The Seven Thunders

The Book of Revelation, chapter ten, brings us one of the most frustrating passages in the history of Christendom. Frustrating because it is the opposite of a spoiler, and not really a cliff-hanger because there will be no next episode or sequel to scripture that will play out the mystery that is The Seven Thunders.

In short, in a sort of interlude between the Sixth Trumpet and the Seventh, John is carried away in a vision to a shore where he encounters a mighty angel. We know this is an angel and not, as some think, Jesus, because of John’s use of the word ‘alos‘ in the Greek concerning “another” angel. ‘Alos‘ meaning, “another of the same kind.” Another like the angels he had already been seeing. Had this one been different, John would have used the word for ‘heteros,’ “another of a different kind.”

This mighty angel calls out with a loud voice like a lion roaring and in reply seven thunders reply from heaven. Apparently John is in a waking vision because he is about to write down what the seven thunders “have said,” but told, “do not write it down,” resulting in one of the more confounding mysteries ever. Clearly, the thunders were proclamations of a sort from heaven, seven of them, because the wording in the text is that the seven thunders “said.”

Mind if I interject something right here? I mean, I never noticed before (not in this context) but it seems to me that later, after all the context, visions and experiences of John, he was, at the end of the book, granted permission to not seal the book. Take a look at Revelation 22:10

10 And he said to me, “Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is at hand.”

I just think that’s interesting. Does that include the thunders? Might the content of the thunders be exposed within the following chapters after all? If we are to believe what “the prophets” have said who spoke before, I humbly submit it is possible. Let’s take a look.

We have precedence that the Seven Thunders were something that was “said” elsewhere in scripture. Often thunder is associated with the voice of God in association with judgement (see 1 Samuel 2:10; 2 Samuel 22:14). In Psalm 18:13 “The Lord thundered from heaven; the voice of the Most High resounded.” In Exodus 19:19 God answered Moses in thunder. Job 37:4-5 tells us God thunders with His majestic voice, while in 40:9 the question is posed, “…can you thunder with a voice like His?”

Jesus, in John 12:28-31 we read,

“Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” 29 The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” 30 Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not mine. 31 Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out.”

And then also within this same Book of Revelation 6:1; 14:2 and 19:6 we also read the voice of God as mighty peals of thunder.

This is what John experiences in Revelation 10. And we do not get to find out? That certainly is the conclusion of virtually every great scholar, commentary, preacher and Bible teacher for the last nearly 2,000 years.

But not so fast!

Do we have any hint; the faintest clue at all in the text? In my humble opinion we just may. Let’s take a look. First, this sealing up and not writing appears to be temporary. Look at Revelation 22:10 where we read:

And he said to me, “Do not seal the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is at hand.

Thus it would appear John was not permitted to write down the words only until God was finished revealing all that was to come in the events of Revelation. Then, the message being completed, John is free to write the entire book that we now have. Let us take a look at some more clues.

Clue Number One: The time frame within Revelation.

Within the broad outline of the book, when we get to the events that encompass the seven year Tribulation Week we read in concert with Daniel’s prophecies a clear demarcation at “the middle of the week” as Gabriel called it. In Jesus’s Olivet Discourse he describes this second half as particularly troublesome, in his words, the worse ever since before that time, and worse than anything after. By the way, this is how we can conclude these events have not yet occurred, such as in 70 A.D., and are yet future. Because if the Great Tribulation happened in 70 A.D. Jesus either was in error, or a liar, because both World Wars at the very least were far worse in scope of destruction and death than anything up to that point. Therefore, believing Jesus, we see these events as yet future. Also, were these events in 70 A.D. we have another problem. Jesus said, “Immediately after” those events would be the sign of the Son of Man coming in the clouds. Clearly, the Second Coming was not in 70 A.D. I looked up the word “immediately” in the original Koine Greek and do you know what it means? It means “immediately.”

