This article isn’t written yet, but here is a broad overview/outline from my notes.
The bowls themselves mirror the ancient Israelite Day of Atonement ceremony applied to the earth.
This section shows the restoration of Israel.
After restoring all of Israel (the 144,000)— grafting in the cultivated olive branches — and just prior to his return to heaven for the wedding feast, Jesus establishes canopy of protection for them over Zion / Jerusalem. It is this canopy that provides protection during his wrath, not the Seal itself.
The Seal on the 144,000 is the same seal that all believers have had since Pentecost: the Holy Spirit as a promise of His return.
Isaiah explicitly lists the protection for the “heat by day” — this is protection from the greenhouse warming and UV scorching throughout the below sequence — and shelter from the storm and rain — this is protection from the coming storm/mega-hail at Armageddon that will crush the armies of the Beast.
TRUMPET 1: The leading rubble-edge of an incoming asteroid strike rains burning cobalt, nickel, and rusty iron slurry over the Amazon basin igniting massive firestorms. Aerosolized metals are seeded into the atmosphere where exposure kills all grass and ⅓ of trees. (Grass far more susceptible to aerosilized metal toxicity.) Revelation 8:7
TRUMPET 2: The main asteroid impactor strikes the Pacific ocean, instantly killing ⅓ of all sea life and destroying ⅓ of ships. Vaporized metals and ocean slurry initiate oxidization cascade, turning the blast area blood red. Revelation 8:8-9
TRUMPET 3: The impact ejecta (splash) rebounds over the Amazon “like a burning torch.” Updrafts from the now-raging Amazon firestorms result in broad dispersal of ejecta material, seeding poisonous metallics into ⅓ of fresh water. Revelation 8:10-11
TRUMPET 4: Metallic aerosols, smoke, dust, ash, and vapor ejected into the atmosphere scatter light in the visible spectrum, causing visible dimming in the sun, moon, and stars. Revelation 8:12
TRUMPET 5 — THE FIRST WOE: The antipode shockwave from the star that had fallen (2nd Trumpet) OR a trailing impactor on Zagros region directly, opens deep mantle pockets under fissures at the antipode in the Middle East — megatons of sulfuric smoke vents into the Zagros region carrying swarms of sulfur-eating bacteria which metabolize the H₂S gas into sulfuric acid. Each exposure leaves eyes and airway in agony for hours or days — repeat exposure is unavoidable. Revelation 9:1-12
TRUMPET 6: Falling Euphrates levels decrease overburden pressure on cap rock weakened by the Trumpet 5 shock. Eventually, the pressurized hydrocarbon-rich slurry beneath overcomes downward pressure and catastrophically erupts vertically across dozens of interconnected seams. Ignited by piezoelectric discharges, twin flame fronts race out perpendicular to fault lines looking like charging lines of lion-headed, fiery warhorses kicking up smoke, ash, and acidic rain in their wake. The flame fronts propagate outward creating self-feeding thermal vortices which suck in the dome’s sulfur as fuel, sustaining combustion across 30,000 km². This depletes the sulfur dome, ending the “locust” plague and darkness.
TRUMPET 7 = BOWL 7 = RIDER ON THE WHITE HORSE
Zechariah 14:6 CEV
6It will be a bright day that won’t turn cloudy or cold.
Zechariah 14:6 WYC
6And it shall be, on that day there shall not be any light, but only cold and frost.
Zechariah 14:6 CEB
6On that day, there will be no light. Splendid things will disappear.
Zechariah 14:6 NET
6On that day there will be no light—the sources of light in the heavens will congeal.
Many translations flag verse 6 in Zechariah 14 as “problematic” or “uncertain” in meaning. As you can see from just tiny sampling of English translations, the meaning has proven to be quite elusive. Does the verse say that won’t be cold, or that it will only be cold? Does the verse even mention temperature at all? Will it be bright day or no light at all? What does it mean for a light source to congeal? The heart of the problem is that this verse contains, not one, but two rare/odd words that seem incongruous in context, and trying to reconcile their definitions with the broader scope of the passage leads to some unusual parsing of the underlying grammatical structure. Once you see what the translators are working with, you realize that the interpretive hoops that some grind the Hebrew through are pretty stunning.
The two unusual words in verse 6 are yaqarot, a plural feminine adjective meaning roughly “precious” or “valuable,” and qippa’on, the nominalized form of the verb meaning “to congeal” or “condense.” Yaqarot appears in three other places in the Bible, always describing the word “stones,” i.e., “precious stones” (gems). The root form of qippa’on also appears in three other places in the Bible where it protrays the waters of the Red Sea “solidifying” during the Exodus crossing, milk “curdling” into cheese, and people “entrenched” (hardened) into sin — though this nominalized form is the only occurence in the Bible.
The literal structure in question is: “not-shall-be light yaqarot and qippa’on” — a negated verb followed by a list of three nouns coordinated at the same semantic level. Here we must make some fundamental observations about the grammer that should limit how we understand these words interoperating.
The word for “light” is masculine singular, therefore the plural feminine word yaqarot that follows cannot be an adjective describing the light itself. This indicates that, instead, yaqarot is acting as an independent substantivized adjective, i.e., it is acting as a noun — something like “the preciouses” (Gollum would approve).
