Difference between revisions of "Abaddon"

<p> [[In]] the [[Book]] of [[Revelation]] (9:1-11), when [[John]] sees his vision of the fifth trumpet blowing, a vast horde of demonic horsemen is seen arising from the newly opened abyss. They are sent forth to torment the unfortunate inhabitants of earth, but not to kill them. They have a ruler over them, called a king ( <i> basileia </i> [ <a> <span> βασιλεία </span> </a> ]), the angel of the abyss, whose name is given in both [[Hebrew]] and Greek. In Hebrew it is [[Abaddon]] and in [[Greek]] Apollyon, both words meaning [[Destroyer]] or Destruction. </p> <p> The word only occurs once in the New [[Testament]] ( <span> Revelation 9:11 </span> ) and five times in the [[Old]] Testament ( <span> [[Job]] 26:6 </span> ; <span> 28:22 </span> ; <span> 31:12 </span> ; <span> [[Psalm]] 88:11 </span> ; <span> Proverbs 15:11 </span> ). In <span> Psalm 88:11 </span> [[Destruction]] is parallel to the grave; in <span> Job 26:6 </span> and <span> Proverbs 26:6 </span> it is parallel to Sheol; in <span> Job 28:22 </span> it is parallel to Death. <span> Job 31:12 </span> says sin is a fire that burns to destruction. [[So]] in the Old Testament Abaddon means the place of utter ruin, death, desolation, or destruction. </p> <p> The angel of the abyss is called Destruction or Destroyer because his task is to oversee the devastation of the inhabitants of the earth, although it is curious that his minions are allowed only to torture and not to kill. [[His]] identity is a matter of dispute. Some make him [[Satan]] himself, while others take him to be only one of Satan's many evil subordinates. </p> <p> [[Walter]] A. Elwell </p>

<i> to perish </i> <span> [[Revelation]] 9:11 </span> <span> [[Job]] 26:6 </span> <span> Job 28:22 </span> <span> Job 31:12 </span> <span> Proverbs 15:11 </span> <span> Proverbs 27:20 </span> <span> [[Psalm]] 88:11 </span> <a> [[Hell]] </a>

<p> <span> Abad'don. </span> <span> [[See]] </span> <a> [[Apollyon]] </a> <span> . </span> </p>

<p> <translit> a </translit> - <translit> bad´on </translit> ( <span> אכדון </span> <i> <translit> 'ăbhaddōn </translit> </i> , "ruin," "perdition," "destruction"): [[Though]] "destruction" is commonly used in translating <i> <translit> 'abhaddōn </translit> </i> , the stem idea is intransitive rather than passive - the idea of perishing, going to ruin, being in a ruined state, rather than that of being ruined, being destroyed. </p> <p> The word occurs six times in the [[Old]] Testament, always as a place name in the sense in which [[Sheol]] is a place name. It denotes, in certain aspects, the world of the dead as constructed in the [[Hebrew]] imagination. It is a common mistake to understand such expressions in a too mechanical way. Like ourselves, the men of the earlier ages had to use picture language when they spoke of the conditions that existed after death, however their picturing of the matter may have differed from ours. [[In]] three instances [[Abaddon]] is parallel with Sheol ( <span> [[Job]] 26:6 </span> ; <span> Proverbs 15:11 </span> ; <span> Proverbs 27:20 </span> ). In one instance it is parallel with death, in one with the grave and in the remaining instance the parallel phrase is "root out all mine increase" ( <span> Job 28:22 </span> ; <span> [[Psalm]] 88:11 </span> ; <span> Job 31:12 </span> ). In this last passage the place idea comes nearer to vanishing in an abstract conception than in the other passages. </p> <p> Abaddon belongs to the realm of the mysterious. Only [[God]] understands it ( <span> Job 26:6 </span> ; <span> Proverbs 15:11 </span> ). It is the world of the dead in its utterly dismal, destructive, dreadful aspect, not in those more cheerful aspects in which activities are conceived of as in progress there. In Abaddon there are no declarations of God's lovingkindness ( <span> Psalm 88:11 </span> ). </p> <p> In a slight degree the Old [[Testament]] presentations personalize Abaddon. It is a synonym for insatiableness ( <span> Proverbs 27:20 </span> ). It has possibilities of information mediate between those of "all living" and those of God ( <span> Job 28:22 </span> ). </p> <p> In the New Testament the word occurs once ( <span> [[Revelation]] 9:11 </span> ), the personalization becoming sharp. Abaddon is here not the world of the dead, but the angel who reigns over it. The [[Greek]] equivalent of his name is given as Apollyon. Under this name Bunyan presents him in the <i> Pilgrim's [[Progress]] </i> , and [[Christendom]] has doubtless been more interested in this presentation of the matter than in any other. </p> <p> In some treatments Abaddon is connected with the evil spirit [[Asmodeus]] of [[Tobit]] (e.g. 3:8), and with the destroyer mentioned in The [[Wisdom]] of [[Solomon]] (18:25; compare 22), and through these with a large body of rabbinical folklore; but these efforts are simply groundless. [[See]] <a> APOLLYON </a> . </p>