So this Tribulation Week that Gabriel described to Daniel commences beginning in Revelation 6 with the Lamb of God opening the Seals Wrath (described as wrath within the chapter) the Seventh Seal kicks off the Seven Trumpet Judgments, the Seventh Trumpet heralding the Seven most fierce of the judgments known as the Bowls, culminating the wrath of God into chapter 19 as the events build and build as both Jesus and Paul described, as a woman in labor. Birth pangs build and build in intensity with contractions growing closer together as well. For instance, in the Seals, a fourth of the earth is destroyed. With the Trumpets, another one third is destroyed, etc.

Anyway, so we find ourselves in Revelation 10 at this interlude. By the way, there are also Three Woes poured out by angels, and so far one Woe has passed and there remain two more to follow. The placement of the Seven Thunders comes at a place just at the precipice of the midpoint, right before the Great Tribulation of the second half.

Clue Number Two: The angelic proclamation confirms the timing.

5 And the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land raised his right hand to heaven 6 and swore by him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and what is in it, the earth and what is in it, and the sea and what is in it, that there would be no more delay. (Revelation 10)

As we can see, the angel proclaims that there will be no more delay in the carrying out of the final judgment upon an unbelieving world.

Clue Number Three: The Thunders have been proclaimed before.

I would like to draw your attention to this enigmatic phrase at the end of the next verse (verse seven):

…but that in the days of the trumpet call to be sounded by the seventh angel, the mystery of God would be fulfilled, just as he announced to his servants the prophets.

Evidently, whatever was proclaimed in the Seven Thunders has already been said before to the prophets in the Old Testament! Therefore, the thorough Bible student already knows what is contained within this mystery of the Seven Thunders without even realizing it.

Clue Number Four: John’s vision immediately precedes Antichrist; so does Daniel’s

That’s right. And you we are all familiar with it. First, let’s look at what John describes visually:

Then I saw another mighty angel coming down from heaven, wrapped in a cloud, with a rainbow over his head, and his face was like the sun, and his legs like pillars of fire. 2 He had a little scroll open in his hand. And he set his right foot on the sea, and his left foot on the land… (v. 1, 2)

…And the angel whom I saw standing on the sea and on the land raised his right hand to heaven and swore by him who lives forever and ever, who created heaven and what is in it, the earth and what is in it, and the sea and what is in it, that there would be no more delay (v. 5, 6)

Now, in Daniel 8 he has a vision. God gives Daniel a vision in the form of a ram and a goat, there are horns that signify particular rulers, future to Daniel, but great empires in our past that did happen. We will dispense with belaboring world history, save for one. The last portion Daniel sees concerns the wicked Antiochus known as the Abomination that makes Desolate, or, the Abomination of Desolation. Antiochus, you will recall, went into the temple and slaughtered a pig on the alter. He also erected a statue of Zeus for worship. None of this ended well, but end it did, historically.

What does this have to do with the future? It has been noted that prophecy tends to happen in echoes. There will be a near fulfillment, as with this one, and then an ultimate and complete fulfillment in the future. There are many such examples. A couple hundred years after Antiochus desecrated the temple Jesus in Matthew 24 said:

15 “So when you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by the prophet Daniel, standing in the holy place (let the reader understand), 16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains… 21 For then there will be great tribulation, such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, no, and never will be.

Note again this describes an event that is future to Christ and, as previously noted, future to us as well because the worst time in history so far has not exceeded the World Wars. But the point here is, Antiochus is a type of Antichrist. Consider (aside from what we read in Revelation 13-14) 2 Thessalonians chapter two:

3 Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, 4 who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God…

8 And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. 9 The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, 10 and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. (2 Thessalonians 2:3, 4, 8-10)

Point being, both John’s and Daniel’s vision concern the exact same pivotal point in future history that finds its fulfillment in Revelation at the Great Tribulation in the middle of the week (13 and 14).

Clue Five: The Similar Setting and Delivery Between John And Daniel.

