The immediate result of the breaking of the seventh and final seal is silence in heaven for about half an hour. Since John does not provide the reader with a cipher for this heavenly calm, various explanations have been offered: it is a rhetorical device for “dramatic silence,” or the seventh seal symbolizes a sense of finality (Caird), or a pause in the vision itself (Swete), or the aftermath of total destruction (Rissi), or the quiet environs of worship when prayers are offered to God (Beasley-Murray). While leaning toward a combination of the first and last explanations, we do not favor any interpretation which presumes a chronology of events. In our view, the silence that John notes does not indicate the final episode in a series of eschatological events; rather, it cues the reader to …