<p> ( <span> Ἀβαδδών </span> , for Heb. <span> אֲבִדּון </span> , <span> destruction, </span> i.e. the destroyer, as it is immediately explained by <span> Ἀπολλύων </span> , APOLLYON (See <a> APOLLYON </a> ) ), the name ascribed to the ruling spirit of Tartarus, or the angel of death, described ( <span> [[Revelation]] 9:11 </span> ) as the king, and chief of the [[Apocalyptic]] locusts under the fifth trumpet, and as the angel of the abyss or "bottomless pit" (see Critica Biblica, 2, 445). [[In]] the Bible, the word abaddon means destruction ( <span> [[Job]] 31:12 </span> ), or the place of destruction, i.e. the subterranean world, Hades, the region of the dead ( <span> Job 26:6 </span> ; <span> Job 28:22 </span> ; <span> Proverbs 15:11 </span> ). It is, in fact, the second of the seven names which the Rabbins apply to that region; and they deduce it particularly from <span> Psalms 88:11 </span> , "Shall thy loving-kindness be declared in the grave, or thy faithfulness in (abaddon) destruction?" (See <a> HADES </a> ). [[Hence]] they have made [[Abaddon]] the nethermost of the two regions into which they divided the under world. But that in <span> Revelation 9:11 </span> Abaddon is the angel, and not the abyss, is perfectly evident in the Greek. There is a general connection with the destroyer (q.v.) alluded to in <span> 1 [[Chronicles]] 21:15 </span> ; but the explanation, quoted by Bengel, that the name is given in [[Hebrew]] and Greek, to show that the locusts would be destructive alike to [[Jew]] and Gentile, is far-fetched and unnecessary. The popular interpretation of the Apocalypse, which finds in the symbols of that prophecy the details of national history in later ages, has usually regarded Abaddon as a symbol of [[Mohammed]] dealing destruction at the head of the [[Saracenic]] hordes (Elliott's Horae Apocalypticae, 1:410). It may well be doubted, however, whether this symbol is any thing more than a new and vivid figure of the same moral convulsions elsewhere typified in various ways in the Revelation, namely, those that attended the breaking down of [[Judaism]] and paganism, and the general establishment of [[Christianity]] (see Stuart's Comment. in loc.). (See <a> REVELATION, BOOK OF </a> ). The etymology of Asmodaeus, the king of the daemons in [[Jewish]] mythology, seems to point to a connection with [[Apollyon]] in his character as "the destroyer," or the destroying angel. [[Compare]] <span> [[Sirach]] 18:22 </span> ; <span> Sirach 18:25 </span> . (See <a> ASMODEEUS </a> ). </p>