13 And at the sounding of the sixth angel a voice came to my ears from the horns of the gold altar which is before God, 14 Saying to the sixth angel who had the horn, Make free the four angels who are chained at the great river Euphrates. 15 And the four angels were made free, who were ready for the hour and day and month and year, that they might put to death a third part of men. 16 And the number of the armies of the horsemen was twice ten thousand times ten thousand: the number of them came to my ears. 17 And so I saw the horses in the vision, and those who were seated on them, having breastplates of fire and glass and of burning stone: and the heads of the horses were as the heads of lions; and out of their mouths came fire and smoke and a smell of burning. 18 By these evils a third part of men was put to death, by the fire, and the smoke, and the burning smell which came out of their mouths. 19 For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails: because their tails are like snakes, and have heads, and with them they give wounds. 20 And the rest of the people, who were not put to death by these evils, were not turned from the works of their hands, but went on giving worship to evil spirits, and images of gold and silver and brass and stone and wood which have no power of seeing or hearing or walking: 21 And they had no regret for putting men to death, or for their use of secret arts, or for the evil desires of the flesh, or for taking the property of others.
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Revelation 9:13-21
Commentary on Revelation 9:13-21
(Read Revelation 9:13-21)
The sixth angel sounded, and here the power of the Turks seems the subject. Their time is limited. They not only slew in war, but brought a poisonous and ruinous religion. The antichristian generation repented not under these dreadful judgments. From this sixth trumpet learn that God can make one enemy of the church a scourge and a plague to another. The idolatry in the remains of the eastern church and elsewhere, and the sins of professed Christians, render this prophecy and its fulfilment more wonderful. And the attentive reader of Scripture and history, may find his faith and hope strengthened by events, which in other respects fill his heart with anguish and his eyes with tears, while he sees that men who escape these plagues, repent not of their evil works, but go on with idolatries, wickedness, and cruelty, till wrath comes upon them to the utmost.