VI: The Prophets' Visions

Black Horse

spiritual famine as the pure Word grows scarce

Root
Ezek 4:16-17 · shachor (H7838)
Old Testament chain
  1. Lev 26:26
  2. 2 Kgs 7:1
  3. Ezek 4:16-17
  4. Amos 8:11
  5. Zech 6:2, 6
  6. Rev 6:5-6
New Testament
Rev 6:5-6; Rev 6:5; Rev 6:6; Matt 13:24-30; John 6:9

The Torah warns that under judgment "they shall deliver you your bread again by weight" (Lev 26:26). Samaria's siege prices wheat and barley by the measure (2 Kgs 7:1), Ezekiel sees Jerusalem "eat bread by weight, and with care" (Ezek 4:16), and Amos names the deeper famine: "not a famine of bread... but of hearing the words of Yahuah" (Amos 8:11). Zechariah's black horses go north (Zech 6:6). Revelation's black horse is spiritual famine as corruption replaces the pure gospel: wheat, the rich sustaining bread of the Word, grows rare and costly, while barley, basic teaching, remains. The futurist reading of a coming economic collapse overlooks Amos, who already defined the famine.

From The Courtroom of Heaven, pp. 29, 86–88