Trumpets of Tribulation — Part 1

Trumpets¹ of tribulation appear often in the Scriptures. In John’s third vision² of the Revelation, seven trumpets announce the “great tribulation” in the land³ of Israel (Rev. 1:9; 7:14; cp. Matt. 24:21). In AD 30,⁴ Jesus said this time of tribulation would come in his generation (Matt. 24:34). John, writing around AD 66,⁵ saw this tribulation in his near future (Rev. 1:1).⁶ The tribulation trumpets were about to sound.

Israel knew the role trumpets play in God’s judgment acts. After their Exodus from idolatrous and oppressive Egypt, God sentenced them to forty years of wandering in the wilderness. He then allowed them to enter the Promised Land. They fought their first battle at Jericho (Josh. 6:1–27).

Israel marched around the city six consecutive days, sounding trumpets. On the seventh day they added a shout to the trumpet blasts: “And the seventh time it happened, when the priests blew the trumpets, that Joshua said to the people: ‘Shout, for the LORD has given you the city! Now the city shall be doomed by the LORD to destruction, it and all who are in it’” (Jos 6:16–17, NKJV; emphasis added).

The fall of Jericho came with trumpets blowing and the people shouting. As we will see in our next post (D.V.), John’s vision links both these actions to the destruction of Jerusalem, too.

The trumpet vision has other echoes from the Egyptian Exodus, including the similarity between the signs here and those Moses performed.

Striking similarity exists between the trumpets which are about to be blown and the ten plagues brought against Egypt. Hail and fire, water turned to blood, periods of darkness, and the appearance of locusts all seem to complete the parallel. The sixth trumpet will bring death among mankind, just as in the Passover, when death came to the firstborn of each Egyptian family.⁷

That God compares Jerusalem to Egypt in this passage (Rev. 11:8) increases the impact of this parallel.

Trumpets, shouts, and signs from Israel’s past inform our understanding of the trumpet vision, but the most important source is the Lord’s Olivet Discourse. As we apply inmillennialism to the Revelation, we see that John’s vision has the same kinds of images Jesus used to describe the fall of the Temple in Jerusalem:

And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring; Men’s hearts failing them for fear, and for looking after those things which are coming on the earth: for the powers of heaven shall be shaken. (Luke 21:25–26)

These include “a great sound of a trumpet” (Matt. 24:31) as God sends his angels to gather the elect into his church kingdom. In the Revelation, John amplifies this trumpet imagery, just as he does the other images Jesus used in the Olivet Discourse.

Several elements associated with the trumpets confirm they refer to the AD 66–70 “great tribulation” in Israel. In this post, we will look at the first trumpet and one aspect of the second.

First Trumpet — A Scorched Earth

“And the first messenger did sound, and there came hail and fire, mingled with blood, and it was cast to the land, and the third of the trees was burnt up, and all the green grass was burnt up.” (Rev. 8:7, YLT)

The Prophets often surround a kernel of physical reality with layers of imagery. Patrick Fairbairn says:

Instead of speaking in the severe and exact style of history, they delight rather to throw around the actual world the life and lustre of a higher sphere; so that symbols to their view often take the place of realities.⁸

We have seen an example of this in Revelation. In the first vision, Jesus inspects actual churches in the physical world. The vision surrounds this reality with images of stars, candlesticks, the tree of life, and several others. This imagery creates an impressive and memorable effect.

John does this in the trumpet vision, too. The first trumpet describes hail, fire, and blood falling on the land.

Historians describe the physical reality at the core of this imagery. In the AD 66–70 wars, the Romans used a scorched-earth military tactic. For example, Josephus says Vespasian, the Roman general, “set fire, not only to the city itself, but to all the villas and small cities that were round about it; some of them were quite destitute of inhabitants.”⁹ He provides several other examples.¹⁰

Alexander Gillespie mentions “other practices of war which Caesar adopted, burning all arable lands and food resources around hostile tribes. Jerusalem fell in 70 AD, in part, due to the siege that began with the destruction of all surrounding trees.”¹¹

This physical reality fulfilled the first trumpet imagery. God was about to send the Roman armies to judge Israel. “Hail and fire, mingled with blood” would come and “the third of the trees [would be] burnt up” (Rev. 8:7, YLT). Jerusalem and the Temple would crumble in the midst of a charred land.

Second Trumpet—A Mountain Displaced

“And the second angel sounded, and as it were a great mountain burning with fire was cast into the sea” (Rev. 8:8).