Daniel does not yet understand the Goat, the Ram and the Horns and verse Daniel 8:15 says, “I sought to understand it.” The next thing Daniel knows he is seeing one who looked like a man and he hears a voice of a man while he is on the banks of the Ulai. What does Daniel hear? “Gabriel, explain the vision to this man (v. 16). Daniel is frightened, falls on his face but Gabriel tells his concerning the vision, not that it concerns his near future, as did happen in the foreshadow echo, but says, “Son of man, understand that the vision pertains to the time of the end.” Now, you could say Gabriel speaks of the end of this string of kingdoms. Well, that’s fine, because the final earthly kingdom is Antichrists, so we still find ourselves at “the time of the end.”

As further confirmation, the angel stands frightened Daniel up, in verse 19 Gabriel says:

“Behold, I am going to inform you of what will occur at the final period of the indignation, because it pertains to the appointed time of the end.

Gabriel then explains the vision to Daniel regarding the primary kingdom influences that lead to Antichrist.

Now here is a strange thing. Tell me what is wrong with this picture, because, similar to how John was told, “Do not write that down,” Gabriel (perhaps the same angel John saw) says to Daniel:

“…But as for you, keep the vision secret, Because it pertains to many days in the future.” (Daniel 8:26b)

Okay… It is difficult to comprehend how recording these events in the Book of Daniel is keeping the vision secret. Can we agree? At some point Daniel must have gotten permission from God to record the vision, then hide the book away for a later time and not blab about it. Keep it a secret means, to hold it close to the vest. For a little fun, take a look where it seems Daniel was revisited to a very similar setting in chapter 12! No seven sayings, but the setting is shockingly similar. It reads almost like Daniel might be back in the distance a bit watching maybe John quizzing that angel, the man in white linen, in the same way. I say angel because he is swearing by Heaven. I really do not recall that as a thing man is permitted to do (in fact commanded not to do). Besides, we know angels often appear as men… even if wearing a glory cloud and standing “over” water. But I digress…

HOWEVER, especially as the setting is similar, angel on the shore and receiving a vision concerning the time of the end, the Seven Thunders have an extremely high probability of being about what is coming up in the remaining 3.5 years of human history on this earth during the final earthly kingdom belonging to Antichrist.

Clue Six: Gabriel’s Heavenly Proclamation.

Out of curiosity I proceeded to count the things said by Gabriel to Daniel. The ESV breaks these things into ten sentences. The NLT and the NIV put them in English into eleven sentences. Admittedly, the correct way to check is in the original text. Having an English translation of the Septuagint handy, we see Gabriel’s proclamations are in seven sentences. That’s still not good enough, so let us take a look at a Hebrew Interlinear Bible. In the original Hebrew, the proclamations from Daniel come in seven sentences. It comes across that way in the KJV and the NASB and others as well.

Therefore, as John at this point in Revelation has only 3.5 years remaining in the Tribulation Week, both John and Daniel write concerning the Antichrist here, from their visions delivered by mighty angels, it may be a reasonably safe assumption to conclude that because John was told the sayings had already been given to the prophets, that what the prophet Daniel recorded in exactly seven sentences, or proclamations, from Gabriel are at the least, the very same message content and subject matter, even if not word-for-word the same as Daniel received. Certainly it could have been an even greater elaboration on Daniel’s vision within the Seven Thunders.

From the Septuagint (Breton’s English) and the Hebrew agrees…

In the Hebrew, each verse is a sentence; SEVEN of them!

It is all about the Great Tribulation, which coincides with what John was told was about to begin in Revelation 10, the middle of the book.

Dan 8:27 And I Daniel fell asleep, and was sick: then I arose, and did the king’s business; and I wondered at the vision, and there was none that understood it.

Daniel was told by Gabriel to seal things up till the end. Maybe this is the gist of what the Seven Thunders were about. The events about to commence concerning Antichrist in the middle of the week of years, either in the form of a restatement, or even greater elaboration.