Revelation 9:6Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Thus one death tears apart the bond of soul and body. It should not be dreaded or feared, because it is more like a departure than a punishment.

The brave do not fear it, the wise desire it, and the unhappy await it. Of it is said: "Men will seek death and will not find it."

Sweet is the life in which there is no death, since our bodily life is joined to death by nature, and this death is often desired. See Rev 9:6.

This points to the painfulness of the sufferings, for calling upon death is characteristic of those in affliction.

That death does not come, though they desire it, shows that it depends on the will of God. Through the bitterness of the calamities sent upon men, He deems it fitting to make the very cause of those calamities, sin, hateful to them.

From the smoke of scientific and technological progress, which darkens the sun and air to the point of ecological catastrophe, there comes forth a new ideology of technology, like the old Tower of Babel forgotten and then remembered again. It spreads across the whole maddened planet by means of the militant noise and clamor of the mass media. It exercises harmful dominion over the minds and hearts of men for a definite time, five months. This time is needed to prepare a generation incapable of being corrected or repenting from the coming admonitions. At the same time, its destructive nature is evident to all: to believers who speak the language of the knowledge of God, and to pagans who chiefly use the language of Hellenic wisdom.