<p>8:8 <em>And the second angel blew his trumpet and as it were a great mountain</em>- This can refer to Israel and Mount Zion: &ldquo;Verily I say unto you, If ye have faith, and doubt not, ye shall not only do this which is done to the fig tree, but also if ye shall say unto this mountain, Be thou removed, and be thou cast into the sea, it shall be done&rdquo; (Mt. 21:21). &ldquo;This mountain&rdquo; was Zion, before which the Lord stood at that time, with its altar fire, which never went out. Yet the great destroying mountain is also Babylon (Jer.&nbsp; 51:25). The punishment upon Babylon will come upon an Israel who fail to come out of her.</p><p>The mountains had been moved out of their places in the seal judgments (6:14), and now this is in turn done to the enemies of God's people. For the mountain falling represents the destruction of Babylon in the Old Testament. But it also represents Judaism. The fall of Israel as an entity is framed in the same terms as the fall of Babylon. They had failed to come out of Babylon, and so Babylon's judgments come upon them. We're dealing here with a double symbol- of both falling Babylon and falling Israel. By contrast, the &quot;great mountain&quot; of God's Kingdom, the Mount Zion, stands secure (Dan. 2:35; Rev. 14:1; 21:10). The clearest Old Testament allusion is to Zech. 4:7: &quot;Who are you, O great mountain? Before Zerubbabel you shall become a plain. And he shall bring forward the corner stone amid shouts of 'Grace, grace to it'&quot;. The corner stone is the Lord Jesus, whose second coming will mean the fall of the &quot;great mountain&quot;. The creation of a plain instead of elevated land is the language of the required levelling of Israel by the work of the Elijah prophet before the coming of Messiah (Is. 40:4). The immediate context of Zech. 4:7 speaks of how the mountain of opposition to Zerubbabel would be removed so that the restoration of Israel's Kingdom could come about. And that opposition was from local Arabs such as Sanballat who were opposing it. Zerubbabel failed to restore the Kingdom and become the Messiah figure he could have become. The essence of the prophecy is to be fulfilled in the last days, when the Lord Jesus will be in perfection the Messiah of Israel. The great mountain will then speak of the fake kingdom of God established by the Babylon beast, which shall be cast down.</p><p><em>Burning with fire</em>- This burning with fire is part of the outworking of how fire was cast into the land as a result of the prayers of the faithful remnant (8:5). The mountain is cast down, burning- just as fire is cast onto the earth from above. Yet burning fire is a feature of God's latter day judgment upon the beast, as often spoken of later in Revelation. The Lord Jesus will sit in judgment on the beast enthroned with wheels of burning fire (Dan. 7:19), replete as that language is with reference to the Angel cherubim (Ez. 1:13), the four beasts of Heaven. Again, we are clearly to see in this the language of the last day. The lamps of fire burning before the throne in Rev. 4:5 speak of the view of the Heavenly throne room as it will be in the last day. Finally, the lake of burning fire- fire burning on water- is the end of the beast system. And this same image, fire cast into water and the water burning, is found here in the&nbsp;second trumpet (and also in the third trumpet, where fire hits water again, the rivers). Perhaps we could understand that this is a foretaste of the final judgment of the lake of fire. Only a third of the water is affected, and then a third part of the rivers, unlike the symbology of the entire lake of fire burning. There is again the implication that even at this late stage, men can see what condemnation will be like and avoid it in repentance. This would be in keeping with how God has worked so many times- He gives worked examples of condemnation to men to warn them of where their path shall lead them. Quite simply, because He wishes their repentance. Significantly, the Koran several times claims that the judgment of unbelievers will be severe exactly because they have rejected warnings (especially Sura 54.16-24). The Moslem followers of the beast will be treated exactly in accordance with their own perceptions of Divine judgment.</p><p><em>Was cast into the sea</em>- In this sense, there is a sea of glass mingled with fire in 15:2. The sea of glass speaks of the establishment of the Kingdom of God on earth, but the picture is mingled with fire because the throwing of fire into the sea is what brings about the Kingdom. We see again how apocalyptic is not interested in precise chronology- the events are run together. Different aspects of the same picture are given. What this means, however, is that the casting of the mountain of fire into the sea is definitely a picture of latter day events, immediately around the time of the establishment of the sea as glass, the Kingdom of God on the sea of nations.