There is a conjunction (“and”) between yaqarot and qippa’on (which is also a noun) forcing coordination not subjugation, therefore qippa’on cannot be modifying yaqarot.
To avoid excessive intermingling of English and Hebrew — and therefore perhaps ease reading and understanding — let us, for now, use two common and broadly applicable words to represent these Hebrew outliers. For yaqarot we will use the word “valuables,” and for qippa’on we will use the word “hardening.” These may not be perfectly exact semantic equivalents, but they are close enough to use for parsing the structure of the sentence.
Thus, at the very base level, the sentence would read: “In that day, there shall not be light, valuables, and hardening.”
Already you can see why translators might insist on a deeper understanding — it hardly makes any sense, even in an apocalyptic context. The rarity of the two words in question allows them, they would assert, greater flexibility in interpretation.
Using a side-by-side list of every English translation (stripping out variants of the same translation), I have boiled down the translation strategies into a few broad categories based on how translators appear to be treating the relationship between the three nouns which can, in turn, be subcategorized based on how the negation is treated: narrowly, applying only to “light,” or broadly, applying to all constituants. Separately, we can categorize translations based on the meaning they ascribe to yaqarot and qippa’on.
These are grouped by semantic domain
Based on the broad range of both grammatical interpretation and semantic meaning, it is plain that translators struggle to understand how these three seemingly unrelated words connect with each other. Almost half the the translations don’t even attempt to represent the underlying Hebrew, instead relying on a paraphrase often completely disconnected from the meaning of either yaqarot or qippa’on. It is also clear that the majority of translations lean heavily on the Septuagint for parsing the meaning of these rare words.
The Septuagint translation of this verse renders the word qippa’on as “frost” which is, perhaps, understandable as being at least in the semantic ballpark. When water hardens (freezes) the result is frost or ice. The problem is that qippa’on represents the action of hardening, not the result of it. The word qippa’on itself encapsulates more of a sense of thickening or coagulating than state change from temperature drop — Job 10:10‘s imagery of milk “curdling” into cheese is a great example of this word.
Then, instead of anchoring their semantics to “light” like most modern translations seem to do, the ancient Greek translators connected yaqarot to the idea of “freezing,” translating it as “cold.” This interpretation is completely disconnected from the clear meaning found in parallel passages. It seems to me that the Septuagint translators were just as stymied by this verse as modern translators are. The fact that the largest portion of English translations just defer to the “cold and frost” word choices reveals just how strong tradition is within the Christian community.
The real disappointment comes when you look at the overlap of these two domains — grammar and semantics. None of the translations that respect the underlying Hebrew grammar — three nouns — also respect the semantic meaning of those nouns. Only two translations represent both words accurately, but both of those only offer a paraphristic interpretation of the underlying text.
Before continuing, we should consider another way that Hebrew can use a “noun + noun” structure: appositional specification. In English, appositionals are usually set apart with commas as in the sentence: “I saw my friend, Joe, at the store.” We see in this example two back-to-back nouns — friend and Joe — where the first noun representing the set of all of “my friends” is narrowed to just a single individual.
Hebrew also uses appositional, noun + noun, structures, but with a much wider and richer range of application — using it in places where English would typically employ simple adjectives, relative clauses, possessives, or prepositional phrases. The following are some examples of Hebrew appositionals showing the literal Hebrew structure followed by the closest English representation. (Note that what is a definite article in English, “the,” is a noun prefix in Hebrew.)
Going back to the array of translation decisions for yaqarot, we can see that, once you omit the Septuagint-aligned versions, the overhwelming majority of translators understand the word to have something to do with the “heavenly bodies,” the “sunlight and moonlight,” or the “precious things” in the sky. This, I believe, is the best interpretation of this word. We already see within the Bible itself a semantic link to glittering and gleaming via “precious stones,” and extra-Biblical usage ties the meaning to divine glory which also, in the ancient Hebrew understand, falls into a similar semantic range; the divine is pictured throughout the Bible as glowing, like burnished bronze, like flame, etc., with angels frequently equated with or symbolized by stars. “Luminaries” is, in my opinion, the best single-word representation of this concept — the glittering, glowing, divine lights in the sky.
When we pair this metaphorical usage with Hebrew apposition, we get a translation that is both true to the underlying Hebrew text and resolves the apparent no-light/light contradiction between verses 6 and 7. Luminaries in apposition to light represents semantic narrowing. It’s not just light that we are talking about in verse 6, but specifically the visible luminaries in the sky that “shall not be.” Apposition keeps all three words as nouns, but as a coordinated list of two items rather than three. It reflects the semantic connection between “light” and “precious things” that many translators seemed to be sensing while retaining the underlying Hebrew grammar. Were it not for the “and qippa’on” that follows, giving the appearance of three coordinated nouns, most translators undoubtedly would have defaulted to apposition.
When translating this as an appositional pair we must take care to avoid confusion. Explanatory appositions are best made explicit in English with an introductory marker such as “that is” or “namely,” but they can also be indicated with just punctuation, or as is often the case when representing these Hebrew constructs in English, a possessive form. Compare the following choices.
