A Seal of the Living God

1st. EARTH:

Literal. In eighteen chapters of the book of Revelations the word earth is used more than fifty times. In 2:4-9 and 17: it is not used. In every instance it shows a clear literal meaning, with two or three exceptions, if they can be called such. 1st is in 8:5; but in the 7th and 13th verses it shows the word earth to be literal, therefore the 5th verse must be; for we could not understand this chapter if the word earth was used figuratively in one verse and literally in the next but one, unless it was explained. 2nd. 12:16, “The earth helped the woman, and the earth opened her mouth.” This appears at first somewhat obscurely; many explain it thus: the earth or Roman government. I think it is clear from the 4th, 9th, 12th and 13th verses of this chapter where the word earth is used in a literal sense, that the 16th verse must and will be understood literal, because there is no explanation. If I am right in the above, then earth has a clear literal meaning; if I am not, still the word is used forty-eight times literally, and but twice obscurely. Again the question is settled in the text, for it is not possible for the four messengers to have power over any other earth and sea and stand on the same, but the literal one. Therefore the earth here is literal. SLG 10.6