EVERY fresh evidence of the growing importance of Asia’s far east raises again the speculation that these nations are the powers referred to in Rev. 16. 12 as the Kings of the East. Superficially the assumption can be very attractive, although the attractiveness fades with fuller investigation.
The visions of the Revelation are conveyed in symbols taken from familiar objects, and they create the impression that the visions deal with simple realities. But on further looking it can be seen that the pictures formed in the mind are of vast sweeping movements on the earth at which one has to look, as with half-closed eyes as if beholding a vision, so as to combine with the realism a sense of the mysticism and unreality which always accords with the unfolding of the divine purpose. It is often remarked that God works in mysterious ways his wonders to perform, which the Apostle states in a slightly different way when he says, “The things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal.”
The ever present problem in studying the Revelation is to decide where the literal interpretation ends and the figurative begins, and yet at the same time to keep the thoughts anchored to events in the earth. This problem applies particularly to the matter of the Kings of the East, because, while the senses tell us that it has a deeper significance in spiritual matters, there is always the fast growing importance of the three major powers of the Far East to accentuate the problem, not only with expanding populations, but also with growing industrial development which must find outside markets, and which in a few years seems likely to upset completely the balance of world power.
Revelation 16.12 informs us, “The sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates, and the waters thereof were dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.” The context reveals that this event occurs in conjunction with the gathering of nations to armageddon, an event which gives the drying up of the river a latter-day setting, having a connection with the return of the Lord Jesus Christ who is to “come quickly” and discover the unpreparedness of those who have known that he must come but have not lived in faith of his appearing. In view of this association two questions are pertinent, namely, What bearing can the uprise of China, India and Japan, as formidable powers in a new world, derive from the drying up of the Euphrates ? and, moreover, What influence can it have upon the appearing of the Lord?
There can be no doubt that the symbology of the Revelation is drawn in large part from the prophecies of the Old Testament, to which have been added from time to time fuller details as the purpose of God has developed. It is obvious that the divine revelation has become clearer as each successive prophet in his time has added his visions to those which preceded him. By this means the mysteries that were hidden from earlier generations have been brought into clearer light. As Peter says, “We have a more sure word of prophecy”.
The symbol of the drying Euphrates in Revelation 16. 12 seems to derive from Isaiah, where in chapter 8. 8 we read that God had threatened to bring against the kingdoms of Syria and Israel, which had joined in alliance against the kingdom of Judah,
“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 the stretching out of his wings shall fill the breadth of thy land (Judah).”
Here we have the Euphrates, used for the military might of Assyria, submerging the political structure of lesser nations and culminating a century later in the deportation of Judah into Babylon. The “Euphrates” in successive waves completely flooded the earth of that time, reaching even to Egypt, and bringing all kingdoms into subjection to its military and commercial dominion. It was from this exile in Babylon that Isaiah predicted the release of the remnant of Israel. God would “say to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers ; that saith of Cyrus, He is my shepherd, and shall perform all my pleasure : even saying to Jerusalem, Thou shalt be built . . . . To open before him the two leaved gates of brass and cut in sunder the bars of iron.”
In this prophecy prediction is made of the uprise of Cyrus king of Persia to break the power of Babylonia. It is reported of him that, with Darius, he diverted the waters of the river into an artificial lake and made his entry along dry river channels under the gates into the inner city. Very literally these kings of the east had dried up the Euphrates, but in a figurative sense, which was of far greater significance, they had evaporated the impressive might of Babylon the Great and made possible the operation of Persia’s more liberal colonial policy, by which many captive peoples were enabled to return to the lands of their origin. Amongst these groups was the remnant of Israel, brought back to the land of their ancestors, where the culture and faith of Israel might be revived in the divinely appointed setting and prepare the way for the emergence of the scion of the House of David, who was to “rise with healing in his wings” and so offset the “stretching out of the wings” of Assyria, even the flooding of the land by the gentile waters of the Euphratean powers.
The Saviour Prince
The outworking of the purpose of God in this respect is specific and clearly perceptible. The destruction of Babylonian power by the might of Cyrus, while natural enough in the rise and fall of kingdoms, was used by God for a particular purpose ; it was not an end in itself, it had a bearing upon the later consequences of Israel’s restoration, and brought forth in due time, in the city of David and the atmosphere of the promised land, the Saviour Prince who in the wisdom of God was the hope all the world as well as the glory of the people of Israel. Viewed in the light of this background, reference to the kings of the east in Rev. 16. 12 is endowed with a deeper meaning than can be found in the uprise of present day Far Eastern powers. Such hidden meanings are common in the unfolding of the Revelation.
Jeremiah had revealed that the nations of Palestine were to be subjected to Babylon for seventy years and then Babylon also should be punished for its iniquity. Daniel, being aware of this prophecy, had foreseen the return from Captivity, but his visions had carried him further forward in time than that event, and had revealed to him the vast sweep of national powers that should intervene between his day and the time of Israel’s full redemption and, added to the shock of that realisation was the further shock that the vision was “for many days”, so that he was to “seal up the vision until the time of the end.” The destruction of Babylon did not end Israel’s subjection to Gentile dominion. The title of Babylon the Great passed in time from the city situated on the Euphrates to Rome and its terminal extensions, so that the Apostle Peter in his day could refer to “The church that is in Babylon”, and the 16th chapter of the Revelation could say that “great Babylon came in remembrance before God.”
