<p>9:2 <em>And he opened the pit of the abyss and smoke went out of the pit</em>- This is the same figure used in 14:11 for the destruction of the beast worshippers. But here it speaks of what they did to deserve that destruction- their actions against Israel and the land promised to Abraham is the grounds for their condemnation.&nbsp; The Hadith mentions smoke as one of the ten signs that the last day is coming: &quot;Allah's Messenger (may peace be upon him) came to us all of a sudden as we were (busy in a discussion). He said: What do you discuss about? They (the Companions) said. We are discussing about the Last Hour. Thereupon he said: It will not come until you see ten signs before and (in this connection) he made a mention of the smoke, Dajjal Antichrist, the beast, the rising of the sun from the west, the descent of Jesus son of Mary (Allah be pleased with him), the Gog and Magog, and landslidings in three places, one in the east, one in the west and one in Arabia at the end of which fire would burn forth from the Yemen, and would drive people to the place of their assembly&quot; (Book 41.6931). Again, we see the crisis in the land in the last days foretold in terms which Moslems will relate to. Sura 44 of the Koran is entitled <em>Al-Dukhan</em>, &lsquo;The Smoke&rsquo;. It speaks of how painful smoke will be the punishment of God&rsquo;s enemies in the last days: &ldquo;But watch thou O Muhammad for the day when the sky will produce visible smoke that will envelop the people. This will be a painful torment. Then they will say: Our Lord relieve us of the torment&rdquo; (Sura 44.10-12). It could be that jihadists bring smoke upon others in an attempt to judge them according to Islam. And they will be judged likewise, drinking the cup they made others to drink. This means that they will be judged as apostates within their own frames of reference.</p><p><em>Like the smoke of a great furnace</em>- See on 8:7. The language of Sodom (Gen. 19:28) and Egypt. Both these places are used to describe Jerusalem under domination of her enemies as the place of particular suffering for God's people (11:8).</p><p>The invading hordes come out of the bottomless pit- both the locusts (:3) and the beast arise from here (Rev. 9:1; 11:7; 17:8). They come up out of the &quot;bottomless pit&quot;, the abyss, the &quot;great furnace&quot; (Rev. 9:2). But the beast arises out of <em>the land</em> promised to Abraham in Rev. 13:2. We can therefore understand the bottomless pit and great furnace as being within the land promised to Abraham. The locusts of Joel 2:3 are pictured as coming upon Israel as if it is the garden of Eden, and leaving it as a desolate wilderness. This could connect with the revival of the land of Israel since 1948 as the garden of Eden (Ez. 36:35); or it could be that Eden is the same as the land promised to Abraham. Is. 31:9 speaks of Jerusalem surrounded by the Assyrians as a furnace. Judah's captivity in Babylon was as it were in a furnace of affliction (Is. 48:10; Ez. 22:18,20,22). The deliverance of the faithful Jews from the furnace in Dan. 3:6,11 was an acted parable of Judah's deliverance from captivity in Babylon / Persia and her empire- throughout the land promised to Abraham. And yet in Rev. 20:3, the beast is again cast into the bottomless pit, clearly representing condemnation and judgment. So it would seem that the judgment upon the beast / locusts occurs several times- they are condemned / judged and put in the bottomless pit, and then released, and then placed there again. This probably speaks of various stages in the judgment upon them. But it would be foolhardy to try to work out an exact chronology ahead of time.</p><p><em>And the sun and the air were darkened because of the smoke of the pit</em>- Israel's extremist neighbours will not think twice about using nuclear weaponry against her, and one wonders therefore whether this will have a literal dimension. The sun is spoken of as being darkened by the smoke. But the sun itself would not be darkened; that is presented here as it appears from the standpoint of an observer on earth. So often the Bible is written this way, from the Genesis account of creation to the language of demons in the New Testament. Failure to appreciate this leads to wrong interpretation. The darkening of the sun is another connection with the account of the Lord's crucifixion (s.w. Lk. 23:45), the point being that the tribulation&nbsp;of the last days will connect the saints with His sufferings; and having suffered with Him, that generation shall live eternally with Him. It is also a quotation from the Olivet prophecy (Mt. 24:29). This again confirms that we are reading of things to happen in the very last days, before the Lord's return- and not at some point between centuries before that. The darkening of the sun is the very figure used for the latter day suffering of Israel at the hands of her invaders (Joel 3:15; Mt. 24:29).</p>