The Danielic Imperative, Episode 24

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The anathema of God was for those who denied justification by faith alone. When that is at stake, we need to be on the battlefield exposing the air and combating the air.

We are unabashedly, unashamedly Clarkian. And so the next few statements that I'm going to make, I'm probably going to step on all of the Vantillian toes at the same time. And this is what we do at Simple Riff around the radio, you know.

We are polemical and polarizing Jesus style.

I would first say that to characterize what we do as fashion is itself fashion. It's not hate. It's history. It's not fashion. It's the Bible.

Jesus said, Woe to you when men speak well of you. For their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way. As opposed to blessed are you when you have been persecuted for the sake of righteousness.

It is on. We're taking the gloves off. It's time to battle.

The Danielic Timeline and the Sign to Flee Judea

Hello, this is Timothy F. Kaufman, your host of the Danielic Imperative. Welcome to episode 24. This is a podcast in which we examine the eschatology of God's holy people in the light of the timeline revealed to us by the prophet Daniel.

Through the prophet Daniel, the Lord revealed to us a timeline of the future of his people. And six centuries later, Jesus and his apostles revealed the future using explicitly and implicitly Danielic language.

It is imperative that Christians understand that timeline as the foundational construct of God's revelation to us about the future of his church. In previous episodes, we demonstrated again why that foundational principle is so important to our studies of the Gospels and Revelation.

As we analyze the sign, Jesus said would indicate that it is time to flee Judea. And in this episode, we'll be talking about the 1260-day prophetic ministry of the two witnesses of Revelation 11, the identity of the two witnesses, and the 42-month period when Jerusalem is trampled by the Gentiles.

We will show that these time periods are literal and that they have already happened. And we will show from the scriptures why the 1260-day period and the 42-month period cannot be the same period, even though all commentaries assume that they are.

According to Revelation 11, there is a 1260-day period, followed by a three-and-a-half-day period when the two witnesses are murdered and lie unburied in the streets until they are resurrected. And after that 1260 three-and-a-half-day period, there would follow a 42-month period when the city of Jerusalem is trampled by the Gentiles.

So basically, we need to establish first that there is a three-and-a-half-year period when the witnesses testify, followed by a three-and-a-half-day period when they lie unburied in the streets, and then a 42-month period when Jerusalem is trampled by the Gentiles.

In other words, Revelation 11 deals with a seven-year period from 63 A .D. to 70 A .D., culminating in the sack of Jerusalem and the destruction of the temple. Today we are simply going to evaluate five mistakes we Christians have made historically that have caused us to miss that time frame for the two witnesses, as well as the historical evidence that the witnesses did in fact prophesy during that time, basically from the Festival of Booths in 63 A .D. until the Passover season of 67 A .D., and were killed and ascended into heaven three-and-a-half days later.

And yes, the evidence for their ministry is in the historical record, but first we have to address the question of why this has been missed, and then in the next episode we'll provide that historical evidence.

But first, a recap of our previous episode. To summarize episode 23, we have historically approached the text of Luke 21 -20, that is, when ye shall see Jerusalem compassed with armies, then know that the desolation thereof is nigh, by assuming it must refer to the Roman siege of Jerusalem in 70 A .D.

It is therefore understood at the outset to be referring to the five-month siege of Jerusalem by the Romans, and because the parallel passages of Matthew 24 -15 and Mark 13 -14 indicate that the sign to flee Judea is the abomination of desolation foretold by Daniel, standing in a holy place where it ought not be, we tend to scour the history of the siege of Jerusalem in 70 A .D., looking for the abomination to appear in the temple, as a sign that it was time for people to leave.

Using that approach, all we can find is armies standing on the Temple Mount after the sack of Jerusalem, and therefore conclude that the armies themselves, or their standard, must be the abomination Daniel had foretold.

But that approach is hermeneutically unviable, because the abomination of desolation was supposed to be the sign to the Jews to leave Jerusalem before it was too late, and the Roman armies weren't standing on the Temple Mount until after it was already too late to leave.

Everyone was already dead or in captivity by then. What we should do instead is discover the identity of the abomination from the Old Testament Scriptures, and then find out when that abomination was placed in a holy place.