The prophets often used mountains to picture kingdoms. This is of special importance to us because these tribulation events would bring about a kingdom transfer.

Patrick Fairbairn wrote an appendix on the “symbolical designation of kingdoms as mountains.”¹² He points out that David used mountain imagery to describe the exaltation of his kingdom: “LORD, by thy favour thou hast made my mountain to stand strong” (Psa. 30:7).

Fairbairn refers to another mountain-saying of David:

Why do you fume with envy, you mountains of many peaks? This is the mountain which God desires to dwell in; Yes, the LORD will dwell in it forever. (Psa. 68:15–16, NKJV; emphasis added)

The mountain of God’s dwelling represented David’s kingdom (i.e., Israel).

To use our inmillennial terminology, the mountain of which David spoke was a symbol of God’s church kingdom¹³ in the Mosaic Age. In John’s day, that kingdom had corrupted itself as Moses had predicted.¹⁴ God was, therefore, about to judge this mountain; he would cast it into the sea.

In the only other New Testament passage that uses this mountain-into-the-sea imagery, Jesus said to his disciples, “Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea; it shall be done” (Matt. 21:21; emphasis added).¹⁵

Jesus spoke these words on Tuesday of Passion Week,¹⁶ during which he performed several symbolic judgment acts against Jerusalem and the Temple. In this context, he told the Jewish leaders that “the kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof” (Matt. 21:43). He also told his disciples that God’s “great tribulation” judgment would come in their generation (Matt. 24:21, 34). This tribulation would complete the kingdom transfer process.

Jesus used mountain-to-sea imagery to assure his disciples their faith-acts were part of God’s judgment of apostate Israel. They would figuratively cast Israel’s Mosaic-Age mountain—the Temple mount within their view as Jesus spoke these words—into the sea. The Messianic-Age mountain—the kingdom Jesus established in the “last days”¹⁷ of the Mosaic Age—would remain (cp. Isa. 2:2; Micah 4:1; Heb. 1:2; 12:22).

John repeats and amplifies this mountain imagery in his account of the second trumpet. This reinforces our assertion that this vision pertains to God’s judgment of Israel and that this judgment occurred soon after John wrote the Revelation.

Conclusion

The symbolism of the first two trumpets agrees with the inmillennial framework. If the Lord wills, we will look at other elements in John’s account of the second trumpet and as many of the remaining trumpets as space allows in our next post.

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1. The image is a miniature by an unknown Spanish artist active around AD 1180. It is in the public domain per here.
2. Rev. 8:2 – 11:19. See our Mapping God’s Highway in Revelation post for an outline of the seven visions.
3. The Greek word gē in Revelation can mean either “land” or “earth.” Inmillennialism says the former better fits the context. Cp. “there was darkness over the whole land (Gk. gē)” (Mark 15:33).
4. A. T. Robertson, A Harmony of the Gospels for Students of the Life of Christ, (New York: Harper, 1922), 173.
5. See Better Early Than Late!
6. See The Bookends of Revelation.
7. F. LaGard Smith, Narrated Bible in Chronological Order (New International Version), (Eugene, OR: Harvest House, 1984), 1672.
8. Patrick Fairbairn, The Interpretation of Prophecy, (Edinburgh: Banner of Truth, 1993), 132. Emphasis added.
9. Flavius Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1974), 3:7:1.
10. Josephus, The Wars of the Jews, 3:4:1, 4:8:3, 4:9:7, 5:6:2, and 6:1:1. This list is provided by Daniel Morais here. Our appreciative use is not an endorsement of the site from which they are taken.
11. Alexander Gillespie, A History of the Laws of War: Volume 2: The Customs and Laws of War With Regards to Civilians in Times of Conflict, (Portland, OR: Hart Publishing, 2011), 57. Emphasis added.
12. Fairbairn, The Interpretation of Prophecy, 504.
13. For the concept of Israel as God’s church kingdom, see Can God’s Kingdom Grow?, Israel: God’s Church Kingdom, and False Jews and Their Persecutions.
14. In Deut. 30–31. See The Great Tribulation: a Sign of the Temple’s Destruction.
15. Jesus uses mountain-moving imagery in Matt. 17:20, but the removal is “to yonder place,” not the sea. Paul likewise speaks of faith to “remove mountains” (1 Cor. 13:2), but does not name a destination.
16. Robertson, A Harmony of the Gospels, 159.
17. See The Last Days in Hebrews for inmillennialism’s explanation of the “last days.”