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Apocalipsis 8

VBL · Chapter 8/22

1Cuando abrió el séptimo sello, hubo silencio en el cielo como por media hora.

2Y vi a los siete ángeles que están delante de Dios. A ellos se les dieron siete trompetas.

3Entonces vino otro ángel y se puso en pie en el altar. Tenía un incensario de oro y se le dio una gran cantidad de incienso para añadirlo a las oraciones de todos los santos sobre el altar de oro que está frente al trono.

4Y de la mano del ángel, el humo del incienso subía junto a las oraciones de los santos ante Dios.

5Entonces el ángel tomó el incensario y lo llenó con fuego del altar, y lo lanzó sobre la tierra; y se oyó el sonido de un trueno, con rayos y relámpagos, y un gran terremoto.

6Entonces los siete ángeles que sostenían las siete trompetas se prepararon para hacerlas sonar.

7Y el primer ángel hizo sonar su trompeta. Y llovía fuego y granizo mezclado con sangre sobre la tierra. Una tercera parte de la tierra se quemó, y una tercera parte de los árboles se quemó también.

8Y el segundo ángel hizo sonar su trompeta. Y sucedió que algo semejante a una gran montaña de fuego ardiente fue lanzada al mar. Y una tercera parte del mar se convirtió en sangre,

9y una tercera parte de las criaturas que vivían en el mar murieron, y una tercera parte de las embarcaciones quedaron destruidas.

10Entonces el tercer ángel hizo sonar su trompeta. Y una gran estrella cayó del cielo, brillando con mucho esplendor. Y cayó sobre una tercera parte de los ríos y fuentes de agua.

11Y el nombre de la estrella es Ajenjo, y una tercera parte del agua se volvió amarga, y muchas personas murieron al beber de esa agua porque se había vuelto venenosa.

12El cuarto ángel hizo sonar su trompeta, y fueron heridas una tercera parte del sol, la luna y las estrellas, de modo que una tercera parte de ellos quedaron en oscuridad, y una tercera parte del día no tendría luz, igual que una tercera parte de la noche.

13Entonces vi y escuché a un águila que volaba en medio del cielo y gritaba a gran voz: “Desastre, desastre, desastre viene sobre los habitantes de la tierra por lo que sucederá cuando los últimos tres ángeles hagan sonar sus trompetas”.

📖 Chapter study

Summary

The Lamb opens the seventh and final seal, causing silence in heaven, followed by the start of seven judgment trumpets sounded by angels. The first four trumpets bring plagues affecting the earth, the sea, the rivers, and the heavenly bodies, recalling the plagues of Egypt.

Explanation

The silence in heaven for 'about half an hour' before the trumpets begin creates a moment of solemn suspense, perhaps representing reverence before the weight of what is about to come. The plagues described — hail mixed with fire, a burning 'mountain' cast into the sea, a star called Wormwood poisoning the waters, a partial darkening of the heavenly bodies — deliberately echo the plagues of Egypt in Exodus 7-10, placing these judgments within the tradition of God confronting oppressive powers to set his people free. It is important to note that these plagues strike only a fraction ('a third'), suggesting partial and still-reversible judgments, unlike total destruction. Today's application is to recognize that apocalyptic language uses dramatic imagery to convey the seriousness of divine judgment on injustice, rather than aiming to calculate specific, literal future events.

Fun facts

  • The name of the star 'Wormwood' (Apsinthos, in Greek) given to the plague of the third trumpet (8:11) is the same word used for the bitter plant used to make the drink absinthe, famous for its extremely bitter taste, used here as a symbol of bitterness and suffering.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Apocalipsis 8:1After the tension of the seventh seal, this silence works as a dramatic pause in the narrative, before the seven trumpets begin - many read it as heaven itself holding its breath, in reverence or expectation, before what comes next.
  2. Apocalipsis 8:2After the silence of the previous verse, the scene starts up again with seven angels receiving seven trumpets, beginning a new cycle of seven plagues, similar in structure to that of the seven seals.
  3. Apocalipsis 8:3An angel appears at the altar with a golden censer, receiving incense to offer together with the prayers of the saints - the same link between incense and prayer already explained back in chapter 5.
  4. Apocalipsis 8:4The smoke of the incense rising up to God is the visual image of how these prayers reach the divine presence, reinforcing the symbolism already established earlier.
  5. Apocalipsis 8:5The same censer that had carried prayers is now used in reverse, filled with fire from the altar and cast onto the earth, causing thunderings and an earthquake - as if the prayers of the persecuted set off the response of judgment that comes next.
  6. Apocalipsis 8:6This describes the moment of preparation before the actual start of the seven plagues announced by the trumpets.
  7. Apocalipsis 8:7This image directly echoes one of the plagues of Egypt, in Exodus: hail and fire falling upon the earth. The book reuses the memory of that ancient story to describe the trumpet plagues as an echo of what God had already done before.
  8. Apocalipsis 8:8The second trumpet brings something like a great mountain burning with fire cast into the sea, and a third of the sea turns to blood - an image that echoes the plague of Egypt in which the Nile River was turned to blood, in Exodus.
  9. Apocalipsis 8:9This continues describing the effects of the second trumpet: mass destruction of marine life and of ships, a direct blow to the trade and fishing that sustained much of the economy of the time.
  10. Apocalipsis 8:10The name of this star, in Greek, is literally the name of a bitter plant used as medicine at the time. That is exactly the point of the image: the star turns fresh water into something bitter and unfit to drink.
  11. Apocalipsis 8:11The star is given the name of a bitter plant used as medicine in antiquity; the name itself already announces the effect - making the water unfit to drink and causing deaths because of it.
  12. Apocalipsis 8:12The phrase ‘the third part’ appears several times in the trumpet plagues - unlike the language of totality used elsewhere in the book, this number marks that it is still a partial blow, not the definitive end.
  13. Apocalipsis 8:13An eagle flying overhead announces three “woes” that are still to come, tied to the last three trumpets - a warning that the worst was still to happen.

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