As we have shown in previous episodes, the abomination of desolation in Matthew 24 -15 and Mark 13 -14 refers to the statue of Jupiter foretold by Daniel to be placed in the temple under the reign of Antiochus IV in 167 B .C.

The statue of Jupiter is what Antiochus IV set up in the temple, as foretold by Daniel in chapters 8, 9, 11, and 12, and thus the statue of Jupiter is the abomination of desolation foretold by Daniel.

That's what Jesus was saying. The same statue that fulfilled Daniel's prophecy in 167 B .C. would return to Israel as a harbinger of Jerusalem's destruction, and would do so within one generation. As we noted in the previous episode, the text does not say the abomination would stand in the holy place in reference to the temple, but rather would stand in a holy place, which could be any holy place at all.

And, as Josephus testified, the statue of Jupiter was set up in the synagogue at Doris in 41 A .D., just ten years after Jesus said it would return. And that leads us to the other sign that it was time to leave Judea.

The Greek text of Luke 21 -20 actually says, when you see Jerusalem encompassed with encampments rather than by armies, as is traditionally assumed, encampments, that was to be the sign according to Luke 21 -20.

And about the same time a statue of Jupiter was set up in the synagogue at Doris in 41 A .D., highway and byway robbers basically took over and destroyed the civil order of Judea, setting up encampments or places of strength, as Josephus calls them, throughout Judea, up and down the country, such that all of Judea was drawn into the madness and overrun with the robberies.

And, of course, Jerusalem is at the very center of Judea. And thus, Jerusalem was surrounded by encampments in the early 40s A .D., at the same time the statue of Jupiter, the abomination of desolation that had been foretold by Daniel, was set up in the synagogue at Doris in 41 A .D.

And thus, all three gospel accounts establish the same time frame, in the early 40s A .D., for the sign that it was time to leave Judea. And importantly, those were signs that were actually useful, helpful warning signs that were given before it was too late to leave Judea safely.

The traditional interpretation of the passages has the sign to depart from Judea occurring after Judea has already been subjugated by the Romans and Jerusalem has already been destroyed and it is too late to leave Judea, which hardly makes sense.

But giving the sign in the 40s A .D. gives people plenty of time to leave Judea before Jerusalem had been sacked by the Romans and the famines and the earthquakes and the murders and the pestilence make it nearly impossible to leave.

Okay, so that's our recap of episode 23. Now let's proceed with episode 24. We have now arrived at the topic of the two witnesses of Revelation 11 who prophesy before the city is destroyed. According to the Apostle John, there are two witnesses who testify against the Jews in the great city for 1 ,260 days.

That's Revelation 11 verses 3 and 8. And there is a three and a half day period while they lay in the streets and are raised from the dead and ascended to heaven, followed by a 42 month period when the city is trampled by the Gentiles, according to Revelation 11 too.

As we have discussed in previous episodes, the 1 ,260 day ministry of the two witnesses cannot be the same 42 month period because 1 ,260 days is actually 43 months, not 42. What is more, the 1 ,260 days takes place prior to the 42 months and the 42 months trampling itself must have occurred before the sack of 70 A .D.

Therefore, when you put those two time periods nearly end to end with a three and a half day period between them, we are looking at a nearly seven year period in which the two witnesses testify, are killed, are raised from the dead, and then the city is trampled for 42 months and then sacked by the Romans.

So we are looking at events that could have started no later than 63 A .D. And incidentally, since the book of Revelation foresaw these events as future events, John's vision must have been received prior to 63 A .D., more likely sometime between 60 and 62 A .D.

But we'll get to that shortly. Before we can get to the dating of the book of Revelation, or to the 1 ,263 and a half days when the witnesses prophesy and are murdered and raised from the dead and ascended into heaven, and before we can identify the 42 month trampling of the city, we first have to address five mistakes, one historical, three exegetical, and one translational, that prevent us from seeing in history what John plainly foresaw to occur in the roughly seven years before Jerusalem's destruction, and indeed, what plainly occurred in that period.

So, to start, let's begin with the prophetic ministry of the two witnesses. It is depicted for us in Revelation chapter 11. So, let's read the whole narrative, which is only 13 verses long. And I will give power unto my two witnesses, and they shall prophesy a thousand two hundred and three score days, clothed in sackcloth.

