The locusts in Revelation 9 are frightening enough without our inventing details about them. They emerge from the abyss, torment people for five months, and serve an angelic king called Apollyon. I understand John to be describing a real future judgment involving a supernatural host. To explain that conclusion, we need to follow the passage from the sounding trumpet through the end of the first woe, paying attention to the creatures’ origin and instructions as well as their appearance.
Read the Fifth Trumpet in Its Order
The first four trumpets bring devastation to the land, the sea, fresh water, and the heavenly lights. Before the fifth sounds, John hears a warning about the three remaining blasts:
And I looked, and I heard an angel flying through the midst of heaven, saying with a loud voice, "Woe, woe, woe to the inhabitants of the earth, because of the remaining blasts of the trumpet of the three angels who are about to sound!"
Revelation 8:13
A woe announces severe distress and judgment. The earlier trumpets devastate the world people inhabit; the fifth brings torment directed at the people themselves. Heaven warns of that greater suffering before it begins. The locust judgment belongs within this sequence, so we need to read more than its most startling details.
I understand these as future events within a literal Tribulation. The trumpets follow the opening of the seventh seal, and their sequence leads toward the proclamation of Christ’s kingdom at the seventh trumpet. Treating each blast as an unrelated event somewhere in church history breaks up that progression. My study of The Seven Trumpets of Revelation explains the series more fully; here we are following Revelation 9:1-12.
Then the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit.
Revelation 9:1-2
John calls this figure a fallen star, then describes him receiving a key and opening the pit. Those actions are why I understand the star as an angelic person. A meteor does not receive a key and unlock a prison.
Some readers identify this fallen star as Satan and understand his fall as rebellion. Others understand the description as a descent from heaven to perform an assigned task. John says the star has fallen but does not name him or explain the circumstances of that fall. We can discuss those interpretations without pretending the passage settles his identity.
The key was given to him. He does not break into the abyss or seize control of it from God; he receives access when the fifth trumpet sounds. In Revelation 1:18, Jesus holds the keys of Hades and Death. In Revelation 20, an angel carries a key to the abyss when he comes to imprison Satan. Although these scenes concern different actions and places, each shows that access remains under God’s authority.
The Greek expression translated bottomless pit describes a shaft, phrear, opening into the abyss, abyssos, a deep or unfathomable place. The English word bottomless supplies no map of the earth’s interior. Scripture gives no coordinates and does not identify the abyss with an ocean trench or volcano, a black hole, or a tunnel through a flat earth. Its use as a place of spiritual confinement is much clearer. During Jesus’ ministry, demons possessing a man in the country of the Gadarenes begged Him not to send them there:
Then they sailed to the country of the Gadarenes, which is opposite Galilee. And when He stepped out on the land, there met Him a certain man from the city who had demons for a long time. And he wore no clothes, nor did he live in a house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out, fell down before Him, and with a loud voice said, "What have I to do with You, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You, do not torment me!" For He had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For it had often seized him, and he was kept under guard, bound with chains and shackles; and he broke the bonds and was driven by the demon into the wilderness. Jesus asked him, saying, "What is your name?" And he said, "Legion," because many demons had entered him. And they begged Him that He would not command them to go out into the abyss. Now a herd of many swine was feeding there on the mountain. So they begged Him that He would permit them to enter them. And He permitted them. Then the demons went out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd ran violently down the steep place into the lake and drowned.
Luke 8:26-33
The demons recognized Jesus as the Son of the Most High God. They had to leave the man at His command and ask permission even to enter the swine. They feared confinement in the abyss because He had authority to send them there. That tells us something about the place and about Christ’s rule over them. It does not establish that these particular demons are the beings John later sees released. The Abyss or Bottomless Pit examines the relevant passages more fully.
When the shaft opens in Revelation 9, smoke pours out like the smoke of a great furnace and darkens the sun and air. John describes an enormous outflow without explaining its chemical composition or identifying a modern weapon. Smoke alone cannot account for what follows, because living beings emerge from it.
The Locust Host and Its God-Given Limits
Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. They were commanded not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green thing, or any tree, but only those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. And they were not given authority to kill them, but to torment them for five months. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man. In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them.
Revelation 9:3-6
John calls them locusts, and I am content to use his word. Their origin, behavior, and later description distinguish them from the insects that devastate crops. They come from the abyss, leave vegetation unharmed, and torment selected human beings with scorpion-like power. This is an extraordinary host, whatever further questions we have about its nature.
I believe the strongest reading is that these are supernatural beings associated with the abyss and its destructive angelic ruler. Those connections give us reasonable grounds to call them demons. Revelation itself does not use that name for them or identify a particular class of fallen angels, so I would distinguish the inference from John’s explicit description. We can recognize their dreadful work without supplying a catalogue of beings Scripture never names.
Their instructions are remarkably precise. They receive power, but they cannot use it wherever or however they please. Grass, green plants, and trees are protected. Among human beings, those bearing God’s forehead seal are protected. The host may torment the unsealed for five months, but it has no authority to kill them. Its fierce appearance does not enlarge its assignment.
John repeatedly describes permission being given or withheld. The key was given, power was given, and authority to kill was withheld. A hostile force acts during God’s judgment, yet it remains subject to His command. God restrains these evil beings and determines how far they may act. His control does not make their destructive character good, and their malice cannot turn His judgment into an uncontrolled disaster.
The forehead seal mentioned here was introduced before the trumpet judgments, when four angels were instructed to hold back harm until God’s servants had been marked:
After these things I saw four angels standing at the four corners of the earth, holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, on the sea, or on any tree. Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, "Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads." And I heard the number of those who were sealed. One hundred and forty-four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel were sealed: of the tribe of Judah twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Reuben twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Gad twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Asher twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Naphtali twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Manasseh twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Simeon twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Levi twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Issachar twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Zebulun twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Joseph twelve thousand were sealed; of the tribe of Benjamin twelve thousand were sealed.
Revelation 7:1-8
John heard a definite number, 144,000, and named the tribes of Israel from which the servants were sealed. I see no reason to make those tribes a disguised name for the church. The protection announced in Revelation 7 helps explain the command in Revelation 9: the locusts must not harm anyone bearing God’s forehead seal. They can distinguish the sealed from the unsealed, although John does not describe the mark’s physical form.
The Holy Spirit’s sealing of the church also expresses God’s ownership, but we should distinguish it from this particular forehead mark. The Spirit is a divine Person who indwells and seals every genuine believer, guaranteeing what God has promised. Revelation 7 describes servants from Israel being marked during the Tribulation. I understand the church to have been gathered to Christ before this worldwide hour of trial. Our security does not depend on recognizing the locusts or obtaining the mark described here.
