The Third Trumpet of Revelation
Revelation 8:10-11
10 And the third angel sounded, and there fell a great star from heaven, burning as it were a lamp, and it fell upon the third part of the rivers, and upon the fountains of waters;
11 And the name of the star is called Wormwood: and the third part of the waters became wormwood; and many men died of the waters, because they were made bitter.
John saw the third trumpet as a burning star that fell on “the third part” of rivers and fountains. The star, whose name was Wormwood, poisoned the water, turning it bitter and causing death. The Futurists theorize that a literal meteorite will speed toward the earth and somehow poison one-third of the world’s rivers. We already know that Futurism is inaccurate, but how could one meteorite poison one-third of all the rivers on earth as they suggest?
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Several candidates have been proposed for the burning star of the third trumpet. Some Catholic commentators have suggested early Christian writers such as Arius, Origen, or Pelagius—whose opinions were often considered unorthodox by Rome—as any views contradicting the Catholic interpretation of the Bible would be defined by the Vatican as poisoning the spiritual waters. The problem with this interpretation is that Arius died in 336 AD and Origen died even earlier—both long before the trumpets began. Pelagius’ death came in 418 AD, more than a decade before the second trumpet and corresponding Vandal invasion of North Africa. None of these early Christian leaders could fulfill this prophecy because the trumpets would be out of order.
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Some believe the burning star was the Vandal king Genseric, a follower of Arius’ version of Christianity. Genseric did persecute non-Arian Catholics, but he is not a significant enough figure in the scheme of history to warrant attention from two separate trumpets. Others see Muhammad, however, the timing of this trumpet is too early for him. Most of these characters would represent a spiritual fulfillment of this trumpet, despite military attacks on Roman territory fulfilling the first two. This makes them all unlikely answers to the question of the third trumpet. Because the first three trumpets are so comparable, we need to identify another military threat to Rome, and one that occurred after the start of the second trumpet in 429 AD.
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In 451 AD, Attila and the Huns began their now-infamous invasion of Roman Gaul. Marching westward along the Danube, Attila’s army sacked and plundered cities throughout modern France, enriching himself and his men at the expense of the local civilians before ultimately facing off against the Roman army and their allies in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains.
The Roman defense was led by the decorated general Flavius Aëtius. His forces were joined by the Alans, Visigoths, and several small tribes, each with a vested interest in stopping the Huns’ advance. The Visigoth faction of the alliance was commanded by their king, Theodoric I. For their part, the Huns had allied with the Ostrogoths, Franks, Burgundians, and others.
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At the start of the battle, Attila attacked the center of the Roman line where Aëtius had positioned the Alanian infantrymen. After several hours of combat, the Huns had methodically eliminated most of the Alanian force, but the Roman line held firm in its position. Believing his side to be on the verge of victory, Theodoric sent his Visigoth forces to attack the Huns’ left flank. In the chaos of the attack, Theodoric was thrown from his horse and trampled to death by his own cavalry. The loss of their king energized the Visigoth soldiers, who pushed the opposing Ostrogothic line backward.
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Approximate path of the 451 AD Gallic military campaign of Attila and the Huns.
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The armies fought to a draw so costly and exhausting that after surveying the plains the next morning, neither commander was interested in continuing the fight. Sixth-century historian Cassiodorus, who spoke to many veterans of the battle, reported it was “a conflict fierce, various, obstinate, and bloody; such as could not be paralleled either in the present or in past ages.”[i] So many men were killed on the Catalaunian Plains that the unknown author of the Chronica Gallica Anno 511 (The Gallic Chronicle of 511) wrote “cadavera vero innumera,” meaning “the corpses were innumerable.”[ii]
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Later that morning, the body of King Theodoric was found under a mass of dead soldiers. His death left the Visigoth army under the command of his son, Thorismund. The prince had performed well in battle, but he had several brothers who threatened his claim to the throne.
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The alliance between the Romans and Visigoths was fragile, as they were two enemies united by a common threat. After two days of posturing and a brief siege of Attila’s camp, the armies still had not resumed fighting. Aëtius, concerned that the much larger force of the Visigoths would turn on his army once Attila had been dispelled, encouraged Thorismund to return home and stake his claim to the Visigothic Kingdom. Attila, believing the departure of the Visigoths to be a feigned retreat intended to draw him into battle, led his remaining forces in an eastward retreat across the Rhine.[iii]
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Jordanes—a famously unreliable source—painted a picture of the human cost of the battle. “Hand to hand they clashed in battle,” he wrote, “and the fight grew fierce, confused, monstrous, unrelenting—a fight whose like no ancient time has ever recorded. There such deeds were done that a brave man who missed this marvelous spectacle could not hope to see anything so wonderful all his life long. For, if we may believe our elders, a brook flowing between low banks through the plain was greatly increased by blood from the wounds of the slain. It was not flooded by showers, as brooks usually rise, but was swollen by a strange stream and turned into a torrent by the increase of blood. Those whose wounds drove them to slake their parching thirst drank water mingled with gore.”[iv] While his description is believed to be embellished, it illustrates a colossal and considerable loss of life.