These are the two olive trees, and the two candlesticks standing before the God of the earth. And if any man will hurt them, fire proceedeth out of their mouth and devoureth their enemies. And if any man will hurt them, he must in this manner be killed.

These have power to shut heaven, that it rain not in the days of their prophecy, and have power over waters, to turn them into blood, and to smite the earth with all plagues, as often as they will. And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them and kill them.

And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified. And they of the people, and kindreds, and tongues, and nations shall see their dead bodies three days and an half, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves.

And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth. And after three days and an half, the Spirit of life from God entered into them, and they stood upon their feet, and great fear fell upon them which saw them.

And they heard a great voice from heaven saying unto them, Come up hither. And they ascended up to heaven in a cloud, and their enemies beheld them. And the same hour there was a great earthquake, and the tenth part of the city fell.

And in the earthquake were slain of men seven thousand, and the remnant were affrighted, and gave glory to the God of heaven. That's Revelation 11 verses 1 to 13, the narrative of the two witnesses. So when did this happen?

There are five obstacles to answering that question. First, the varying opinions about when the book of Revelation was written, which of course leads to varying opinions about the identity of the two witnesses.

Second, in some schools of thought, the 1 ,260 days and the 42 months refer to the same time period, which in turn leads people to look for the wrong duration for the narrative of Revelation chapter 11.

For example, in most schools of thought, not only are the 1 ,260 days and the 42 months of Revelation assumed to refer to the same time period, but they are also assumed to be the same time period as the 1 ,260 days of the woman's flight to the wilderness in Revelation 12 -6 and the 42 months of Revelation 13 -5, which refers to the civil dominion of Antichrist.

In other words, many interpretations assume that the ministry of the two witnesses is concurrent with the flood of error in Revelation 12 and the reign of Antichrist in Revelation 13. That is not the case as we will show from the text.

Third, the narrative of chapter 11 appears to suggest that the two witnesses are killed by the Antichrist because Revelation 11 -7 says, "...the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them and shall overcome them and kill them.".

And that sure sounds like they are killed by the beast in Revelation 17 -8, which says, "...the beast that thou sawest was and is not and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit and go into perdition," which refers to the beast after which the whole world wanders.

But as we will show, a little knowledge of scriptures in the Danielic timeline clears up and corrects that assumption. Fourth, the testimony of the two witnesses appears to occur between the sixth and seventh trumpets.

In fact, the way John writes and describes the trumpets, the last three trumpets are three woes, and it almost sounds like the testimony of the two witnesses is part of the second woe, which is to say, part of the sixth trumpet.

That is not true either as we will show from the text of scriptures. Fifth, while the witnesses are numerically two, it appears from the text of scripture that they are physically one. I want to make clear what I'm saying here because it is important.

According to the text, the witnesses are numerically two, but they are physically one. The scriptures point to that fact as we will show. One of the reasons it has been so hard to identify the two witnesses historically is that we have always looked for witnesses that are physically two people, and a large part of that is caused by intentional mistranslations of Revelation 11 to pluralize the singular references to the individual who is in fact two prophets.

According to the text, the two witnesses have a single mouth, a single body, and had they been buried, they would have been buried in a single tomb, which by definition is only intended to hold a single body.

There is more to this than meets the eye, and the intentional mispluralizations of Revelation 11 don't help. So, we'll wrap up today's episode on that point, and then in the next episode we'll walk through the historical evidence showing that the events of Revelation 11 verses 1 to 13 all took place between 63 and 70 AD.

So, let's walk through the five hindrances to properly understanding the when and the who of the two witnesses of Revelation 11, and then we'll get to the fulfillment itself. Okay, let's start with the first issue, which is the dating of the book of Revelation.

We won't spend a lot of time on this, but anyone who wants to hear our position on this can go back to episode 19. We point out that Irenaeus in Against Heresies book 5, chapter 30, paragraph 3, and Jerome in Against Jovinianus book 1, chapter 26, both place the writing of the book of Revelation under the reign of Emperor Domitian, or toward the end of his reign, which places the writing sometime between 81 and 96 AD.

