Wahyu 1:4

1:4 From John, ¹  to the seven churches that are in the province of Asia: ²  Grace and peace to you ³  from “he who is,” ⁴  and who was, and who is still to come, ⁵  and from the seven spirits who are before his throne,

Wahyu 12:4

12:4 Now ⁶  the dragon’s ⁷  tail swept away a third of the stars in heaven and hurled them to the earth. Then ⁸  the dragon stood before the woman who was about to give birth, so that he might devour her child as soon as it was born.

Wahyu 14:6

Three Angels and Three Messages

14:6 Then ⁹  I saw another ¹⁰  angel flying directly overhead, ¹¹  and he had ¹²  an eternal gospel to proclaim ¹³  to those who live ¹⁴  on the earth – to every nation, tribe, ¹⁵  language, and people.

[1:4]  ¹ tn Grk “John.” The word “From” is not in the Greek text, but has been supplied to indicate the sender of the letter.

[1:4]  ² tn Grk “Asia”; in the NT this always refers to the Roman province of Asia, made up of about one-third of the west and southwest end of modern Asia Minor. Asia lay to the west of the region of Phrygia and Galatia. The words “the province of” are supplied to indicate to the modern reader that this does not refer to the continent of Asia.

[1:4]  ³ tn It is probable that the ὑμῖν (Jumin) applies to both elements of the greeting, i.e., to both grace and peace.

[1:4]  ⁴ tc The earliest and best mss (Ì^18vid א A C P 2050 al lat sy co) lack the term “God” (θεοῦ, qeou) between “from” (ἀπό, apo) and “he who is” (ὁ ὤν, Jo wn). Its inclusion, as supported by the bulk of the Byzantine witnesses, is clearly secondary and a scribal attempt to achieve two things: (1) to make explicit the referent in the passage, namely, God, and (2) to smooth out the grammar. The preposition “from” in Greek required a noun in the genitive case. But here in Rev 1:4 the words following the preposition “from” (ἀπό) are in another case, i.e., the nominative. There are two principal ways in which to deal with this grammatical anomaly. First, it could be a mistake arising from someone who just did not know Greek very well, or as a Jew, was heavily influenced by a Semitic form of Greek. Both of these unintentional errors are unlikely here. Commenting on this ExSyn 63 argues: “Either of these is doubtful here because (1) such a flagrant misunderstanding of the rudiments of Greek would almost surely mean that the author could not compose in Greek, yet the Apocalypse itself argues against this; (2) nowhere else does the Seer [i.e., John] use a nom. immediately after a preposition (in fact, he uses ἀπό 32 times with the gen. immediately following).” The passage appears to be an allusion to Exod 3:14 (in the LXX) where God refers to himself as “he who is” (ὁ ὤν), the same wording in Greek as here in Rev 1:4. Thus, it appears that John is wanting to leave the divine name untouched (perhaps to allude to God’s immutability, or as a pointer to the Old Testament as the key to unlocking the meaning of this book), irrespective of what it “looks” like grammatically. The translation has placed the “he who is” in quotation marks to indicate to the reader that the syntactical awkwardness is intentional. (For further comments, see ExSyn 63).

[1:4]  ⁵ tn BDAG 106 s.v. ἀπό 5.d states: “The expr. εἰρήνη ἀπὸ ‘ὁ ὢν καὶ ὁ ἦν καὶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος’ Rv 1:4 is quite extraordinary. It may be an interpretation of the name Yahweh already current, or an attempt to show reverence for the divine name by preserving it unchanged, or simply one more of the grammatical peculiarities so frequent in Rv.”

[12:4]  ⁶ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “now” to indicate that this remark is virtually parenthetical.

[12:4]  ⁷ tn Grk “its”; the referent (the dragon) has been specified in the translation for clarity.

[12:4]  ⁸ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence of events within the vision.

[14:6]  ⁹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “then” to indicate the implied sequence within the narrative.

[14:6]  ¹⁰ tc Most mss (Ì47 א* Ï sa) lack ἄλλον (allon, “another”) here, but the support for it is stronger (Ì^115vid א² A C P 051 1006 1611 1841 2053 2329 al latt sy bo). The problem that its inclusion represents is that there is no reference to any other angel in the immediate context (the last mention was in 11:15). In this instance, the longer reading is harder. The word was probably intentionally omitted in order to resolve the tension; less likely, it might have been accidentally omitted since its spelling is similar to “angel” (ἄγγελος, angelos).

[14:6]  ¹¹ tn L&N 1.10 states, “a point or region of the sky directly above the earth – ‘high in the sky, midpoint in the sky, directly overhead, straight above in the sky.’”

[14:6]  ¹² tn Grk “having.”

[14:6]  ¹³ tn Or “an eternal gospel to announce as good news.”

[14:6]  ¹⁴ tn Grk “to those seated on the earth.”

[14:6]  ¹⁵ tn Grk “and tribe,” but καί (kai) has not been translated here or before the following term since English normally uses a coordinating conjunction only between the last two elements in a series of three or more.