The command limits both whom the locusts may attack and how long they may act. They receive five months. Some readers compare that span with the length of an ordinary locust season, but the host’s authority lasts five months because that is the time assigned to it. Nothing in the passage authorizes us to turn those months into centuries of political or religious oppression.
John compares the suffering to a scorpion’s strike, then describes people seeking death and being unable to find it. They will long for an escape they cannot obtain. He does not tell us what each person attempts or how death is withheld. We should let that dreadful statement stand without inventing a medical mechanism or claiming to know every circumstance.
What John’s Comparisons Do and Do Not Mean
The shape of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle. On their heads were crowns of something like gold, and their faces were like the faces of men. They had hair like women's hair, and their teeth were like lions' teeth. And they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots with many horses running into battle. They had tails like scorpions, and there were stings in their tails. Their power was to hurt men five months.
Revelation 9:7-10
John describes what the beings resemble through a series of comparisons. Their shapes are like horses prepared for battle, their faces resemble men’s faces, and their hair resembles women’s hair. They have lion-like teeth, breastplates like iron, and wings whose noise recalls many chariots and horses charging into battle. Their tails have scorpion-like stings. The combined description conveys a fearsome host equipped to inflict the torment already announced.
Taking the passage literally includes reading those comparisons as comparisons. A real creature can have a face resembling a man’s without being human. Something resembling a golden crown need not be made of gold. An iron-like breastplate suggests formidable protection, but John does not say the beings are indestructible. We should neither explain away the coming event nor treat the description as a set of engineering specifications.
The crown-like forms do not identify a modern political regime or establish an angelic rank. John describes their appearance after already explaining that the host receives its authority. The NET translation note on Revelation 9:7 points out that he makes two comparisons: the forms resemble crowns, and their appearance resembles gold. Neither comparison tells us the material or gives us grounds to assign a hidden office to the beings wearing them.
The comparison with women’s hair also describes appearance. John does not call the hair seductive, shameful, beautiful, or deceptive. Neither that detail nor the human-like faces identifies a particular ethnicity, and the passage gives no basis for condemning a modern hairstyle. A description of these beings cannot be made into a moral lesson about women’s appearance.
The sound of the wings conveys the tumult of a host rushing into battle, without identifying an engine. The description of the tails tells us where the scorpion-like stings are. John then returns to the five-month limit. Even as he describes the creatures’ intimidating features, he reminds us that their power will end at the appointed time.
The King of the Host and Other Interpretations
And they had as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, but in Greek he has the name Apollyon. One woe is past. Behold, still two more woes are coming after these things.
Revelation 9:11-12
John identifies their king as the angel of the abyss and gives his name in Hebrew and Greek. Abaddon is associated with destruction or ruin; Apollyon means Destroyer. In the Old Testament wisdom books, Abaddon can refer to destruction or the realm of the dead. Here John uses it as the name of the angelic ruler over this host. The immediate context determines how we should understand it.
John names an angelic person without explaining his creation or rank among other beings. The title Destroyer does not make him the owner of the abyss or give him control over death. His host may torment people but may not kill them. Giving his name in two languages helps readers identify him. It gives us no reason to search later languages for a similar-sounding politician’s name.
Some readers identify Apollyon with Satan, whom Revelation elsewhere names as the dragon, the serpent of old, and the Devil. John does not use those names for Apollyon. Nor does he say that Apollyon is the fallen star who receives the key in verses 1-2. He introduces the star as the key-holder and Apollyon as the host’s king. Neither proposed identification is explicit, so I would not teach either as certain. At the same time, John’s silence does not prove that these must be different beings.
There is also no explicit identification with the destroyer at Passover, the angel who struck the Assyrians, or the destroying angels mentioned in Psalm 78. Similar work does not establish that every passage concerns the same angel. The distinctive Angel of the LORD in the relevant Old Testament appearances is a Christophany, an appearance of Christ. Apollyon should never be confused with the eternal Son. My study of Apollyon and the Destroyer Angel considers those passages in more detail.
Having a king also sets this host apart from ordinary locusts. Proverbs includes locusts among small creatures whose behavior displays remarkable wisdom:
There are four things which are little on the earth, But they are exceedingly wise: The ants are a people not strong, Yet they prepare their food in the summer; The rock badgers are a feeble folk, Yet they make their homes in the crags; The locusts have no king, Yet they all advance in ranks; The spider skillfully grasps with its hands, And it is in kings' palaces.
Proverbs 30:24-28
Ordinary locusts advance in ranks without a king, while Revelation’s host has one. That contrast adds to the reasons for distinguishing it from ordinary insects. It comes from the abyss, has an extraordinary appearance, and leaves plants unharmed. Enlarging a natural insect does not explain what John describes.
Exodus 10 and Joel provide further biblical background. A locust invasion could strip a land of food and leave its people facing ruin. Joel describes a devastating advance in military language, with darkness and the noise of an approaching host. Those passages help us understand the dread in Revelation, but their similarities do not establish that each describes the same event or species. Revelation 9 also gives a crucial difference: vegetation is spared while people are tormented.
The military comparisons have led some readers to identify the beings as helicopters. They begin with wings, noise, and a warlike appearance, then try to fit the remaining details to a machine. Faces resembling human faces and hair resembling women’s hair require further guesses, as do lion-like teeth and stinging tails. The explanation must also account for the abyss and the angelic king. Why does the host distinguish sealed from unsealed people, and why is it forbidden to kill? Substituting a drone or an engineered bioweapon does not resolve those problems.
If my opening question is What modern object resembles one detail?
I have already given that detail more weight than the rest of the passage. John wrote in the vocabulary of his own day, but that does not mean he was struggling to name a piece of twenty-first-century military equipment. Each generation can find an invention that resembles something in the description. Resemblance alone is poor grounds for identifying the host.
Other readers understand the host as a human army or political movement. They point to the military imagery or the experience of oppression. Yet neither an ordinary army nor a movement naturally accounts for the host’s origin and exact restrictions. An explanation needs to account for the whole description, including the details that do not fit its initial suggestion.
Preterist readings place the fulfillment in an ancient invasion or ruler’s actions. Idealist readings understand the scene chiefly as a recurring portrayal of evil and judgment. I understand a future event because John places this host within a sequence of trumpets and gives its torment an appointed duration. When that judgment ends, further judgments follow. The passage does teach that evil remains under God’s restraint, but that general truth does not replace the event John describes.
A real supernatural host therefore seems to me the best explanation. Its precise nature remains partly unexplained, and filling every silence would not improve our understanding. John tells us where the beings come from and who rules them. He also identifies their targets, describes their torment, and sets out the limits on their power.