But there are other writers who place the apocalypse prior to Paul's epistles, under Emperors Claudius from 41 to 54 AD, or Nero from 54 to 68 AD. In other words, the typical date of 95 AD is not authoritative at all.

It is just traditional, and there is other evidence for an earlier writing. Due to the preponderance of opinions on when it was written, there is no good reason simply to defer to Jerome and Irenaeus.

We ought rather to rely on internal evidence from the scriptures, which means we discover the dating of the book of Revelation by what John himself says about when he is writing it. More on this later, but if John foresaw the testimony of the two witnesses occurring before the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD, then Revelation must have been written many years before 70 AD.

We'll demonstrate why that must be the case at the conclusion of the discussion on the two witnesses. The second issue is the 1 ,260 days of the ministry of the two witnesses, and the 42 months of the trampling of Jerusalem in Revelation 11, and the 1 ,260 days of the doctrinal persecution occurring in Revelation 12, and the 42-month civil dominion of the Beast of Revelation 13.

If all those refer to the same time period, then it would seem that the two witnesses must testify during the reign of Antichrist, who, as we have shown, does not and cannot arise until the 13-way division of the Roman Empire at the end of the 4th century.

However, as we have already shown in multiple previous episodes, based on the principle of intercalation in the Hebrew lunisolar calendar, the 1 ,260 days of Revelation 11 cannot possibly be the same time period as the 42 months of the same chapter, because they both must be literal, and in real, literal solar time, 1 ,260 days is never 42 months.

We won't go into the details here, but listeners who want to understand why 1 ,260 days and 42 months cannot possibly refer to the same time period in Revelation 11 can go to episodes 20 and 21, The Days, Weeks, Months, and Years of Prophecy, parts 1 and 2.

The short story is that the trampling of Jerusalem by the Gentiles, Revelation 11, 2, is said by Christ to occur within one generation, that's Luke 21, 24, and therefore must be a literal 42 months. And the 1 ,260-day ministry of the two witnesses must precede the 42 months, and thus the 1 ,260 days must be literal as well, and together they comprise a period that is nearly seven years from 63 AD to the end of Jerusalem in 70 AD.

Okay, the third issue that we must address is the fact that the two witnesses are supposed to be killed by the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit. That's from Revelation 11, 7. And when they shall have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall overcome them, and kill them.

Again, that's Revelation 11, 7. The commentaries universally assume that the beast that comes up from the bottomless pit to kill the two witnesses in Revelation 11 must be the sea beast of Revelation 13, or the Antichrist, as he is commonly known.

But that is an unwarranted and unsubstantiated assumption based on a mistranslation. What is translated as bottomless pit into English is actually one word, abyss, that can either refer to the sea or to the abode of demons, which is why familiarity with the Danielic timeline is so important.

In reality, the beast that kills the two witnesses comes up from the abyss, or the sea. And our particular point here is that all the empires of Daniel's visions come up out of the sea. The Babylonian Empire came up out of the sea, the Medo-Persian Empire came up out of the sea, the Greek Empire came up out of the sea, and the Roman Empire came up out of the sea, as stated explicitly in Daniel 7.

And the sea is also called the deep or the abyss. And thus, in the context of Revelation, the beast that ascended out of the abyss can refer either to the Roman Empire or to its successor, Roman Catholicism.

This can be seen in how the scriptures use the words sea, deep, and abyss. By way of comparison, in Revelation 9 -1, John is describing the fifth trumpet, and he writes, I saw a star fall from heaven unto earth, and to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.

In that verse, what is translated as bottomless pit is actually two words, abyssos and phryar. As noted, abyssos can refer to the deep or the sea, and phryar is simply an artificial well, a hole in the ground.

When they occur together, they can, and here they do, mean bottomless pit, a deep well. And in Revelation 9 -1, the smoke that comes up out of the bottomless pit is like the smoke of a great furnace. It is clear that hell is in mind here, and the locusts that come up out of the bottomless pit are demonic, which we will address in more detail when we get to the seven trumpets.

So, what is translated as bottomless pit in Revelation 9 is two words, abyssos and phryar. That together means a deep well or bottomless pit. But what is translated as bottomless pit in Revelation 11, the chapter we're examining today, is actually only one word in Greek, abyssos, which on its own may refer to the deep, as in the abode of demons, or the abode of the dead.