Now we come to the final “and _qippa’on” of this troublesome clause. I will once again refer to the weight of translation evidence which shows another overwhelming preference for a broad negation strategy when grammar requires a choice. I also agree with this direction, and it makes sense, the negation is applied to the verb and all of the nouns are in coordination as targets of the negated action — “there won’t be X and Y.”
This is also the point where we need to choose a word to represent qippa’on. The most literal translation would be “thickening” or “congealing” indicating a liguid transitioning to a denser state. The best example is pointed out above of milk becoming cheese. Obviously this passage is not talking about cheese making; it’s talking about the global conditions “in that day” — atmospheric conditions — which means that if a liquid is in view, atmospheric water is undoubtedly it.
Modern scientific vocabulary is pretty granular when it comes to the state changes of matter. For an increase in density in atmospheric water there is “condensation” (gas to liquid), “deposition” (gas to solid), and “freezing” (liquid to solid — temperature based). Biblical Hebrew has clear and specific vocabulary for freezing, but it does not, however, have any words for the process of condensation or deposition. If Zechariah had meant normal freezing or frost, he almost certainly would have used that vocabulary, but instead he coined a word (this is the only instance we have of its usage) that can conceivable cover the entire gamut of options.
Importantly, Koine Greek also lacks words for condensation or deposition. Not only that, the sceintific understanding of the hydrologic cycle didn’t give the ancient translators the concepts to understand it. They likely looked at qippa’on and freezing was the best fit they could provide, despite the fact that if it were freezing, Zechariah would have written “freezing.” This translation decision has had outsized influence over interpretations of this verse ever since.
Fortunately, we do now have the understanding and terminology for the density changes that occur in atmospheric water: condensation, and this word, I propose, is a much better fit than “freezing.” For thoroughness, I will point out that the other temperature-related words are even worse options than “freezing” — both “frost” and “cold” are resultant products of the action of freezing, not the nominalized action itself which is what the Hebrew indicates.
Another option might be “solidifying” or perhaps “condensing.” Both of these words carry broader connotations in the English which aligns them better with the sense of qippa’on in the Hebrew, but they do so at the expense of clarity and connection to the passage. We have in view throughout verses 6 and 7, and atmospheric image — the light, the luminaries, day and night — and condensation is the “densification” process that occurs in that very physical domain to produce rain, snow, sleet, hail, etc. as well as the morning dew.
This, now, is where all of the physics above makes what has baffled translators for millennia snap into sharp focus. To understand, let’s recap what the physical cascade above predicts about the state of the earth at the time of Christ’s return for Armageddon.
Under these conditions “no condensation” takes on vivid reality. Water vapor can’t “thicken” into rain-forming droplets. Conditions where morning dew would form are absent. Even in cold climates, water freezing or deposition into ice is prevented. It also answers the question as to why Zechariah didn’t just write “no rain” — he was, perhaps, divinely inspired to point to a more fundamental underlying reality. There just being no rain on a particular day is actually not that noteworthy. The process of condensation itself being broken, on the other hand, is spectacularly unique.
Not only does this bring understanding to verse 6, but verse 7 reveals the nuance of the situation. In verse 6 the negation is applied to the verb, but in verse 7 we have a different structure: “shall-be not-day and not-night.” I speculate that Zechariah isn’t saying that there won’t be day and night, rather he is saying that there will be “un-day” and “un-night” (in the same way that a zombie is “undead”). He then adds one more detail: “in the evening time there will be light.” The light is scattered through the vapor. It never gets fully dark. It never gets fully bright. The sun and mooon that normally mark day and night are diffuse blobs, but the light they emit still diffuses through the haze. It’s “un-day” and “un-night.” This is not a fudge. It’s a precise description of the sky conditions under a global vapor lock — a diffuse, perpetual twilight.
One final note about the beginning of verse 7: Many translations see the verse as indicating a “unique” day known to Yahweh, but the grammar actually reports it as “one” day. I believe that the true sense here is not of quality but of timing. Rather than “unique circumstances spanning the entire time of the Day of the Lord (which may be longer than a single day),” I believe it is saying that when the Lord comes with all his holy ones (verse 5) that the events in verse 8 and onward will occur in a single day. This also aligns with the Timeline produced by the literal spans.
In closing, I want to distinguish between the physical model above and this translation. The Trumpets and Bowls cascade I’ve outlined is an attempt to understand the possible mechanisms for what is described in Revelation. The translation of Zechariah 14:6-7, by contrast, is a methodological argument independent of the physical model.
Even if you set aside every other claim in this paper, Zechariah 14:6-7, as rendered in our English Bibles — any version — is almost certainly incorrect. As we’ve seen, every version compromises the translation at either the grammatical or the lexical level, often both. Most follow a tradition inherited from the Septuagint’s best guess at words its translators also didn’t understand. My proposed translation, while still unusual — no more unusual than any other — is grammatically responsible, lexically defensible, and contextually coherent in ways that other translations simply aren’t.
Whatever else you take from this paper, I believe this translation of Zechariah 14:6-7 stands on its own merit.