The Remaining Woes and the Tribulation Timeline
After naming the king, John announces that the first woe is past and two more are coming. The five months end; the host does not gain an endless reign. At the sixth trumpet, four angels bound at the Euphrates are released, and another terrifying host brings death to a third of mankind:
Then the sixth angel sounded: And I heard a voice from the four horns of the golden altar which is before God, saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet, "Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates." So the four angels, who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year, were released to kill a third of mankind. Now the number of the army of the horsemen was two hundred million; I heard the number of them. And thus I saw the horses in the vision: those who sat on them had breastplates of fiery red, hyacinth blue, and sulfur yellow; and the heads of the horses were like the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire, smoke, and brimstone. By these three plagues a third of mankind was killed–by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which came out of their mouths. For their power is in their mouth and in their tails; for their tails are like serpents, having heads; and with them they do harm. But the rest of mankind, who were not killed by these plagues, did not repent of the works of their hands, that they should not worship demons, and idols of gold, silver, brass, stone, and wood, which can neither see nor hear nor walk. And they did not repent of their murders or their sorceries or their sexual immorality or their thefts.
Revelation 9:13-21
The fifth-trumpet host was forbidden to kill. The sixth trumpet brings enormous loss of life through a host whose horses, riders, and means of destruction John describes separately. The two judgments should not be merged simply because both are terrifying or include lion-like features.
What follows the deaths is just as sobering as the plagues themselves. The survivors continue worshiping demons and idols that cannot see, hear, or walk. Their murders, sorceries, sexual immorality, and thefts continue. The judgment has exposed the powerlessness of their objects of worship, yet they refuse to turn to God.
John repeatedly says that they did not repent. I understand him to be describing people who refuse a real opportunity. Other Tribulation passages tell us about God’s witnesses and people who come to faith during that time. His offer is genuine, but overwhelming evidence does not compel someone to receive it. A person can hate the consequences of sin while still refusing to give up the practices and false worship that brought those consequences.
The word translated sorceries, pharmakeia, concerns magic and occult practices, which could include drugs or potions. The NET note on Revelation 9:21 explains that usage. Here sorcery appears alongside demon worship and idolatry. The related origin of the English word pharmacy gives us no reason to read this as a condemnation of legitimate medicine. The wrongdoing is seeking power through spells, divination, and occult rituals.
After the sixth-trumpet account, Revelation pauses to describe the little book and John’s continuing prophetic commission, then the measuring of the temple and the two witnesses. God continues to give testimony while judgment proceeds. The seventh trumpet announces the kingdom of our Lord and His Christ. The sequence leads toward Jesus’ rightful reign, and the beings released from the abyss will never gain permanent dominion.
My study of the End Times Timeline places these events within the larger prophetic sequence. To understand the church’s place, we must also consider Paul’s promise about Christ gathering His people:
But I do not want you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning those who have fallen asleep, lest you sorrow as others who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who sleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will by no means precede those who are asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words.
1 Thessalonians 4:13-18
Paul comforts grieving believers by assuring them that Christians who have died will not miss Christ’s coming. The dead in Christ rise first, and the living are caught up with them to meet the Lord in the air. All of them will remain with Him. Our hope rests on belonging to the Lord who died and rose again.
I understand this gathering to take place before the coming worldwide hour of trial. 1 Thessalonians 4 describes the gathering itself. Its place before the Tribulation becomes clear as we read it alongside other prophetic passages; these verses alone do not supply a seven-year timetable. The church’s next great expectation is to meet Christ. We are not instructed to identify the fifth-trumpet creatures in order to survive their mission.
Following that gathering, I understand Daniel’s final week to unfold as a literal seven-year Tribulation. Revelation describes the seals, trumpets, and bowls within God’s dealings at the end of the age, leading to Christ’s visible bodily return. The phrase Great Tribulation refers especially to the intensified final half of those seven years. It follows the midpoint abomination of desolation, the desecration of the holy place Jesus warned about in Matthew 24:15-21. The fifth trumpet belongs within the seven years, but I would not assign it a more precise date than Scripture’s sequence allows.
Jesus will return bodily, defeat His enemies, and reign for a literal thousand years. At the beginning of that reign, the abyss appears again, this time as Satan’s prison:
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years; and he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal on him, so that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished. But after these things he must be released for a little while.
Revelation 20:1-3
An angel binds Satan, shuts him in the abyss, and seals him there so that he cannot deceive the nations during the thousand years. The abyss remains a place of temporary confinement under God’s control. Satan is released briefly afterward and is later cast into the Lake of Fire. The two destinations should not be treated as interchangeable.
Scripture also speaks of Hades, Gehenna, and angels held in chains of darkness. Each passage needs to be read in its setting so that we do not confuse different places or events. The locusts’ five-month torment occurs on earth during the Tribulation. It does not describe the final judgment of every unbelieving human being or justify teaching that hell is simply God turning people over to demons.
Unbelieving humans will be raised bodily for judgment at the Great White Throne. I understand the Lake of Fire to bring the final, irreversible destruction of both body and soul, called the second death. Human souls are not inherently immortal. This excludes both universal salvation and eternal conscious torment for human beings. It also differs from soul sleep, since the dead remain conscious between death and resurrection. Revelation 20:10 specifically describes endless torment for the devil, the beast, and the false prophet. We need to preserve those distinctions when teaching final judgment. The five months of suffering in Revelation 9 do not describe the final destiny of every unbeliever.
Read Revelation 9 With Sobriety and Hope
We can spend so much time naming the locusts that we scarcely hear the warning. Revelation describes people who continue in false worship and wicked conduct even after devastating judgment. I would not assure someone that he can reject Christ now and easily repent once prophecy becomes unmistakable. The survivors in this chapter do not respond that way. No one should presume on a future willingness to repent while deliberately refusing God’s call today.
People suffering from illness or despair today should not be told that their pain proves the Revelation 9 locusts are attacking them. John is describing a particular future judgment, and a loose resemblance to one feature is no basis for frightening someone with that diagnosis.
For believers, the passage should encourage steady obedience rather than panic. The Holy Spirit indwells and seals those who have truly been born again. Christ’s ownership of His people cannot be overturned by a creature from the abyss. His promise to gather the church gives us comfort, and His coming kingdom gives us reason to remain faithful when evil appears powerful.
Confidence in Christ does not make occult investigation harmless or excuse carelessness about sin. Scripture reveals enough about the host to warn us. It never instructs us to contact its ruler, summon spirits, or seek hidden knowledge through forbidden practices. Christians resist evil by submitting to God, believing His Word, and praying. We refuse participation in darkness and receive instruction and correction in faithful church fellowship, rather than pursue private spiritual experiments.