The Great River Euphrates is mentioned again in the 9th chapter of the Revelation where the sixth angel is recorded as sounding his trumpet and loosing the four angels bound by the river. This loosing is to be for the purpose of slaying “the third part of men”, and has been interpreted to mean the destruction of the Eastern, or Byzantine, third of the Roman Empire, which survived the Western and Central divisions by over 900 years. The four angels bound by the river have been identified as the successive waves of Asiatic hordes which had migrated westward into Europe, beginning with the Seljuks in A.D. 1063 and ending with the Ottomans at the fall of Constantinople in 1453. The Ottomans formed the foundation of the Turkish Empire, which at the height of its power extended from Persia to Central Europe, and southward to include Egypt.
Figuratively speaking the Euphrates again had overflowed all its channels and come up over all its banks. The powerful empire which it established served the function of restraining the ambitions of European nations to expand their influence into the holy places, until the time was ripe for Israel again to raise its head and dream again the dreams of restoration of God’s favour to Zion. And then the slow process of evaporation began. In 1820 Greece revolted, and in succession the European provinces were stripped away. The climax came in 1917 when General Allenby of Megiddo, in a swift series of great victories routed the Turkish armies in Syria and Palestine and reduced the territory of Turkey to the narrow limits of Asia Minor.
On other previous occasions where the “Euphrates” had been the subject of military conquest there had been a succession in power, but with the fall of Turkey there was no successor. The Western powers were unable to take advantage of their victory because of jealousies and rivalries, the River had evaporated, and it remained dry, and into the vacuum so created was thrust The National Home for World Jewry and the independent nationalisms of the several Arab States.
Sundry questions arise at this point and help to focus the mind on the relative values of human speculations and divine revelations.
Has the drying of the Euphrates been completed by Turkish decline, or is there yet more to follow ?
In what way could Turkey’s decline have a bearing upon the political awakening of India, China and Japan, to say nothing of the lesser nationalisms that have since developed ?
In what way does it prepare the way for the Return of Christ and the resurrection of the saints—which is the end of the vision ?
And what relationship exists between Far Eastern powers and the same future climax in the divine purpose ?
There can be no doubt that answers can be built up to indirectly satisfy in measure these questions, but a candid view of all such answers leaves the mind lacking satisfaction and conviction.
World Redemption
There is no denying the fact that Turkey’s decline opened the way for Israel’s colonisation of Palestine as a National Home for the Jewish people, and ultimately for the State of Israel. But who would aver that Israel produces the Kings of the East ? Israel’s restoration is the first step, and only the first The main event is the redemption of the whole world that is wrapped up in the return of the Lord. It seems therefore that the requirements of “drying up” extend further afield than the local influence of Turkey, and extend rather to include the world wide influence of “Babylon the Great”, who at this time is to come in remembrance before God for its iniquity. The sixteenth chapter of Revelation ends on the note of the pouring out of the seventh vial, when the “great earthquake” shatters the cities of the nations. The following chapters detail the fall of Babylon the Great, the destruction of the Beast and his armies, the binding of Satan, and the descent of “The New Jerusalem” out of heaven.
The picture as a whole is the presentation of the theme of Zion’s exaltation over the apostacy of the world, in which the Kings of the East and the Great River Euphrates are set in antithesis. The theme begins with the historical facts relating to Israel’s defection and correction by ancient Babylon and passes through to the sublime vision of God’s whole purpose fulfilled by Jesus Christ and his redeemed. In the first instance, the pagan Cyrus, “Mine anointed”, and his tributary kings enacted the part of the kings of the east for the restoration of the worldly Zion. The establishment of spiritual Zion is the subject of the second instance, and if the nations of the world are engaged in any degree in the drying up of Babylon the Great it will be simply as accessories to the purpose of God for this greater end.
To be worthy of association in the vision of Rev. 16. 12, with such world shattering events as Armageddon and the destruction of the kingdoms of men, the coming of the Kings of the East must be above the mundane level of the uprise of fresh powers among the nations of the earth. Dr. Thomas draws the mind to the full conclusion in his clear exposition. He names the kings of the east the kings of “a sun’s rising”—which is the east—and identifies them as the sons of righteousness who are to be drawn up out of the graves of the earth by Christ’s life giving power. They are the called and chosen and faithful, who are able to sing the song of Moses and the Lamb, the song of the redeemed, drawn out of every tongue and tribe and nation from the earliest time until the latest. These are the blessed and holy who take part in the first resurrection and shall live and reign with Christ a thousand years.
Anything that falls short of this full conclusion fails to appreciate the significance of the vision of the sixth vial.
The Origin of the Organic World – Part One