The term is comprehensive of all people on earth and so illustrates the catholicity of the hostility against Jesus’ faithful witnesses. At the same time the term demonstrates the focus of these people: they are earth-minded, which is to say that they are limited in their view of reality, as if heaven and hell do not exist. They give no credence to the beast from the abyss who killed the witnesses, nor to the Lord about whom they have heard so much from these witnesses.
10 and those who dwell on the earth will rejoice over them and make merry and exchange presents, because these two prophets had been a torment to those who dwell on the earth.