King James Version · Under Rome
Revelation 9
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And the fifth sounded, and I saw a star fall from unto the earth: and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit. And he opened the bottomless pit; and there arose a smoke out of , as the smoke of a great furnace; and the sun and the air were darkened by reason of the smoke of . And there came out of the smoke upon the earth: and unto them was given , as the scorpions of the earth have . And it was commanded them that they should not hurt the grass of the earth, neither any green thing, neither any tree; but only those men which have not the seal of in their foreheads. And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man. And in those days shall men seek , and shall not find it; and shall to , and shall flee from them. And the shapes of the were like unto horses prepared unto battle; and on their heads were as it were like gold, and their faces were as the faces of men. And they had hair as the hair of women, and their teeth were as the teeth of lions. And they had breastplates, as it were breastplates of iron; and the sound of their was as the sound of chariots of many horses running to battle. And they had tails like unto scorpions, and there were stings in their tails: and their was to hurt men five months. And they had a king over them, which is of the bottomless pit, whose name in the is , but in the hath his name . One woe is past; and, behold, there come two woes more hereafter. And the sixth sounded, and I heard a voice from the four of the golden which is before , Saying to the sixth which had the , Loose the four which are bound in the great river . And the four were loosed, which were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year, for to the third part of men. And the number of the army of the horsemen were two hundred thousand thousand: and I heard the number of them. And thus I saw the horses in the , and them that sat on them, having breastplates of , and of jacinth, and brimstone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths issued and smoke and brimstone. By these three was the third part of men killed, by the , and by the smoke, and by the brimstone, which issued out of their mouths. For their is in their , and in their tails: for their tails were like unto , and had heads, and with them they do hurt. And the rest of the men which were not killed by these plagues yet not of the works of their hands, that they should not devils, and idols of gold, and silver, and brass, and stone, and of wood: which neither can see, nor hear, nor walk: Neither they of their murders, nor of their sorceries, nor of their fornication, nor of their thefts.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Under Rome, 63 BC to AD 100 ›
Judea as a client kingdom and then a province. Roads, garrisons, taxes, crucifixion, and a common Greek language that let a message travel the empire faster than any before it.
- Rome
- The republic tears itself apart in civil war and comes out as an empire under Augustus. What follows is two centuries of relative peace across the whole Mediterranean, enforced by legions and paid for by taxes, with safe roads and safe sea lanes. Every one of Paul's journeys depends on that.
- Judea
- Governed first through Herod the Great, a client king of enormous ability and enormous brutality who rebuilds the temple into one of the wonders of the ancient world, then directly by Roman prefects. Crucifixion is the standard penalty for sedition and is used often and publicly.
- The wider world
- Greek is spoken from Spain to Syria, which means a letter written in Corinth can be read in Rome without translation. Jewish communities already exist in most major cities, which is where the first Christian preaching lands. Mystery religions, imperial cult, and philosophy all compete in the same marketplace.
- Further afield
- The Han dynasty rules China and trades silk westward along routes that touch the Roman world at second hand. In Britain the Roman conquest begins within a decade of the crucifixion.