to open up (literally or figuratively · verb — second aorist active indicative, 3rd person singular
fourth
τετάρτην,tetartēn
G5067
fourth · adjective — accusative singular feminine
seal
σφραγῖδαsphragida
G4973
a signet (as fencing in or protecting from misappropria… · noun — accusative singular feminine
heard
ἤκουσαēkousa
G191
to hear (in various senses) · verb — aorist active indicative, 1st person singular
voice
φωνὴνphōnēn
G5456
a tone (articulate · noun — accusative singular feminine
fourth
τετάρτουtetartou
G5067
fourth · adjective — genitive singular neuter
beast
ζῴουzōou
G2226
a live thing · noun — genitive singular neuter
say
λέγοντος·legontos
G3004
properly · verb — present active participle, genitive singular neuter
Come
ἔρχουerchou
G2064
to come or go (in a great variety of applications · verb — present middle or passive deponent imperative, 2nd person singular
and
καὶkai
G2532
and · conjunction
see
βλέπε.blepe
G991
to look at (literally or figuratively) · verb — present active imperative, 2nd person singular
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references
Revelation 4:7 And the first beast was like a lion, and the second beast like a calf, and the third beast had a face as a man, and the fourth beast was lik…
Revelation 6:3 And when he had opened the second seal, I heard the second beast say, Come and see.
Revelation 6:1 And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.
Revelation 6:5 And when he had opened the third seal, I heard the third beast say, Come and see. And I beheld, and lo a black horse; and he that sat on him…
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
Commentary
Matthew Henry on Revelation 6:3-8
The next three seals give us a sad prospect of great and desolating judgments with which God punishes those who either refuse or abuse the everlasting gospel. Though some understand them of the persecutions that befell the church of Christ, and others of the destruction of the Jews, they rather seem more generally to represent God's terrible judgments, by which he avenges the quarrel of his covenant upon those who make light of it.
I. Upon opening the second seal, to which John was called to attend, another horse appears, of a different colour from the former, a red horse, Rev 6:4. This signifies the desolating judgment of war; he that sat upon this red horse had power to take peace from the…
and see--supported by B; omitted by A, C, and Vulgate. The fourth living creature, who was "like a flying eagle," introduces this seal; implying high-soaring intelligence, and judgment descending from on high fatally on the ungodly, as the king of birds on his prey.
Adam Clarke on Revelation 6:7
The fourth beast - That which had the face of an eagle.
John Gill on Revelation 6:7
And when he had opened the fourth seal,.... Of the seven seals of the sealed book; that is, when the Lamb had opened it, or took it off, as in Revelation 6:1;
I heard the voice of the fourth beast say, come and see; this living creature was that which was like an eagle, and was on the north side of the throne, answerable to the standard of Dan, which was on the north of the camp of Israel, and had the figure of an eagle upon it; and the opening of this seal begins with Maximinus the Roman emperor, who came from Thrace, far north. This living creature was not James, the brother of our Lord, who had been dead long ago, as Grotius imagines; nor Cyprian, as Brightman thinks, though he lived und…
The soaring flight and the swiftness upon its prey of the fourth living creature, namely, the eagle, suggests those plagues that come from above, from the divine wrath for the vindication of the pious and for the punishment of the impious, unless these should turn from their sins through improvement.
"And when He had opened the fourth seal, I heard the fourth living creature saying, Come and see. And, lo, a pale horse; and he who sate upon him was named Death." For the pale horse and he who sate upon him bore the name of Death. These same things also the Lord had promised among the rest of the coming destructions-great pestilences and deaths; since, moreover, he says:- "And hell followed him." That is, it was waiting for the devouring of many unrighteous souls. This is the pale horse.
And when he had opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature, saying: Come, and see. And behold a pale horse, and he that sat upon him, his name was Death, and hell followed him. The people represented by the pale horse are the same as those represented by the red horse, their spiritual death being now symbolized by the pallor of the horse. It is right to say that death, that is the Devil intending to fight against the living, sits on them, because he seeks to extinguish the lives of the elect by the agency of those he has already killed spiritually. Hell means those in whom death dwells. Therefore hell follows death, because the wicked imitate the Devil. We may also understand by the pale horse the heretics specifically. And power was given to him over the four parts of the earth, to kill with sword, with famine, and with death, and with the beasts of the earth. There are two parts in this world, namely Christ's and the Devil's; but Christ's part is not divided, according to this: One is my dove; [Song 6:8] whereas the Devil's part is divided into four parts: pagans, Jews, heretics, and bad Catholics. Therefore there are as many plagues as there are parts of the Devil. It has already been explained how he kills with sword, with famine, and with death. As for the beasts, by them are represented ungoverned pulsions. So our enemy kills the souls of the reprobates with beasts because when fleshly pulsions are not restrained by the cages of the divine commandments, they are made wild, so to speak, by the impulse of diabolic incitement, and hurl the lives of the wretched down every precipice.
Dictionary and topics
Famine · Sent as a — Sent as a
Horse · SYMBOLI — SYMBOLI
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
Tyndale Open Study Notes on Revelation 6:7-8
With the fourth seal comes a ghastly looking horse. In the ancient world, pale green was the color for depicting a corpse. • the Grave: Greek Hades. In Greek thought, Hades was the underworld abode of bodiless beings. The Hebrew idea of Sheol, the place of the dead (1 Sam 28:15), was similar. • The killing of one-fourth of those on earth indicates that the final judgment has not yet arrived (contrast Rev 6:16-17). • This fourfold set of woes (sword and famine and disease and wild animals; cp. Ezek 14:21) summarizes the tragedies of earthly existence. The world cannot offer hope to humanity.
