![]() ![]() John’s picture suggests that these angels are standing over the whole world, and nothing is beyond their control. John uses symbolic language to create a visual illustration of the four directions of a compass. John is so high above the world he can see “angels standing at the four corners of the earth.” His depiction of the earth having “four corners” is in no way a scientific description. In Revelation 7:1, the apostle John’s vision unfolds from a heavenly vantage point. The same idea is conveyed by the “four corners” in Ezekiel 7:2, except that here the all-inclusive event is the catastrophic end of the world: “Son of man, this is what the Sovereign LORD says to the land of Israel: ‘The end! The end has come upon the four corners of the land!’” The New Living Translation renders the second half of the verse as follows: “The end is here! Wherever you look-east, west, north, or south-your land is finished.” In other words, there will be a worldwide gathering of God’s people. ![]() In Isaiah 11:12, the prophet speaks of a future restoration of Israel in which the dispersed of Judah will gather together from “the four corners of the earth.” The “four corners of the earth” is a poetic reference to the earth’s farthest reaches in the four cardinal directions: north, south, east, and west. The Lord’s voice fills the whole heavens and travels to the furthest ends of the earth. Therefore, corners indicates the extremities of a thing, and in this case, the earth. The fully extended wings reach the extremities of the creature. The word corners in the passage is a translation of the Hebrew term for “wings,” as in the wings of a bird outstretched over its young. Under the whole heaven he lets it go, and his lightning to the corners of the earth” (Job 37:2–3, ESV). Job’s friend Elihu describes the voice of the Lord as thunder and lightning: “Keep listening to the thunder of his voice and the rumbling that comes from his mouth. The phrase corners of the earth is used several places in the Bible as a figurative term for the outermost borders or most distant parts of the earth. ![]()
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