Revelation Chapter 9 verse 5 Holy Bible

ASV Revelation 9:5

And it was given them that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when it striketh a man.
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BBE Revelation 9:5

And orders were given them not to put them to death, but to give them great pain for five months: and their pain was as the pain from the wound of a scorpion.
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DARBY Revelation 9:5

and it was given to them that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months; and their torment [was] as [the] torment of a scorpion when it strikes a man.
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KJV Revelation 9:5

And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months: and their torment was as the torment of a scorpion, when he striketh a man.
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WBT Revelation 9:5


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WEB Revelation 9:5

They were given power not to kill them, but to torment them for five months. Their torment was like the torment of a scorpion, when it strikes a person.
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YLT Revelation 9:5

and it was given to them that they may not kill them, but that they may be tormented five months, and their torment `is' as the torment of a scorpion, when it may strike a man;
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Pulpit Commentary

Pulpit CommentaryVerse 5 - And to them it was given that they should not kill them, but that they should be tormented five months; and it was given them [i.e. the locusts] that they [the locusts] should not kill them [the unsealed], but that they [the unsealed] should be tormented five months. The devil and his agents have not unlimited power committed to them; they are restrained within limits by the will of God. The evils which follow in the train of heresy and infidelity are not as yet permitted to kill (cf. Job 1:12), for this judgment extends only to the natural life of man. God reserves the final killing to himself at the great judgment day. This is shown in the limitation, "five months." This apparently meaningless period becomes explicable, when we remember that the usual duration of a locust plague is five months, viz. from April to September. The visitation is for the natural period of such occurrences; the torment is to extend to the natural period of man's sojourn on the earth. It does not extend into the next life; other and special means are adopted for man's punishment then, as set forth under the seventh trumpet. Various other explanations have been given of the five months. (1) Five years of Gothic rule (Vitringa). (2) Five months = 5 × 30 days; each day represents one year; therefore 150 years are signified, viz. (a) of the Saracens, A.D. 830 - A.D. 980 (Mede); . . .

Ellicott's Commentary

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(5) And to them . . .--Better, And it was given to them that they should not kill them (i.e., those who had not the seal of God in their foreheads), but that they should be tortured five months. The general period of a locust plague is about five months: "as the natural locusts commit their ravages only for five months, so the ravages of these symbolical ones will be only for a short period" (Stuart). Their power is to inflict torment, and not death. The next verse tells us that men would consider death preferable to this torment; but the relief of the grave is denied them.And their torment . . .--Literally, and the torture of them (i.e., the torture inflicted by them) is as the torture of a scorpion when it has stricken a man. The wound of a scorpion occasions intense suffering: we have in it the symbol of the malicious cruelty of the merciless. The emblem is used in Ezekiel: the rebellious and malicious opponents of the prophet being compared to scorpions (Ezekiel 2:6). We may compare the similar imagery of the bee for the Assyrian power (Isaiah 7:18), and the Psalmist's complaint that his enemies came about him like bees--a swarm, irritating him with wing and sting. The tenth verse tells us the way in which the injury was inflicted: there were stings in their tails.