The four angels by the great river Euphrates

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

9:15. And the four angels were loosed, who were prepared for an hour, and a day, and a month, and a year: for to kill the third part of men.

The main message of the apocalypse is this: If this happens first prepare for that to happen next. Usually the “this” is a smaller or an array of smaller events that lead to a major catastrophe in which people in large numbers would have to leave their bodies and hand their souls to the maker. With the word “prepare” I don’t only mean psychologically, mentally, but also religiously – change your ways, get closer to God, baptize yourself and avoid heavy sins - .

The major event in chapter 9 is the world war 3 (verses 16-19) in which one third of the population will die. To realize where we are standing in connection to this major catastrophe St John the apostle informs us of two less deadly events: A smaller desert war we described earlier (chap.9 verses :3-12) and the release of the fourth angels by the Euphrates river. (chap.9 verses: 14-15)

How could the four angels stand there tied up? The general notion of angels is that an angel is a bodiless servant of God who doesn’t live on earth and occasionally is sent as a messenger to humans or as a guardian to protect them from demons. But those four don’t seem to fit to this image. They in our opinion are not servants of God. Here is our explanation: The word angel comes from the Greek word ἄγγελος (angelos) "messenger". (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angel)  which in itself derives from the verb (agelo) “to announce”, “to declare”- to have an opinion or a message and to announce it, to declare, or to warn (Basic Dictionary of Ancient Greek, GUTENBERG PUBLICATIONS, Athenes Sep. 1995). So an angel is not always a messenger of God. An angel could also be a King, a President, a nation, a state with an opinion or message about to announce it or declare it.  This message could be a declaration of war.

In our opinion these four angels bound in the river Euphrates are the four nation states TURKEY, SYRIA, IRAQ, and IRAN ready to break loose of their coalitions and of international control on them, and create the conditions for a world war in the following verses (rev. Chap 9: 15 – 19).

Look at the map of the Mesopotamia today. The river passes through the first three and just touches the edge of Iran when it meets the Tigris River.