Revelation 6:10
Revelation 6:1010And they cried out in a loud voice, “How long, O Lord, holy and true, until You avenge our blood and judge those who dwell upon the earth?”
Watchtower commentary takes symbolically. The "souls under the altar" are not literally conscious — Revelation is a symbolic book, and the souls' cry for justice is a figure of speech for the unavenged blood of martyrs, comparable to Abel's blood crying from the ground in . Soul-sleep doctrine is preserved by treating the cry as metaphorical, not as evidence of conscious post-mortem existence.
Acknowledge the symbolism in Revelation, then ask what the symbol must depict. The souls cry out specific words ("Until when, Sovereign Lord, holy and true?"). They ask a question. They are given white robes (v11) — you cannot clothe a metaphor for unavenged blood. They are told to wait — you cannot instruct a figure of speech. The Abel comparison backfires: Abel's blood "cries" is a single metaphorical verb; these souls speak, ask, receive, are clothed, and are told to rest. John's symbol depicts conscious persons, not annihilated non-existence. And every NT author depicts the dead as conscious — Paul (Phil 1:23, 2 Cor 5:8), Jesus (, 23:43), Peter (), and now John.