But it may also refer to the sea. An interesting example of this is when Paul uses the word abyssos in Romans 10 -7, that is, or who shall descend into the deep. Paul is writing in Greek, but quoting from Deuteronomy 30 -13, which is actually a reference to the sea.

As in, neither is it beyond the sea that thou should say, who shall go over the sea for us and bring it to us. Our point here is simply that when abyssos occurs on its own, we cannot assume that it means bottomless pit, as the translators historically have done.

It might just mean abyss, or sea, or deep, or sheol, for example. Context has to bear that out. We know of at least one point when Paul translated an Old Testament reference to sea as abyss, and we know that the Danielic beasts come up out of the sea, and thus the fact that the two witnesses are killed by a beast that comes up out of the abyss does not mean necessarily that they have been killed by a beast that comes up out of the bottomless pit.

We find the same issue in Revelation 17, where a beast is described as having seven heads and ten horns and is obviously being described in a Danielic context, referring, of course, to the aggregation of the four beasts of Daniel 7, the lion, the bear, the four-headed leopard, and the ten-horned beast.

In Revelation 17 -8, in English, says the beast shall ascend out of the bottomless pit. But again, what is rendered as bottomless pit in English is just one word in Greek, abyss. Given the Danielic context of the passage and the context of Daniel 7, in which four beasts in succession come up out of the sea, and the fact that the abyss can and does mean sea in some contexts, the rendering bottomless pit is unwarranted.

In a Danielic context, as the succession of empires is described in Daniel 7, a beast coming up out of the sea is simply a description of an earthly empire that has risen to a position of earthly dominion.

And as we have elsewhere discussed, the beast of Revelation 13 also comes up out of the sea. But that beast of Revelation 13, Roman Catholicism, is simply the fifth earthly empire in succession. And therefore, it too comes up out of the sea.

The Babylonian lion came up out of the sea, the Medo-Persian bear came up out of the sea, the Greek leopard came up out of the sea, the Roman beast came up out of the sea, and in Revelation 13, the Roman Catholic beast comes up out of the sea.

A succession of empires, each of which comes up out of the sea. So what is our point? Our point is simply that every one of these empires in succession is a beast that comes up out of the sea. And in the case of the two witnesses of Revelation 11, the text says that they were killed by the beast that ascendeth out of the abyss, or the sea, which, in its context, is simply a reference to the Roman Empire, one of the empires that came up out of the sea in Daniel's visions.

And that brings us back to the two witnesses being killed by the beast that comes up out of the abyss. As we mentioned in episode 21, because of the insurrections and robberies, Roman soldiers frequently set upon the population of Jerusalem to attack them and often to kill them.

The listener may recall Josephus' description of Geseus Flores, who was procurator of Judea from 64 to 66 A .D. He sent his soldiers to the upper marketplace in Jerusalem to kill any person that they came across.

That's from Josephus' Wars of the Jews, Book 2, Chapter 14, Paragraphs 8 to 9. Since the Roman procurators from 40 A .D. onward grew progressively more and more lawless, it is not difficult to imagine that Marcus Antonius Julianus, the next procurator after Flores, was just as bad as Flores, or worse, although his actions are almost completely lost to the historical record.

In any case, it was a common occurrence at the time for Roman soldiers to be sent into the city to kill people to intimidate the population, especially those who were causing disturbances. And what is more, it was also common in the commotion of the Tribulation for dead bodies to lay in the street of the city.

As Josephus describes in Wars of the Jews, Book 2, Chapter 18, Paragraph 3. Now citing Josephus. It was then common to see cities filled with dead bodies, still lying unburied, and those of old men mixed with infants, all dead and scattered about together.

Women also lay amongst them, without any covering for their nakedness. You might then see the whole province full of inexpressible calamities. Again, Josephus, Wars of the Jews, Book 2, Chapter 18, Paragraph 3.

And what is more, it was not uncommon for procurators and Jews to exchange presents to celebrate their alliances. That's from Josephus, Antiquities, Book 20, Chapter 9, Paragraph 2. So yes, the two witnesses are killed by the beast that ascends from the abyss, or from the sea, which in this case is a reference to the Roman Empire.