We need the same care when discussing current events. A disease or eclipse does not become the fifth trumpet because it resembles one detail in John’s language. Nor does a volcanic eruption, military project, or political movement. We should be ready for Christ and honest about what Scripture says. Setting dates or confidently identifying the host afresh with each new headline distracts people from both responsibilities.
I also want our attention to prophecy to affect how we live now. Someone who knows elaborate theories about Apollyon but neglects his family, excuses dishonesty, or refuses to speak of Christ has neglected clearer responsibilities. The coming judgment should make us earnest about repentance and faithful in ordinary obedience. The coming King deserves our worship more than His defeated enemies deserve our curiosity.
That King is the Savior who first came in humility. Jesus is the eternal Son, fully God and fully man, born of a virgin and completely sinless. Wicked men tortured and killed Him, but He voluntarily gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice for our sins. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus. Father and Son acted in unity to provide our salvation.
Christ’s saving work through His shed blood and death was complete before His burial and bodily resurrection. He rose again and lives as the Savior of everyone who comes to Him. His death was for the whole world, and God’s gracious offer is genuine. People can still resist and reject it, as the refusal to repent in Revelation 9 painfully illustrates.
Everyone who truly repents and believes receives forgiveness and justification, a right standing before God. That person is born again and becomes a new creation, indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit. Salvation is received by grace through faith. Our conduct neither earns it nor keeps us saved, but genuine new birth does produce evidence in a changed life. Eternal security gives no permission for lawlessness, and a Christian label does not establish that someone has been regenerated.
Every person begins with a place in the Book of Life. Those who finally reject the Messiah have their names blotted out, while believers remain. Through Christ’s blood, it is their sins that are blotted out. The call to repent is therefore a sincere invitation to receive the Savior, not an announcement that some people were never offered salvation at all.
My Final Thoughts
I understand the locusts as a real supernatural host that will emerge from the abyss during the fifth trumpet. Their appearance is extraordinary, their torment severe, and their ruler destructive, yet their targets, actions, and duration are restricted. We can teach those truths firmly while admitting that John leaves some questions about their precise nature unanswered.
Revelation directs us toward the reign of Jesus, who will judge rebellion and fulfill His promises. If you have been putting off repentance, do not assume another frightening event will make surrender easier. Christ genuinely calls you to come to Him now. If you belong to Him, trust His promise, obey what He has already made clear, and tell others why His blood is sufficient to save them.
The demons in Luke 8 begged Jesus not to send them into the abyss. Revelation later describes powers emerging from it and Satan being shut within it. I want to follow those passages carefully, because the Bible gives this prison a particular purpose and places it under God’s authority. We lose that explanation when we combine every reference to death and judgment into one place or supply the missing details from folklore.
The Abyss and the Terms Scripture Keeps Distinct
The Greek abyssos means an abyss or immeasurable depth, as Thayer’s lexicon explains. In the received New Testament text used in these studies, the noun appears nine times: once in Luke, once in Romans, and seven times in Revelation. Those passages need to be read in their own settings. The same word can describe depth without every use identifying the same prison.
Revelation 9 joins abyssos to phrear, a word for a well or shaft. The phrase phrear tes abyssou means the shaft of the abyss, as the lexical entry for phrear notes. We can therefore distinguish the opening from the prison beyond it when John describes smoke and beings coming out. The traditional expression bottomless pit conveys depth without supplying the prison’s dimensions or a calculation of the earth’s shape.
We also need to read the Hebrew word tehom, or deep, in its own context. In the Masoretic Text of Genesis, it describes the deep associated with the waters at creation.
In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. The earth was without form, and void; and darkness was on the face of the deep. And the Spirit of God was hovering over the face of the waters. Then God said, “Let there be light”; and there was light. And God saw the light, that it was good; and God divided the light from the darkness. God called the light Day, and the darkness He called Night. So the evening and the morning were the first day.
Genesis 1:1-5
Genesis describes waters, not a prison for demons. Elsewhere the Hebrew word can refer to seas, springs, or depths more generally, and the Septuagint, the ancient Greek translation of the Old Testament, sometimes renders it with abyssos. We need to read each occurrence in context rather than let a shared Greek word override the Hebrew text. A watery deep does not become Revelation’s place of confinement merely because the translation uses that noun.
Scripture also uses Sheol, Hades, Gehenna, and the Lake of Fire when speaking of death and judgment. Sheol and Hades concern the realm of the dead before final judgment, while Gehenna warns of final destruction. The Lake of Fire is the second death for human beings after resurrection and judgment. By contrast, the abyss serves as temporary confinement for spiritual powers. If we call every one of these places hell without explaining the passages, we make it harder to see their different purposes.
Luke 16 describes Hades and a great gulf in the account of the rich man and Lazarus, but does not call that gulf abyssos. Jude and 2 Peter describe angels confined under darkness without using that noun either. We can compare their descriptions without assuming that similar language proves an identical location.
Before tracing who enters or leaves the abyss, we should notice who has authority over death. The risen Jesus told John that He holds the keys of Hades and Death.
And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. But He laid His right hand on me, saying to me, “Do not be afraid; I am the First and the Last. I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death. Write the things which you have seen, and the things which are, and the things which will take place after this. The mystery of the seven stars which you saw in My right hand, and the seven golden lampstands: The seven stars are the angels of the seven churches, and the seven lampstands which you saw are the seven churches.
Revelation 1:17-20
The Jesus who holds those keys was dead and is alive forevermore. Keys signify His authority over Hades and Death, so neither Satan nor a demon determines our final destiny. Other agents in Revelation receive or carry a key to the abyss, but they act under authority given to them. They cannot release its inhabitants in defiance of Christ.
Legion, Romans, and the Authority of Christ
Luke uses abyssos when Jesus meets a man in the country of the Gadarenes. Demons had driven him from ordinary life into the tombs and wilderness, and chains and shackles could not restrain him. The spirits tormenting this man recognized the Son of the Most High God and pleaded with Him about where they would be sent.
Then they sailed to the country of the Gadarenes, which is opposite Galilee. And when He stepped out on the land, there met Him a certain man from the city who had demons for a long time. And he wore no clothes, nor did he live in a house but in the tombs. When he saw Jesus, he cried out, fell down before Him, and with a loud voice said, “What have I to do with You, Jesus, Son of the Most High God? I beg You, do not torment me!” For He had commanded the unclean spirit to come out of the man. For it had often seized him, and he was kept under guard, bound with chains and shackles; and he broke the bonds and was driven by the demon into the wilderness. Jesus asked him, saying, “What is your name?” And he said, “Legion,” because many demons had entered him. And they begged Him that He would not command them to go out into the abyss. Now a herd of many swine was feeding there on the mountain. So they begged Him that He would permit them to enter them. And He permitted them. Then the demons went out of the man and entered the swine, and the herd ran violently down the steep place into the lake and drowned.
