Revelation 9:15

Revelation 9:15. A new circumstance connected with the four angels is added in this verse. They had not only been bound: they had been kept ready for an appointed moment. They had been prepared unto the hour and day and month and year. The translation of these last words in the Authorised Version conveys an altogether false idea of their meaning, suggesting as it does that we are to put together the four periods mentioned, and to regard the sum as indicating the length of time during which either the preparation had been going on, or the plague was to continue. It is to be observed, however, that the words ‘unto' and ‘the' are not repeated before ‘day and month and year.' Add to this the fact, already illustrated in the writings of St. John (chap. Revelation 5:12; John 14:6), that when we have a series of nouns grouped together in this way the emphasis lies upon the first, the others only filling up the thought, and we shall be satisfied that we are not to combine into one these portions of time. The meaning is that the angels are prepared ‘unto the hour' appointed by God, and that this hour shall fall in its appointed day and month and year. The commission given to the angels is to kill the third part of men. The point chiefly to be noticed is the climax from a one-fourth part under the seals to a one-third part here. In the climax marking the separate members of the trumpets the progress is from the ‘tormenting' in the fifth trumpet to the ‘killing' in the sixth.