And it was common in those days for Roman soldiers to enter the city and kill people, and it was not uncommon for dead bodies to lay in the street unburied for days at a time, and for the ruling class in Jerusalem to exchange gifts, all of which are alluded to in Revelation 11, verses 7 to 10, which reads,.

And when they have finished their testimony, the beast that ascendeth out of the abyss shall make war with them, and shall overcome them, and kill them. And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified.

And they of the people, and kindreds, and tongues, and nations, shall see their dead bodies three and a half days, and shall not suffer their dead bodies to be put in graves. And they that dwell upon the earth shall rejoice over them, and make merry, and shall send gifts one to another, because these two prophets tormented them that dwelt on the earth.

Again, Revelation 11, verses 7 to 10. Everything being described here about the testimony and death of the two witnesses is consistent with the culture in occupied Israel in the years leading up to the war with Rome before the destruction of Jerusalem.

And to our point, we cannot assume, as the commentaries do universally, that the beast that comes up from the abyss to kill the two witnesses in Revelation 11 must be the sea beast of Revelation 13, or the Antichrist.

It is, in fact, a reference to the Roman Empire that, like all Danielic beasts, came up out of the sea. Okay, the fourth issue we want to address today is that the testimony of the two witnesses of Revelation 11 appears to occur between the 6th trumpet of Revelation 9 and the 7th trumpet of Revelation 11.

At the 6th trumpet, the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates are loosed, according to Revelation 9 .14. And at the 7th trumpet, it is the time of the dead that they should be judged, according to Revelation 11 .18.

On a first reading, it appears that the two witnesses must testify between the 6th and 7th trumpets. However, it must be pointed out that in the book of Revelation the author always places an interlude between the 6th and 7th seal, trumpet, or vial judgment.

Between the 6th and 7th seal, there is an intermission, the entire chapter of Revelation 7, when the elect are sealed against the day of wrath. And, to our point, the seal narrative pauses at Revelation 6 .17 and picks back up at Revelation 8 .1.

And the chapter between them is not one of the seals. Likewise, between the 6th and 7th vial judgment, there is a brief side discussion about the dragon, the beast, and the false prophet gathering the kings of the whole world together for battle against the Lord.

That's Revelation 16, verses 13 -16. And, to our point, the vial judgment's narrative pauses at Revelation 16 .12 and picks back up at Revelation 16 .17 and the verses between them are not one of the vials.

Just read through chapter 16 a few times and you'll see that it is an odd intermission between the 6th and 7th vial judgment. In the same way, as you read the narrative of the trumpet judgments between the 6th and 7th trumpet, there is a lengthy intermission, that is, Revelation 10 .1 -11 .13 as John is told to record God's judgment against the temple.

And, to our point, the trumpet narrative pauses at Revelation 9 .21 and picks back up at Revelation 11 .14 and the whole of chapter 10 and chapter 11, verses 1 -13 are not part of the trumpet narrative.

We invite the listener to inspect Revelation 9 -13 and see that the narrative on the trumpets is interrupted between the 6th and 7th trumpet for an intermission regarding the destruction of Jerusalem and the ministry of the two witnesses.

The narrative of the 5th, 6th and 7th judgments is also described as the three woes, according to Revelation 8 .13. The first woe is the 5th trumpet, which is the locusts and when it is complete, Revelation 9 .12 says one woe is passed and behold there come two woes more hereafter.

And then there is the 6th trumpet, which is the loosing of the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates, according to Revelation 9 .14. The narrative of the 6th trumpet ends at Revelation 9 .21 which concludes the second woe.

And then the narrative of the trumpets does not resume again until after the two witnesses have testified and died and rose from the dead. At which point, Revelation 11 .14 says the second woe is passed and behold the third woe cometh quickly.

And then the 7th trumpet, or the third woe ensues at which point the kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ and he shall reign forever and ever. That's Revelation 11 .15.

And that is the third woe. Because the narrative of the trumpets skips from Revelation 9 .21 which actually concludes the second woe and does not pick up again until Revelation 11 .14 which says the second woe is passed it gives the impression that the ministry of the two witnesses is part of the second woe which is to say, part of the 6th trumpet.