Luke 8:26-33
The demons knew Jesus could send them into the confinement they feared. Their plea for permission to enter the swine shows that they had no independent right to choose their destination. Jesus allowed it, and the herd rushed into the nearby lake and drowned. That lake was an ordinary body of water in the region; the drowning does not turn it into either the abyss or the Lake of Fire.
Jesus freed the man by His command, and I want that deliverance to govern how we read the encounter. He did not instruct His followers to interview demons, seek hidden names, or arrange a hierarchy from the claims of hostile spirits. The demons feared the Lord who rescued the man. We should trust Him rather than let interest in them overshadow what He did.
Romans 10 uses the same noun while addressing a different question: must we undertake some impossible journey in order to receive salvation? Paul draws on Deuteronomy 30, where Moses says God’s word is not beyond reach in heaven or across the sea. He applies the nearness of that word to the gospel.
But the righteousness of faith speaks in this way, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?'” (that is, to bring Christ down from above) or, “‘Who will descend into the abyss?'” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith which we preach): that if you confess with your mouth the Lord Jesus and believe in your heart that God has raised Him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
Romans 10:6-10
God has already sent His Son and raised Him from the dead, so we do not have to climb into heaven to bring Christ down or descend into the depths to bring Him up. The gospel reaches us through the word Paul and the other apostles proclaim. We are called to believe and confess Jesus as Lord, receiving what God has accomplished rather than undertaking a journey to accomplish it ourselves.
Paul connects the abyss with bringing Christ up from the dead, so death belongs within the comparison he makes. But he is explaining how salvation is received, not tracing Christ’s travels or identifying Him as a prisoner among Revelation’s locust-like beings. I would miss his argument if I used those words to reconstruct hidden geography. No journey of ours could do what God has already done through Christ.
The Fifth Trumpet and the Destroyer
Revelation places the opening of the shaft at the fifth trumpet. The seals lead to the trumpet judgments, and this judgment is the first of three woes. I understand it as a future event within the literal seven-year Tribulation. That sequence governs how I read the vision, rather than letting the latest war or frightening invention decide what its symbols must mean.
Then the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit. Then out of the smoke locusts came upon the earth. And to them was given power, as the scorpions of the earth have power. They were commanded not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green thing, or any tree, but only those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. And they were not given authority to kill them, but to torment them for five months. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man. In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them. The shape of the locusts was like horses prepared for battle. On their heads were crowns of something like gold, and their faces were like the faces of men. They had hair like women’s hair, and their teeth were like lions’ teeth. And they had breastplates like breastplates of iron, and the sound of their wings was like the sound of chariots with many horses running into battle. They had tails like scorpions, and there were stings in their tails. Their power was to hurt men five months. And they had as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, but in Greek he has the name Apollyon. One woe is past. Behold, still two more woes are coming after these things.
Revelation 9:1-12
John describes a star fallen from heaven and then speaks of him receiving a key and opening the shaft. Those actions identify a personal agent, but they do not give us his name. Some readers understand him as a holy messenger carrying out judgment, while others identify a fallen angel. I would not take the description fallen by itself as enough to settle that question or name him as Satan. He receives the key, which makes his authority dependent on the One who gives it.
When the shaft opens, smoke darkens the sun and air, and locust-like beings emerge with power to torment. Their activity is restricted to five months, during which they must leave vegetation unharmed, afflict only people without God’s seal on their foreheads, and refrain from killing. John describes something terrifying while also telling us whom these beings may harm, what they may do, and when their power to torment must end.
The seal on God’s servants is not a protective charm that someone can reproduce. Revelation distinguishes those who belong to the Lamb from those who worship the beast within a particular prophetic sequence. It directs us to Christ, rather than teaching a ritual for copying the mark of His ownership.
John describes the beings through comparisons rather than giving us a familiar species name. They resemble horses prepared for battle, with human-like faces, hair like women’s hair, and teeth like lions’ teeth. Their breastplates are like iron, their wings sound like chariots rushing to battle, and their tails sting like scorpions. I understand them to be supernatural agents of judgment with a demonic character, since ordinary locusts do not fit what he describes. John does not actually call them demons, however, and the comparisons do not give us a complete classification of their nature.
Their king is the angel of the abyss, named Abaddon in Hebrew and Apollyon in Greek. The lexical entries for Abaddon and Apollyon explain the connection with destruction and the meaning Destroyer. John gives us two names for one ruler, not two beings from a later mythology.
The Hebrew abaddon can describe destruction or the realm of destruction elsewhere, but John applies it personally to this ruler. He does not identify that ruler as Satan, whose confinement comes later. Shared language about destruction does not identify him with the Passover destroyer either, since Exodus 12 gives that figure neither of these names.
I would not turn the ruler of these destructive forces into a guardian angel assigned to protect believers or identify him with the divine Angel of the LORD. I understand that divine Messenger in the relevant Old Testament appearances to be Christ before His incarnation. Incarnation means the eternal Son taking true human nature. The angel of the abyss is not that divine Person; the word angel means messenger, but using it of both does not make them the same messenger.
We also need the whole prophecy before identifying a modern event as the fifth trumpet. A resemblance to one feature cannot establish that an insect infestation, military machine, pandemic, or addictive technology fulfills it. John includes the shaft opening, these beings emerging, the restrictions on their victims, and the five-month period. We cannot discard those details to make a frightening current event fit.
Chained Angels and the Beast From the Abyss
Jude and Peter describe angels already held for judgment. Their language deserves comparison with the abyss, but neither uses abyssos for their confinement.
But I want to remind you, though you once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed those who did not believe. And the angels who did not keep their proper domain, but left their own abode, He has reserved in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day; as Sodom and Gomorrah, and the cities around them in a similar manner to these, having given themselves over to sexual immorality and gone after strange flesh, are set forth as an example, suffering the vengeance of eternal fire.
Jude 1:5-7
Jude describes angels who left their proper domain and are held in everlasting chains under darkness for the judgment of the great day. I understand the chains to secure them for that appointed judgment. Because Jude tells us what they are reserved for, I would not treat their present confinement as their final state forever.
Peter likewise describes rebellious angels being held for judgment.
For if God did not spare the angels who sinned, but cast them down to hell and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved for judgment; and did not spare the ancient world, but saved Noah, one of eight people, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the flood on the world of the ungodly; and turning the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, condemned them to destruction, making them an example to those who afterward would live ungodly; and delivered righteous Lot, who was oppressed by the filthy conduct of the wicked (for that righteous man, dwelling among them, tormented his righteous soul from day to day by seeing and hearing their lawless deeds)– then the Lord knows how to deliver the godly out of temptations and to reserve the unjust under punishment for the day of judgment,
2 Peter 2:4-9
Peter’s expression cast them down to hell translates tartaroo, a verb connected with Tartarus, as Thayer explains. He does not use the noun abyssos, although he likewise describes rebellious angels being held under darkness for judgment. His warning also assures believers that the Lord knows how to deliver the godly from temptation.
