Prayers and incense

Beale points out that the incense of prayer offered up on the altar in Revelation 8:1-5 links back to the prayers of the saints under the altar in 6:9 (the fifth seal). Those souls were praying for vindication, and were told to wait until the full number of martyrs were added. By the time we get to chapter 8, the full number has been killed, and it’s time for judgment to fall, which falls in the seven trumpets.

The link sort of works. When the sixth seal is opened, 144,000 Jews are sealed with a protective seal. They are not harmed by the locorpions from the pit that appear with the fifth trumpet (9:4), and don’t seem to be harvested until chapter 14. They are avenged only when the blood is poured out on the harlot-city who drinks blood. The full measure of the martyrs is not filled in chapter 8, or with the trumpet sequence (unless the trumpets are understood to continue through chapter 14). While the incense of chapter 8 may be the prayers of the saints of chapter 6, the trumpets that blow in response to the prayers only begin the process that will lead to the filling up of the martyrs. But that does indicate that the trumpets are blown in response to the martyrs’ prayers; the prayer for vindication will be answered; but it will be answered, somewhat paradoxically, through a process that first multiples the number of martyrs.