Revelation 16:20

¹⁹The great city was split into three parts, and the cities of the nations collapsed. And God remembered Babylon the great and gave her the cup of the wine of the fury of His wrath.²⁰Then every island fled, and no mountain could be found. ²¹And great hailstones weighing almost a hundred pounds each rained down on them from above. And men cursed God for the plague of hail, because it was so horrendous.

Sermons

If We Would, We May

A.W. Tozer

Summary

Revelation 16:20 describes the catastrophic judgment of God upon the great city, Babylon. The verse portrays a vivid image of the city being split into three parts and the cities of the nations falling. This symbolic language signifies the complete and utter destruction of all that opposes God's kingdom. The fall of Babylon represents the ultimate defeat of evil and the establishment of God's eternal reign, fulfilling His righteous judgment and bringing about the final victory of good over evil.

Commentary

Adam Clarke
Jamieson-Fausset-Brown
John Gill

Adam Clarke Bible Commentary

Every island fled away - Probably meaning the capture of seaport towns, and fortified places.

John Gill Bible Commentary

And there fell upon men a great hail out of heaven,.... Which must be understood not as after the fall of the cities, and the flight of the islands and mountains, but at the same time; and it looks as if such men that shall escape at the battle of Armageddon, that hail stones from heaven will fall upon them and destroy them; just as the kings of the Amorites and their men were killed by hail stones, cast down by the Lord from heaven, as they fled before Joshua, when more were killed by the stones than were slain by the sword, Jos 10:11 the allusion seems to be to the plague of hail in Exo 9:23 every stone about the weight of a talent; which is threescore pound weight, a prodigious weight indeed for a single hailstone! such hail stones were never known to fall; the largest I have read of is what Caspar Wesserus assured Mr. Broughton (f) of, at Zurich, which being brought from a field afar off, to the consul, and so must melt in carriage, yet weighed a pound. It may be said of this hail storm, as of the earthquake in a preceding verse, that it will be such as never was since men were upon earth; and denotes the sore, heavy, and even intolerable judgments of God upon the antichristian party: God's judgments are sometimes signified by hail storms, Isa 30:26 and particularly the judgments upon Gog and Magog, Eze 38:22 which may respect the same as here: the Jews (g) now expect a great hail in the times of Gog and Magog: and men blasphemed God because of the plague of the hail; the plague of hail brought down the hard heart of Pharaoh, and humbled him, so that he acknowledged his wickedness, and the sin of his people, and owned the justice of God; but this more terrible storm will have no effect upon these men, to convince and reform them, but, on the contrary, they will break out into blasphemy against God, who caused it to fall on them; it will have the same effect as the fourth and fifth vials: for the plague thereof was exceeding great; it must beat down all before it, and be intolerable: whether this hail storm may not also have some regard to coldness and lukewarmness, as Naplet suggests, and so may point at the close of the spiritual reign of Christ, or the Laodicean state, which will bring on the second coming of Christ, and so this effect of the seventh vial will end where the seven churches and seven trumpets do, may be considered; See Gill on Rev 11:15. (f) See his (Zohar's) Works, p. 491. (g) Shemot Rabba, sect. 12. fol. 99. 1. Next: Revelation Chapter 17