We should distinguish those imprisoned angels from the demons active in the Gospels, who fear being sent into confinement. Not every evil spirit is already held in a prison, and similar descriptions do not establish an identical location for every group. Ordinary temptation does not mean the abyss has opened either. Revelation places that opening within an appointed sequence of judgments.
In Revelation 11, John describes a beast ascending from the abyss to attack God’s two witnesses. He places the attack after they have completed their appointed testimony.
And I will give power to my two witnesses, and they will prophesy one thousand two hundred and sixty days, clothed in sackcloth.” These are the two olive trees and the two lampstands standing before the God of the earth. And if anyone wants to harm them, fire proceeds from their mouth and devours their enemies. And if anyone wants to harm them, he must be killed in this manner. These have power to shut heaven, so that no rain falls in the days of their prophecy; and they have power over waters to turn them to blood, and to strike the earth with all plagues, as often as they desire. When they finish their testimony, the beast that ascends out of the bottomless pit will make war against them, overcome them, and kill them.
Revelation 11:3-7
The two witnesses prophesy for 1,260 days before the beast overcomes and kills them. Their enemies cannot simply silence them at will, and God’s raising them afterward overturns the beast’s apparent victory. His emergence from the abyss does not give him authority to change the outcome God has announced.
Revelation 17 returns to the beast’s origin and places his emergence beside his approaching ruin.
But the angel said to me, “Why did you marvel? I will tell you the mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. The beast that you saw was, and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to perdition. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was, and is not, and yet is. “Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to perdition. “The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful.”
Revelation 17:7-14
The beast’s emergence and his ruin belong to the same prophecy: he ascends from the abyss and goes to perdition, or destruction. The kings allied with him give him their authority and join his war against the Lamb, but the Lamb defeats them as Lord of lords and King of kings. I need to keep that outcome in view when reading about the beast’s rise, so the power of evil does not eclipse the victory Christ has already announced.
Satan’s Temporary Prison and the Final Judgment
The beast’s emergence is followed later in Revelation by Satan being shut within the abyss. Chapter 20 gives us a particularly clear reason to distinguish that prison from the Lake of Fire: Satan is released from one before being cast into the other.
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years; and he cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal on him, so that he should deceive the nations no more till the thousand years were finished. But after these things he must be released for a little while. And I saw thrones, and they sat on them, and judgment was committed to them. Then I saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, who had not worshiped the beast or his image, and had not received his mark on their foreheads or on their hands. And they lived and reigned with Christ for a thousand years. But the rest of the dead did not live again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he who has part in the first resurrection. Over such the second death has no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with Him a thousand years. Now when the thousand years have expired, Satan will be released from his prison and will go out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together to battle, whose number is as the sand of the sea. They went up on the breadth of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city. And fire came down from God out of heaven and devoured them. The devil, who deceived them, was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone where the beast and the false prophet are. And they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.
Revelation 20:1-10
The angel who descends from heaven has a key and a great chain, binds Satan, and shuts him in the sealed abyss. John tells us the purpose of that confinement: Satan will no longer deceive the nations until the thousand years are finished. I understand this as a real restraint during Christ’s literal earthly reign. That restraint is still future; it does not describe Satan’s present condition.
When Satan is briefly released at the end of the thousand years, he gathers the nations against the saints and the beloved city. I understand those nations to include mortals born during the kingdom who rebel despite living under Christ’s righteous rule. Fire from God devours the attackers, bringing their rebellion to an end. Satan’s release occurs at the time the prophecy has already appointed and ends in the judgment it has announced; it is no escape from Christ’s authority.
The devil is then cast into the Lake of Fire, where the beast and false prophet already are, and Revelation 20:10 says these three are tormented day and night forever. We have followed Satan from temporary confinement, through a brief release, to final punishment. That order would make no sense if the abyss and the Lake of Fire were merely different names for the same place.
After the millennium and the defeat of this final rebellion, John sees the Great White Throne. The unbelieving dead are raised, and the books are opened for judgment.
Then I saw a great white throne and Him who sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away. And there was found no place for them. And I saw the dead, small and great, standing before God, and books were opened. And another book was opened, which is the Book of Life. And the dead were judged according to their works, by the things which were written in the books. The sea gave up the dead who were in it, and Death and Hades delivered up the dead who were in them. And they were judged, each one according to his works. Then Death and Hades were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death. And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.
Revelation 20:11-15
Death and Hades give up the dead before they are themselves cast into the Lake of Fire, so the terms still describe different roles. For human beings, I understand the Lake of Fire as the second death, the irreversible destruction of both body and soul. Human souls have no inherent immortality, and those finally absent from the Book of Life face this judgment. That rules out universal salvation without making every human being share the endless torment expressly described for the devil, beast, and false prophet.
I believe every person begins written in the Book of Life. Those who finally reject the Messiah are blotted out, while believers remain because Christ’s blood has blotted out their sins. The other books record deeds and sins; they are not simply additional names for the Book of Life. None of this makes the abyss the final destination of the human dead.
What Scripture Reveals and What It Leaves Hidden
The shaft opening, the smoke and beings emerging, and the angel descending with a key and chain concern a real prison and real future events. They do not give us its latitude, measurable depth, or a physical route to it. The Bible does not name a volcano, ocean trench, cave, black hole, or hidden portal as its location, nor does it identify the abyss with the earth’s core.
Prophetic imagery can describe a real event without becoming a geological diagram. The word bottomless does not establish a flat earth, and movement upward or downward does not give an explorer directions. Hostile powers emerge after the shaft is opened, while the angel comes from heaven to bind Satan. Those movements describe acts of judgment and restraint rather than a route people can follow.
That leaves us responsible to test claims about supposed discoveries. A drilling recording, seismic signal, satellite image, or alleged government report cannot acquire biblical authority merely by being attached to this subject. We need evidence for what a recording or image actually shows, and we must not claim that Scripture identifies a location it never names. Fear makes a poor reason to accept a sensational claim.
We also need restraint in what we claim about the beings connected with the abyss. Scripture explains their fear of confinement, the limits on their activity, and the Lamb’s final victory without providing a complete list of inhabitants or identifying every agent entrusted with a key. Secret names and elaborate ranks would add supposed knowledge where God has not given it.
