:
In the first trumpet, we see hail, fire, and blood cast on the earth, and some trees and all green grass burnt up. In the second trumpet, a great mountain, as it were — that is, something similar to a great burning mountain — is cast into the sea. In the first trumpet, the earth, trees and grass are affected; in the second, the sea, its creatures and its ships. Both are fiery, burning judgments.
So why hit objects, when it is people God is dealing with?
The judgments fall on things rather than men. Yet the things listed — earth, trees, grass, sea and creatures in it, ships, rivers, fountains, sun, moon, stars — are not moral beings, and so are not accountable to God. Man is the rebel sinner who has to be dealt with. The things are symbols of man and of what is connected with him.
Jeremiah calls Babylon a mountain marked for burning, and that gives the key:
"Behold, I am against you, O destroying mountain, declares the LORD, which destroys the whole earth; I will stretch out my hand against you, and roll you down from the crags, and make you a burnt mountain." The LORD speaks against the Chaldean kingdom. It looked so firmly established in its might and greatness that no one could overthrow it. Yet He threatens it with consuming judgment, a "burnt mountain." … A mountain as a symbol represents a kingdom or a firmly established power. The key idea in these prophetic symbols is a strong, solid, established power. And this power is itself the target of God's governmental vengeance.
The mountain does not just collapse where it stands. It is thrown, and where it lands others suffer:
A mountain is the usual symbol of high, settled power. But here it is thrown into the sea, because it becomes the means of judgment to others, and not just the object of judgment itself.
The verse names three things: a mountain, fire, and the sea it lands in. One writer takes each in turn:
A great mountain speaks of a great governing power, while burning with fire points to a fearsome character of oppression. Thrown into the sea speaks of God's own sovereign power inflicting this scourge upon the nations (the sea of the Gentiles). The waters of the sea speak of "peoples and multitudes and nations and languages" (Revelation 17:15).
Commentators differ on what the blood and the dying creatures mean. One takes the dying to be a spiritual death:
First, all through the peoples (the sea) of the Roman earth, the "blood," the "deathful power of evil," prevails. A third part of the creatures in the sea that had life died. As another writer has put it, "I take dying here to be departure from the profession of association with God, public separation from Him, or apostasy." Unbelief and atheism always flourish in times of great disturbance, social earthquakes and revolutions.
Another holds that both senses are present at once:
Does blood here symbolise a violent natural death, or does it refer to the spiritual death of apostasy? In our judgment these two forms of death are here combined.
The third loss touches how people make a living:
This trumpet seems to foretell the overwhelming destruction of a great world power. In its fall it will bring ruin and death on a third part of the nations. The destruction of the ships brings trade to a standstill, and so they lose their means of living.
Each of these trumpets stops at the same fraction:
The language is still highly symbolic. A feature common to each is that the judgments only fall on a third part of the things affected. This shows that for the moment the effects are not universal but limited. The phrase "the third part" occurs again in Revelation 12:4, where the Roman Empire is in question. So here it points to the Roman earth: practically the western European powers, or, we may say, Christendom.
- Symbol — The verse says something like a mountain. Earth, sea, creatures and ships stand for people and what belongs to them, because objects cannot answer to God.
- Mountain — In prophecy a mountain is a kingdom or a firmly established power. Jeremiah's "burnt mountain" is Babylon: it looked unshakeable, yet God condemned it.
- Cast — The throw makes this power both the object of judgment and the tool of it. It falls, and its fall wrecks others.
- Sea — The mountain lands in the sea of the nations: "peoples and multitudes and nations and languages." The sovereign power of God sends it there.
- Third — Blood, death and lost shipping follow, yet each stops at a third. The judgment is severe, but not yet universal.
and the third part of the creatures which were in the sea which had life died; and the third part of the ships were destroyed.
The second trumpet has sounded, and a burning mountain falls into the sea. Verse 9 counts the cost — so what is that mountain, who are the creatures, and why does the damage stop at a third?
Scripture sets the pattern. A mountain stands for a settled power, and God once used that picture of Babylon.
In the judgment of the second trumpet John saw "something like a great mountain, burning with fire," thrown into the sea. In Scripture a mountain pictures a great and long-established power. So Scripture calls Babylon a "destroying mountain," and the LORD says to her, "I will roll you down from the crags, and make you a burnt mountain" (Jer. 51:25). The sea never stops moving, so it often pictures the nations in a state of unrest (see Rev. 17:15).
History has already staged smaller versions of this scene.
It is a power that is mighty, seated firmly and lifted high, yet full of volcanic forces in conflict. These will tear out her own insides and spread ruin all around. Thrown into the sea of the nations — already in commotion, as the word "sea" implies — this power produces death and disaster beyond that of the previous trumpet. It attacks human life more directly. Such a state of eruption was in France at the end of the eighteenth century, and it may well illustrate what seems intended. History is full of such warnings of what is coming, and we do well to take note of them. We may expect this all the more as the end approaches. Things grow towards it, and at last it takes by surprise those who have not heeded the warning.
In this vision the sea is not water.
The ever-restless sea is here the chosen figure for the peoples of the earth in terrible anarchy. They have no strong controlling power or firm hand over them. God ordains civil and governmental authority (Rom. 13:1). So the prophetic sea stands for the general state of the nations with no civil or spiritual government. Into these seething masses of mankind this burning power is cast.
Commentators differ over the death meant here. Some argue from the word "creatures" that individual people are in view, and that the death is moral, not physical.
Persons, and not peoples or nations in general as in the first judgment, are in question. The term "creatures" would imply as much... Moral, spiritual death is the undoubted force of the judgment carried out here. It is death towards God, and death towards the principles of truth and righteousness. In fact, it is moral death in its widest sense.
Others read the death as physical, and see the falling power itself as the instrument of it.
A great power that seemed settled is removed from its place. That power is not so much shattered itself as made the means of suffering to others. It is burning with fire, and the result is destruction to a third of the living creatures and ships in the sea. The whole thing is a figure taken from what a volcano would do if it were cast into the sea. In this way the Lord fills out the picture of destruction. A great consuming power falls on confused masses of people, and the result is human slaughter and political anarchy.
The wrecked ships carry trade, and trade feeds nations far from the disaster.
This trumpet appears to foretell the overwhelming destruction of a great world power. Its fall will bring ruin and death on a third of the nations. The destruction of the ships brings commerce to a standstill, and so destroys the way they make their living.
The same fraction runs through these judgments. It sets both a limit and a place.
A feature common to each is that the judgments fall only on a third part of the things affected. This shows that for the moment the effects are not universal but limited. The phrase "the third part" occurs again in Revelation 12:4, where the Roman Empire, energised by Satan, is in question. This leads to the conclusion that here it shows the Roman earth — in practice the western European powers, or perhaps we may say, Christendom.
A narrower blow is not a lighter one.
The trumpets may reach less far than the seals. But it will appear later that they strike with heavier judgment.
- Mountain — a great, long-standing power. God once pictured Babylon this way: rolled down and left burning.
- Sea — masses of people with no firm government. The mountain falls into a crowd already in turmoil.
- Death — a third of the creatures die. Some read this as death towards God and truth; others as real slaughter and anarchy.
- Ships — trade stops, and the loss of livelihood spreads ruin far beyond the point of impact.
- A third — the damage is limited, not universal. The trumpets hit a smaller area than the seals, but hit it harder.