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Most of the cities targeted by the Huns were situated on Europe’s major rivers. Attila, described as the “scourge of all the lands” by the contemporary Greek diplomat and historian Priscus, slaughtered an incalculable number of Roman civilians along the banks of these rivers on his Gallic campaign. The blood and rotting corpses he left scattered in Europe’s rivers would easily poison the waters with disease, making it toxic to those downstream.[v]
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In this prophecy, we find another celestial object—a “great star”—falling from Heaven. The star represents a powerful leader, comparable to the sun, moon, and stars of both Isaiah’s and Ezekiel’s prophecies[vi] and the sixth seal of Revelation.[vii] Like a shooting star, Attila appeared almost out of nowhere and disappeared just as suddenly. Attila’s invasions of the Western Empire only lasted a little more than a year. After he attacked Roman Gaul in 451, Attila briefly reentered northern Italy the next year until he realized there was not enough food available on the peninsula to feed his troops due to a famine and returned home.
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Aëtius, who would be given the title “Last of the True Romans” by sixth-century historian Procopius, was the final great general of Western Rome.[viii] For thirty years, Valentinian had viewed him as a political threat. After the children of Aëtius and Valentinian married in 453 AD, the emperor suspected his general was plotting to place his son Gaudentius on the throne.
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That same year, Attila suddenly died while celebrating his own wedding, which Valentinian believed removed the Huns as the primary military threat to the Romans. On September 21, 454 AD, while Aëtius was attending court in Ravenna, Valentinian leaped from his chair and declared that he would no longer allow himself to be the victim of the general’s drunkenness, nor permit him to steal his empire. Unsheathing his sword, the emperor struck Aëtius on the head, killing him instantly.[ix]
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The assassination was promptly seen as foolish and unnecessary. When Valentinian boasted of the murder to the advisors in his court, one counselor proclaimed, “I am ignorant, sir, of your motives or provocations; I only know that you have acted like a man who cuts off his right hand with his left.”[x]
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Fire symbolizes war or cleansing in prophecy. The fiery hail, mountain, and star of John’s vision were metaphors for military conquests against Rome as punishment for the empire’s persecution and corruption of Christianity. The prophetic star fell upon rivers, as the cities sacked by Attila were located along the major rivers of Gaul. The wormwood plant’s bitter taste and aquatic habitat allude to the corpses Attila left in the rivers, which poisoned the water and caused the deaths of many who drank it downstream.
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[i] Gibbon, Edward. 1974. “Chapter XXXV.” In The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. III, 490. New York: AMS Press.
[ii] Burgess, R. 2017. “The Gallic Chronicle of 511: A New Critical Edition with a Brief Introduction.” In Society and Culture in Late Antique Gaul: Revisiting the Sources, edited by R. W. Mathisen and D. Shantzer, 85-100. London and New York: Routledge.
[iii] Gibbon, Edward. 1974. “Chapter XXXV.” In The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. III, 490-493. New York: AMS Press.
[iv] Jordanes. 1908. The Origin and Deeds of the Goths, translated by Charles C. Mierow, 64. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
[v] Jordanes. 1908. “XXXV. Character of Attila King of the Huns.” The Origin and Deeds of the Goths, translated by Charles Christopher Mierow, 57. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
[vi] Isa. 13:1, 10 (KJV), Isa. 34:4-5 (KJV), Eze. 32:7-8 (KJV).
[vii] Rev. 6:12-14 (KJV).
[viii] Brewer, E. Cobham. 1898. “Last of the Romans.” In Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, 731. Philadelphia, PA: Henry Altemus Company.
[ix] Priscus of Panium. 2014. The Fragmentary History of Priscus: Attila, the Huns and the Roman Empire, AD 430-476, translated by John Given, 125-127. Merchantville, NJ: Arx Publishing.
[x] Gibbon, Edward. 1974. “Chapter XXXV.” In The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. III, 503-504. New York: AMS Press.
