14 one saying to the sixth angel who had the trumpet , "Release the four angels who are bound at the great river Euphrates ." 15 And the four angels , who had been prepared for the hour and day and month and year , were released , so that they would kill a third of mankind . 16 The number of the armies of the horsemen was two e hundred e million e ; I heard the number of them. 17 And this is how I saw in the vision the horses and those who sat on them: the riders had breastplates the color of fire and of hyacinth and of brimstone ; and the heads of the horses are like the heads of lions ; and out of their mouths proceed fire and smoke and brimstone . 18 A third of mankind was killed by these three plagues , by the fire and the smoke and the brimstone which proceeded out of their mouths . 19 For the power of the horses is in their mouths and in their tails ; for their tails are like serpents and have heads , and with them they do harm . 20 The rest of mankind , who were not killed by these plagues , did not repent of the works of their hands , so as not to worship demons , and the idols of gold and of silver and of brass and of stone and of wood , which can neither see nor hear nor walk ; 21 and they did not repent of their murders nor of their sorceries nor of their immorality nor of their thefts .
Matthew Henry's Commentary on Revelation 9:14-21
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.