</p><p>The wicked are as a troubled sea (Is. 57:20). But closer examination of that passage reveals that is talking about the Jews at the time of the Assyrian invasion who chose not to be amongst the righteous remnant. This exactly fits our context. And the Hebrew word translated &quot;troubled&quot; means literally 'sent away', and is also translated 'divorced'. The metaphor of divorce is certainly used about God's relationship with Israel, and the destruction of the faithless majority of Israel at the time of the end will be the final climax of that great divorce. such troubling of the sea will be the lot of the majority in Israel, but &quot;Peace, peace&quot; to the repentant remnant (Is. 57:19).</p><p><em>And the third part of the sea became blood</em>- In the AD70 application, this may refer to the mass killing of Jews in the Sea of Galilee. Josephus recorded: &ldquo;One might see the lake all bloody, and full of dead bodies, for not one of them escaped. And a terrible stink, and a very sad sight, there was on the following days over the country. In this way thousands were slain&rdquo; (B.J. 3:10:9). Likewise, on the Mediterranean coast: &ldquo;The sea was bloody a long way, and the maritime ports were full of dead bodies ... and the number of the bodies that were thus thrown out of the sea was 4,200&rdquo; (B.J. 3:9:3). Perhaps something similar will happen in the last days.</p><p>Water becoming blood is obviously a reference to the plagues upon Egypt (Ex. 7:20). The continual allusion to those plagues suggest that there has been an abuse of Israel by a latter day Egypt. In <em>The Last Days</em> <a href=http://www.aletheiacollege.net/ld/5.htm>chapter 5</a> I work out in more detail the typology of Egypt's domination of Israel, with the Passover deliverance being a type of the second coming. That might explain the reference to &quot;green grass&quot;, associated as it is with Passover. Bother &quot;rivers&quot; and &quot;waters&quot; are described as being turned into blood in Egypt (Ps. 78:44; 105:29), and both rivers and waters are spoken of here in the trumpets.</p><p>A burning mountain coming into the sea would create the impression of a sea of fire- and the lake of fire is the picture of the beast&rsquo;s final destruction (Rev. 19:20; 21:8). There may therefore be no specific symbology in the &lsquo;sea&rsquo; or water beyond this.</p><p>Fire destroying things in water is surely an indication that this is from God. The Hadith (Book 41.7012) says that the Antichrist of the last days will do the same: &quot;The <em>Dajjal</em> would appear and there would be along with him water and fire and what the people would see as water that would be fire and that would burn and what would appear as fire that would be water&quot;. The Muslims will therefore see the entity bringing these things about- the Lord Jesus- as the antiChrist and thus be the more motivated to engage in mad warfare against Him, to their own destruction.</p><p>In Rev. 8:8 we have an Angel casting a mountain into the sea. This must surely connect with the Lord's encouragement that we can cast mountains into the sea by our faith (Mk. 11:23). Therefore... it surely follows that our prayers have a direct effect upon the Angels. They throw mountains around because of our faithful prayer... Inevitably we see a connection with Ps. 46:2, which comforts us not to fear when mountains are cast into sea. Surely the point is that we shouldn&rsquo;t be scared when we perceive the awesomeness of the power of prayer and its influence upon Angels. It&rsquo;s all too easy to ask for things without perceiving how it would really be if that prayer were answered. We need to have specific and focused faith in what we ask for, realizing that legions of Angels are potentially able to operationalize what we ask for. See on Is. 6:7.</p><p>Jer. 51:25 calls Babylon a &quot;destroying mountain&quot; which is to be judged by fire to become &quot;a burnt mountain&quot;. The use of identical language in Rev. 8:8 must make that passage have some reference to the fall of latter-day Babylon.&nbsp;&quot;Destroying mountain&quot; is the language of Dan. 2:44 concerning the little stone destroying the image and growing into a mountain, symbolizing God's Kingdom. Jer. 51:20-23 stresses no less than nine times how 'Babylon' is to be &quot;broken in pieces&quot;, which is another connection with Dan. 2:44 concerning the breaking in pieces of the nations who are confederate with 'Babylon', the head of gold.&nbsp;&nbsp;</p>