In those days people will seek death but will not find it. They will long to die, but death will flee from them!
Parallel translations
- WEB In those days people will seek death, and will in no way find it. They will desire to die, and death will flee from them.
- KJV And in those days shall men seek death, and shall not find it; and shall desire to die, and death shall flee from them.
- BSB In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, but death will escape them.
- NKJV In those days men will seek death and will not find it; they will desire to die, and death will flee from them.
- NASB And in those days people will seek death and will not find it; they will long to die, and death will flee from them!
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
People will long to die but death will elude them. The torment is so great that even death seems a desired escape that is withheld.
Overview
This describes a horror in which suffering offers no exit, recalling Job's anguish (Job 3:21) and the despair of the cursed. It exposes the misery of life apart from God when judgment falls. The verse soberly portrays the dead-end of sin, where even death cannot relieve. It magnifies, by contrast, the hope of the gospel, in which Christ has conquered death and offers life rather than unending torment (1 Corinthians 15:54-57).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Luke 23:30Then they will begin to tell the mountains, ‘Fall on us!’ and tell the hills, ‘Cover us.’
- Jer 8:3Death shall be chosen rather than life by all the residue that remain of this evil family, that remain in all the places where I have driven them,” says Yahweh of Armies.
- Rev 6:16They told the mountains and the rocks, “Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him who sits on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb,
- Isa 2:19Men shall go into the caves of the rocks, and into the holes of the earth, from before the terror of Yahweh, and from the glory of his majesty, when he arises to shake the earth mightily.
- Hos 10:8The high places also of Aven, the sin of Israel, will be destroyed. The thorn and the thistle will come up on their altars. They will tell the mountains, “Cover us!” and the hills, “Fall on us!”
- Job 7:15–16so that my soul chooses strangling, death rather than my bones.
- Job 3:20–22“Why is light given to him who is in misery, life to the bitter in soul,
- 2 Sam 1:9He said to me, ‘Please stand beside me, and kill me; for anguish has taken hold of me, because my life lingers in me.’
- John 4:8–9For his disciples had gone away into the city to buy food.
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Christ at the center
Revelation ends the story with the slain-yet-standing Lamb who is worthy, the Lion of Judah, the Alpha and Omega, the returning King who makes all things new and dwells with his people forever.
How Revelation 9:6 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Greek word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.