Home › Glossary › Letter A

Abaddon

Biblical
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A Hebrew term meaning "destruction," often personified as an angel of the abyss in apocalyptic literature.

Detailed Definition
Abaddon appears in the Book of Proverbs as a synonym for Sheol and in Revelation as the king of locusts from the bottomless pit. In poetry, Abaddon evokes themes of annihilation, divine judgment, and the terror of the underworld, serving as a potent symbol of eschatological dread and moral decay.
Example
Example in poetry:
In John Milton’s Paradise Lost, Abaddon is invoked as the “angel of the bottomless pit,” symbolizing ultimate ruin; A modern poet might write, “Abaddon yawns beneath the fractured earth, where hope dissolves like ash”; In apocalyptic verse, Abaddon appears as a devouring silence after the final trumpet; Contemporary eco-poetry could personify climate collapse as “Abaddon rising in the smoke of burning forests”; In spiritual lament, a poet cries, “Not Sheol, not Hades—but Abaddon has claimed my joy”; Victorian hymnody sometimes used Abaddon to evoke the terror of divine judgment.
Additional Notes
Abaddon appears in the Hebrew Bible (Job 26:6, Proverbs 15:11) as a synonym for Sheol or the realm of the dead, but in the New Testament (Revelation 9:11), it is personified as the "angel of the abyss" named Apollyon in Greek. This dual usage—abstract place of destruction versus a demonic ruler—offers rich symbolic potential in apocalyptic and metaphysical poetry, especially when exploring themes of chaos, divine judgment, or the limits of human knowledge. Poets may draw on its resonance in both Jewish and Christian traditions to evoke layered meanings of ruin and revelation.
Also Known As
Apollyon Sheol
Skip to main content