Because these spirits are creatures under authority, we do not need occult knowledge to face spiritual conflict. We must not try to communicate with imprisoned spirits or depend on protective rituals and amulets. We resist the devil by submitting to God, holding to His Word, praying, and living in obedience within the fellowship of the church. Fearful fascination can keep a person occupied with demons while neglecting the obedience Christ actually requires.
Romans 10 directs us to the gospel we can hear and believe without having to journey into the depths. Its Savior is Jesus Christ, the eternal Son who became fully man through the virgin birth without ceasing to be fully God. He lived without sin and willingly offered Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice. Wicked men tortured and crucified Him, while He voluntarily shed His blood and gave His life for our sins. His atonement rests on His perfection and that completed sacrifice through His blood and death, before His burial and bodily resurrection. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus; Father and Son acted in unity. He was truly buried and rose bodily from the dead.
Christ died for the whole world, making His offer of salvation genuine for every person, though people may resist His grace and reject Him. Repentance and faith in Christ bring forgiveness and justification, meaning God declares the believer righteous before Him. The believer is born again, indwelt and sealed by the Holy Spirit, and eternally secure in Christ. That is a real new life, so calling ourselves Christians while continuing in lawlessness cannot establish that we have been born again. Obedience gives evidence of His work; it neither earns nor keeps salvation, and it does not mean we have reached sinless perfection. Belonging to Christ calls us away from occult curiosity and into faithful obedience.
My Final Thoughts
I understand the abyss as a real, temporary prison under Christ’s authority, distinct from Hades and from the final Lake of Fire. Scripture tells us why the powers connected with it cannot act without restraint, even though it does not answer every question we might ask about them. I do not want interest in those powers to draw my attention away from the Lord they fear. Jesus died and rose bodily, and He will reign, judge evil, and make all things new. We can trust Him and obey what He has revealed without inventing what He has left hidden.
In Revelation 9, John identifies Apollyon as the angel who rules over the terrifying beings released from the bottomless pit. He tells us this angel’s name and what he does, but he does not explain his background. I think we need to resist the temptation to fill in those gaps. We can understand Apollyon’s place in the passage without inventing a biography for him, and the judgment itself deserves more attention than some of the speculation surrounding his identity.
The Fifth Trumpet and the Abyss
The fifth trumpet sounds during the future seven-year Tribulation. To understand where it falls in Revelation, we need to follow the judgments that precede it. In chapter 6, the Lamb begins opening the seals of the scroll, and the opening of the seventh seal leads into the trumpet judgments. The first four trumpets strike parts of the earth and sea, the fresh water, and the heavenly lights. An angel then announces three coming woes. The fifth trumpet begins those woes with the opening of the bottomless pit, from which smoke rises and darkens the sun and air. The smoke recalls the plagues and other Old Testament descriptions of judgment.
Then the fifth angel sounded: And I saw a star fallen from heaven to the earth. To him was given the key to the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit, and smoke arose out of the pit like the smoke of a great furnace. So the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit.
Revelation 9:1-2
John describes the star as already fallen when he sees it; he is not watching it fall at that moment. The key is given “to him,” so we are dealing with someone who can receive a key and use it, rather than a piece of rock falling from the sky. Scripture sometimes uses stars to represent angelic beings, which helps explain the description. John does not name this figure, however, and we cannot identify him as Satan or Apollyon merely because he is associated with the abyss.
Whoever this figure is, he has to receive the key before he can open the pit. He is allowed to release its inhabitants as part of this judgment; he has not forced his way in. Earlier in Revelation, Christ has already declared His authority over death:
I am He who lives, and was dead, and behold, I am alive forevermore. Amen. And I have the keys of Hades and of Death.
Revelation 1:18
The One who conquered death has not been overpowered by the beings described in chapter 9. The pit opens because God permits this judgment on a rebellious world, and releasing its inhabitants does not put them beyond His authority. Jesus’ dealings with demons show what His authority over these beings involves.
The bottomless pit, also called the abyss, is a place of confinement. During Jesus’ earthly ministry, the demons in the afflicted man understood that He could send them there. They pleaded with Him:
And they begged Him that He would not command them to go out into the abyss.
Luke 8:31
The demons had been tormenting a man, but they knew they could not prevent Jesus from imprisoning them if He gave that command. Their pleading acknowledged His authority over them. Revelation 20 describes a future confinement in the abyss, after Christ returns, and this time the prisoner is Satan himself:
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key to the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years;
Revelation 20:1-2
Satan will be confined there throughout Christ’s thousand-year reign, unable to deceive the nations. Since an angel can bind him and put him in that prison, we should not imagine that Satan governs the abyss independently of God. The beings released at the fifth trumpet are no more free to disregard God’s commands than Satan will be free to escape his imprisonment.
The Horde and Its Angelic King
John describes the released beings as resembling locusts, but their instructions are the opposite of what we would expect from a locust infestation. They must leave the vegetation alone and direct their attack toward particular people:
They were commanded not to harm the grass of the earth, or any green thing, or any tree, but only those men who do not have the seal of God on their foreheads. And they were not given authority to kill them, but to torment them for five months.
Revelation 9:4-5
I understand these to be supernatural beings, not ordinary insects. They are permitted to inflict dreadful suffering, yet they cannot attack indiscriminately or kill the people they torment. John goes on to explain in Revelation 9:6 that people will want to die but will be unable to do so. We should not let the restrictions make us underestimate that agony. The torment is severe, even though God limits whom these beings may harm and ends their assignment after five months.
The reference to God’s seal takes us back to Revelation 7, where 144,000 servants from Israel’s tribes are sealed before the destructive winds are released. The seal identifies them as His own, and Revelation 9 expressly exempts the sealed from this torment. That does not mean the 144,000 are the only people saved during the Tribulation. Revelation 7 also describes a great multitude from every nation coming out of that terrible period.
As John describes the horde in Revelation 9:7–10, he repeatedly uses the word like. The beings resemble horses prepared for battle, but their faces look human. Their hair is like women’s hair, and their teeth are like lions’ teeth. They wear what look like iron breastplates, and their wings sound like chariots charging into battle. He is using comparisons to describe what he sees, and we need to keep those comparisons together. Selecting one feature because it resembles a modern weapon does not establish that John was describing that machine.
After describing the beings and their attack, John identifies their ruler:
And they had as king over them the angel of the bottomless pit, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, but in Greek he has the name Apollyon.
Revelation 9:11
The Hebrew name Abaddon carries the sense of destruction or ruin. In the Old Testament, the word appears alongside references to death and the grave. Its Greek counterpart, Apollyon, means destroyer. Both names suit the destructive role of the angelic king John identifies over the horde.
