“And authority was given them over the fourth part of the earth, to kill with a long sword and with food shortage and with deadly plague and by the wild beasts of the earth.” (Revelation 6:8b)

29, 30. (a) What application would the “four injurious acts” of Ezekiel 14:21 have today? (b) What may we understand by “the wild beasts” of Revelation 6:8? (c) What appears to be the main point of the prophetic scene?

²⁹ John’s vision mentions wild beasts as a fourth cause of untimely death. Indeed, the four things featured by the opening of the fourth seal​—warfare, famine, disease, and wild beasts—​were in ancient times viewed as predominant causes of untimely death. So they would foreshadow all causes of untimely death today. It is just as Jehovah warned Israel: “So, too, it will be when there will be my four injurious acts of judgment​—sword and famine and injurious wild beast and pestilence—​that I shall actually send upon Jerusalem in order to cut off from it earthling man and domestic animal.”​—Ezekiel 14:21.

³⁰ Death by wild beasts has seldom made headlines in modern times, though in tropical countries wild animals have steadily claimed victims. In the future, they may claim even more if lands become desolated because of warfare or people become too emaciated by famine to fight off hungry animals. Additionally, there are many humans today who, like unreasoning animals, display beastly dispositions quite contrary to those described at Isaiah 11:6-9. These people are largely responsible for the global expansion of sex-related crimes, murder, terrorism, and bombings in the modern world. (Compare Ezekiel 21:31; Romans 1:28-31; 2 Peter 2:12.)