Apocalipse 6

BLIVRE · Chapter 6/22

1E eu vi quando o Coreiro abriu um dos selos; e ouvi um dos quatro animais dizendo [com] voz como de trovão: “Vem, e vê.”

2E eu olhei, e eis um cavalo branco; e o que estava sentado sobre ele tinha um arco; e uma coroa lhe foi dada, e ele saiu [como] conquistador, e para que conquistasse.

3E quando ele abriu o segundo selo, eu ouvi o segundo animal dizendo: “Vem, e vê.”

4E saiu outro cavalo vermelho; e ao que estava sentado sobre ele foi concedido que tirasse a paz da terra, e que uns aos outros se matassem; e uma grande espada lhe foi dada.

5E quando ele abriu o terceiro celo, eu ouvi o terceiro animal dizer: “Vem, e vê.” E olhei, e eis um cavalo preto, e o que estava sentado sobre ele tinha uma balança na sua mão.

6E ouvi uma voz no meio dos quatro animais, dizendo: “Uma medida de trigo por um dinheiro, e três medidas de cevada por um dinheiro; e não danifiques o azeite e o vinho.”

7E quando ele abriu o quarto selo, eu ouvi a voz do quarto animal dizendo: “Vem, e vê.”

8E eu olhei, e eis um cavalo amarelo, e o que estava sentado sobre ele, seu nome [era] Morte; e o Xeol o seguia. E foi-lhes dada autoridade para matar a quarta [parte] da terra, com espada, com fome, com morte [por doença] , e com os animais ferozes da terra.

9E quando ele abriu o quinto selo, eu vi debaixo do altar as almas dos que foram mortos por causa da palavra de Deus, e por causa do testemunho que tinham.

10E clamavam com grande voz, dizendo: “Até quando, Santo e Verdadeiro Soberano, não julgas e vingas nosso sangue daqueles que habitam sobre a terra?”

11E foram dados a cada um [deles] compridas roupas brancas; e foi-lhes dito que repousassem ainda um pouco de tempo, até que se completassem os seus companheiros de serviço e seus irmãos, que [ainda] viriam a ser mortos.

12E eu vi quando ele abriu o sexto selo, e eis que houve um grande tremor de terra; e o sol se tornou preto como um saco feito de pelos de animais, e a lua se tornou como sangue.

13E as estrelas do céu caíram sobre a terra como a figueira lança de si seus figos verdes, abalada por um grande vento.

14E o céu se removeu como um rolo de livro que se enrola; e todos os montes e ilhas se moveram de seus lugares.

15E os reis da terra, e os grandes, e os rigos, e os comandantes, e os poderosos, e todo escravo, e todo livre se esconderam nas cavernas e nas rochas das montanhas.

16E diziam aos montes, e às rochas: “Caí sobre nós, e escondei-nos do rosto daquele que está sentado sobre o trono, e da ira do Cordeiro;

17Porque chegou o dia da sua grande ira; e quem poderá ficar de pé?”

📖 Chapter study

Summary

The Lamb begins to open the seven seals, releasing four symbolic horsemen — associated with conquest, war, famine, and death — followed by the souls of the martyrs crying out for justice, and finally great cosmic signs that terrify humanity.

Explanation

The so-called 'Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse' (white, red, black, and pale/yellow) have become one of the most famous images in all of world literature, symbolizing destructive forces that run throughout human history: military conquest, civil war, economic scarcity, and widespread death. The fifth seal reveals something emotionally moving: the souls of those who died for their faith, still awaiting God's full justice, showing that the book openly acknowledges the real suffering of the persecuted without minimizing it. The cosmic signs of the sixth seal — the sun darkened, the moon like blood, stars falling — use traditional Old Testament apocalyptic language (as in Joel 2 and Isaiah 13) to convey that God's judgment is imminent and all-encompassing. Today's application is that the book does not ignore real human suffering, but places it within a larger story moving toward God's final justice.

Fun facts

  • The expression 'the four horsemen of the apocalypse' became so popular in Western culture that it is still used today in entirely secular contexts — politics, sports, economics — to describe any set of four destructive or threatening forces.

Verse-by-verse explanation

  1. Apocalipse 6:1This begins the sequence of the seven seals: each time the Lamb opens one, one of the four living creatures summons the next scene with the same command, “Come and see.”
  2. Apocalipse 6:2This rider opens a sequence of four, each tied to a type of disaster the readers of the time knew well: military conquest, war, famine, and death. It is not a fixed order predicting specific events; it is an ancient way of describing the great evils that always travel together with war.
  3. Apocalipse 6:3This repeats the formula of the first seal, now with the second living creature calling forth the scene of the second rider.
  4. Apocalipse 6:4The red horse and its rider represent war: the power to take peace from the earth and make people kill one another, a classic image of widespread armed conflict.
  5. Apocalipse 6:5This repeats the formula for the third time; the black horse and the balances in the rider's hand are symbols of scarcity, setting up the explanation of famine that comes in the next verse.
  6. Apocalipse 6:6A penny, or denarius, was the pay for a full day's work; spending that entire wage just to buy a day's ration of wheat shows a famine so severe that it consumes everything a person earns. Oil and wine, goods belonging to those with more possessions, remain untouched - the image of a crisis that weighs more heavily on the poor.
  7. Apocalipse 6:7This repeats the formula for the fourth and final time before the scene of the fourth rider.
  8. Apocalipse 6:8The fourth rider, named “Death,” with “Hell” (Hades, the realm of the dead) following behind, receives power over a fourth of the earth using sword, hunger, plague, and wild beasts - the four classic types of punishment already listed in prophecies such as Ezekiel 14.
  9. Apocalipse 6:9In the ancient temple, the blood of a sacrifice was poured out at the base of the altar; here the lives of those who died for their faith are described with the same image, as an offering poured out that still cries out for justice, similar to the blood of Abel crying out from the ground in Genesis.
  10. Apocalipse 6:10The cry “how long” is a common expression in psalms of lament, used here by martyrs asking God to bring justice for their spilled blood.
  11. Apocalipse 6:11The answer to this cry is not immediate: each one receives a white robe (a symbol already seen in the letters to the churches) and the instruction to wait, because the full number of martyrs had not yet been completed.
  12. Apocalipse 6:12A darkened sky, a red moon, and falling stars is language already found in Isaiah, Joel, and Ezekiel to describe all of creation being shaken - ancient readers recognized this as an image of a great upheaval, not as a literal description of astronomy.
  13. Apocalipse 6:13The image of stars falling like unripe figs shaken by a strong wind is a comparison to something well known to readers of the time - the moment when a fig tree drops fruit that is not yet ripe during a storm.
  14. Apocalipse 6:14The sky “rolled together as a scroll,” with mountains and islands moved out of place, echoes an image from Isaiah 34 about the total collapse of the natural order, used here to describe an upheaval of cosmic proportions.
  15. Apocalipse 6:15The list of social groups - kings, the rich, military commanders, slaves, and free people - shows that this fear spares no one: neither status nor power offers protection against what is about to happen.
  16. Apocalipse 6:16The scene of people begging for the mountains to fall on them echoes an image from the prophet Hosea. The effect here is one of reversal: the Lamb, a symbol of gentleness throughout the book, is precisely the One these groups are trying to hide from.
  17. Apocalipse 6:17The question “who shall be able to stand?” is deliberately left unanswered until the next chapter, which reveals exactly who manages to remain standing before this day of judgment.

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