Revelation 9:14; Loose the Four Angels Bound

Revelation 9:14 Saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, Loose the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates. 

The text reveals that when the four angels are released at the great river Euphrates, all hell breaks loose in a worldwide war.

This sixth judgment will be sharp and overwhelming “a third of mankind” will be slain. Under the third seal a fourth part was slain (Revelation 6:8), and now a third of the remaining three-fourths are slain. What a bloodbath awaits the inhabitants of all the territory associated with the Euphrates! [Herbert Lockyer, All About the Second Coming – The Drama of the Ages, 79]

In Old Testament times, God used this river figuratively to overrun the land of his people with their enemies (Isa. 8:7–8). The river was a symbol of the destructive onrush of the Assyrians to execute divine judgments upon Israel.

Isaiah 8:7-8 Now therefore, behold, the Lord bringeth up upon them the waters of the river, strong and many, even the king of Assyria, and all his glory: and he shall come up over all his channels, and go over all his banks: And he shall pass through Judah; he shall overflow and go over, he shall reach even to the neck; and the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of thy land, O Immanuel. 

As used by John, this same river is the site of God’s judgment on the unsaved world, although the destruction is limited to “the third part.” The Euphrates was where human sin began and where Satan held dominion for so long. Now it endures divine scourge (Revelation 9:14; 16:12). [Herbert Lockyer, All About the Second Coming – The Drama of the Ages, 79]

There is a definite article attached to the four angels identifying them specifically although Scripture does not furnished of these angels. In Revelation 7:1 it is mentioned the four angels at the four corners of the earth, those were different ones as they were not bound. Walvoord observed insightfully, “Good angels are never bound.”

2 Peter 2:4 For if God spared not the angels that sinned, but cast them down to hell, and delivered them into chains of darkness, to be reserved unto judgment; 

Jude 6 And the angels which kept not their first estate, but left their own habitation, he hath reserved in everlasting chains under darkness unto the judgment of the great day. 

These angels served as leaders of the in invading host. [Beckwith]

He now commands the sixth angel to set free the four angels which have been bound and thus rendered unable to stop the march of the gospel (Matt. 24:14).

Matthew 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

When the moment comes for their release, evil forces are loosed against a world that has forsaken God and His Word. We can be sure that the forces of the Antichrist are also pitted against the citizens of the kingdom of heaven, even though they bear God’s seal and receive His spiritual protection (v4–5).

Jesus said that if the days of great distress were not shortened, no one would survive or “no flesh be saved”. But “but for the elect’s sake those days shall be shortened.” (Matt. 24:22).

The passive construction of the verb loose or to set free means that God is the agent who commands the release of these four angels. The number four signifies worldwide impact, as is evident from the destruction that these angels induce: a third part of the world’s population perishes. This is a picture of a war that encompasses the entire world as it faces God’s judgment. All along God had kept in check the forces of global destruction of humanity, albeit he had sent calamities on a third of the earth, trees, the creatures of the sea, the ships, the waters, and the heavenly bodies (8:7–12). He also increases the intensity of his judgments. Following the opening of the fourth seal, Death and Hades are given “authority over the fourth part of the earth to kill with a sword, and famine, and disease, and by the wild beasts of the earth” (6:8, emphasis added). But now we read that a third part of the earth’s population is slain. To be precise, after the plagues that affect a third of creation, God releases a plague on ungodly people. This scourge is so severe that these people long to die but cannot because death slips away from them. Then as a result of the next plague, a third of mankind perishes.

Kistemaker, S. J., & Hendriksen, W. (1953–2001). Exposition of the Book of Revelation (Vol. 20, p. 296). Grand Rapids: Baker Book House.