The word angel means messenger; it does not, by itself, tell us whether a being is faithful or fallen. John identifies Apollyon as the angel of the abyss without explaining how he came to occupy that position. We also need to distinguish ruling the horde from opening the pit. John names Apollyon as king over the released beings, but he leaves the key-holder unnamed and does not tell us that Apollyon performed that earlier task.
I do not identify Apollyon with Satan either. When Revelation identifies Satan in the later account of his imprisonment, John is explicit:
He laid hold of the dragon, that serpent of old, who is the Devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years;
Revelation 20:2
Here we have the dragon, the serpent of old, the Devil, and Satan all identified as the same being. John makes no corresponding identification between Satan and Apollyon in chapter 9. A connection with the abyss is not enough to supply one.
Apollyon should not be confused with the Angel of the LORD, whom I understand in the relevant Old Testament passages to be the Son appearing before He became human. Such an appearance is called a Christophany. The designation “angel of the bottomless pit” is not the Old Testament title “Angel of the LORD,” and John does not identify Apollyon as the preincarnate Son. The study on angels examines these different beings and their roles more fully.
The Biblical Destroyer Pattern
Other passages describe angels carrying out destruction under God’s direction. Comparing them with Revelation 9 helps us understand how He limits judgment, but doing similar work does not establish that these angels are all Apollyon. At Passover, for example, the LORD protected the houses marked with blood by refusing the destroyer entry:
For the LORD will pass through to strike the Egyptians; and when He sees the blood on the lintel and on the two doorposts, the LORD will pass over the door and not allow the destroyer to come into your houses to strike you.
Exodus 12:23
The destroyer could not enter a house the LORD had determined to spare. Its occupants had been instructed to apply the blood to the doorposts and lintel, and God honored His promise to them. Psalm 78 later recalls the judgments on Egypt in these words:
He cast on them the fierceness of His anger, Wrath, indignation, and trouble, By sending angels of destruction among them.
Psalm 78:49
The psalm describes the plagues as expressions of God’s anger against Egypt, with these angels acting under His direction. His authority to halt destruction is just as clear in the judgment that followed David’s sinful census. When the angel stretched out His hand over Jerusalem, the LORD intervened:
And when the angel stretched out His hand over Jerusalem to destroy it, the LORD relented from the destruction, and said to the angel who was destroying the people, "It is enough; now restrain your hand."
2 Samuel 24:16
The Angel of the LORD restrained His hand at the LORD’s command. The remainder of 2 Samuel 24:16 identifies Him by that title, and I understand Him to be the preincarnate Son, as in the Old Testament appearances discussed earlier. His work of destruction does not make Him Apollyon. We can compare the way God directs and restrains judgment in these passages without assuming He always sends the same angel to carry it out.
The restrictions in Revelation 9 likewise show God determining whom the horde may harm, what it must leave alone, and how long its attack may last. Apollyon rules these beings, but he cannot give them permission to disobey God. This judgment belongs within the larger sequence in which the Lamb opens the seals, the trumpets sound, and the bowls are poured out under divine direction. Christ will defeat the beast at His return; Satan’s confinement, eventual release, and final judgment will also occur at the appointed times. The study on The End Times Timeline follows those events in order.
We should not find these judgments less serious because God controls them. They are deliberate judgments against people who persist in idolatry, blasphemy, bloodshed, and deception. Later in the same chapter, Revelation 9:20–21 describes the survivors of the plagues still refusing to repent. Severe suffering does not automatically make someone willing to turn from sin; people can endure terrible consequences and remain defiant toward God. That is a sobering warning for anyone who assumes there will always be another opportunity to put things right.
The Gospel Warning in the Destroyer Pattern
The warning about repentance brings us back to the provision God made at Passover. He spared the households marked with the lamb’s blood because He honored His promise, not because the people inside were naturally better than the Egyptians. God provided a substitute and instructed the families to apply its blood to their doorways. Having obeyed, they could trust His promise when the destroyer passed through Egypt. Their deliverance helps us understand why sinners need Christ.
Jesus is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. He was without sin and willingly gave Himself to be slain as the perfect sacrifice for us. Wicked people inflicted the torture and death He endured while bearing our sins in His innocent body and shedding His blood for us. His saving sacrifice was completed through His blood and death; after His burial, He rose bodily from the grave. The Father did not punish, curse, abandon, strike, bruise, or pour wrath on Jesus.
Christ died for the sins of the whole world, so the offer of salvation is genuine for every person. People can resist God’s grace and reject the Savior, but everyone who repents and believes in Him is forgiven and born again. If I can explain every detail of the fifth trumpet but have never received Christ, my knowledge of prophecy will not save me. I need the forgiveness He provides just as much as the person who has never opened the book of Revelation.
Those who belong to Christ also need to understand the protection promised in Revelation 9. God exempts people with His seal from this particular torment. He has not promised that every believer in every age will escape suffering. Christ will gather His church before the Tribulation judgments begin, but people who come to faith during that period will face fierce persecution. They may suffer terribly without ceasing to belong to Him, and their enemies cannot overturn His promise to raise them from the dead.
Everyone who is genuinely born again becomes a new creation. The Holy Spirit lives in that person and seals him, so his eternal life is secure in Christ. Obedience is evidence of that new life, not a way to earn or keep salvation. A believer still needs correction and growth, but that is different from refusing to turn from sin. If I refuse and merely call myself a Christian, my claim gives me no reason to assume that I have been born again. Our assurance rests in Christ and gives us reason to obey Him through hardship, rather than assume faith will keep trouble away.
Revelation also describes what awaits those who finally reject Christ. After the Tribulation and the thousand-year reign, the remaining dead will be raised to stand before the Great White Throne. There John records:
And anyone not found written in the Book of Life was cast into the lake of fire.
Revelation 20:15
Every person begins written in the Book of Life. Those who finally reject the Messiah are blotted out, while believers remain because their sins have been blotted out through Christ’s blood. The other books opened at this judgment record people’s deeds and sins. Anyone absent from the Book of Life is cast into the lake of fire, which Revelation calls the second death. For human beings, this is the final, irreversible destruction of body and soul. There will be no further opportunity for salvation, and it is not a life of endless conscious torment.
My Final Thoughts
I understand Apollyon to be the angelic king John names over the horde from the abyss. I do not identify him as Satan, the unnamed key-holder, or the Angel of the LORD. John gives us enough to understand his destructive assignment without answering every question about his background. We should be willing to stop where the explanation stops instead of treating conjecture as something Scripture has established.
When I teach about these judgments, I need to remember that the people being warned are people who need the same mercy I need. There is no excuse for sounding pleased about the suffering of unbelievers or acting as though knowing prophecy makes us superior to them. God has provided forgiveness through His Son. We should speak frankly about judgment and urge people to receive Christ while they can.
