Bible Strands
Matthew 24:7
Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines and earthquakes in various places.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Jesus, on the Mount of Olives, answering the disciples' question about the temple's destruction and the sign of his coming (Matthew 24:3).
The words — Ἐγερθὲται (egerthēsetai), aorist passive: nations do not choose to rise; they are raised up. The passive voice removes human agency from the escalation.
The thread — Luke 21:11 lists the same cluster (earthquakes, famines, pestilences) with added "fearful sights and great signs." Isaiah 19:2 supplies the "against" motif in a prophetic context: Egyptian against Egyptian, brother against brother.
Why it lands — The verse sits between "these things must happen" (v. 6) and "the beginning of birth pains" (v. 8); it demands that a reader recognize real catastrophe without mistaking it for the final act.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Greek words
King James Version
For nation shall rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom: and there shall be famines, and pestilences, and earthquakes, in divers places.
Cross-references
- Luke 21:11 There will be great earthquakes, famines, and pestilences in various places, along with fearful sights and great signs from heaven.
- Revelation 6:8 Then I looked and saw a pale green horse. Its rider’s name was Death, and Hades followed close behind. And they were given authority over a fourth of the earth, to kill by sword, by famine, by plague, and by the beasts of the earth.
- Isaiah 19:2 “So I will incite Egyptian against Egyptian; brother will fight against brother, neighbor against neighbor, city against city, and kingdom against kingdom.
- Zechariah 14:13 On that day a great panic from the LORD will come upon them, so that each will seize the hand of another, and the hand of one will rise against the other.
- 2 Chronicles 15:6 Nation was crushed by nation, and city by city, for God afflicted them with all kinds of adversity.
- Acts 11:28 One of them named Agabus stood up and predicted through the Spirit that a great famine would sweep across the whole world. (This happened under Claudius.)
- Revelation 6:12 And I watched as the Lamb opened the sixth seal, and there was a great earthquake, and the sun became black like sackcloth of goat hair, and the whole moon turned blood red,
- Joel 2:30 I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and columns of smoke.
- Luke 21:25 There will be signs in the sun and moon and stars, and on the earth dismay among the nations, bewildered by the roaring of the sea and the surging of the waves.
- Ezekiel 21:27 A ruin, a ruin, I will make it a ruin! And it will not be restored until the arrival of Him to whom it belongs, to whom I have assigned the right of judgment.’