Revelation 20 - In Depth Bible Commentaries

2294 2295 2296 2297
nor his image, and they did not receive the mark upon the forehead and upon their
2294
The negative conjunction ouvde, oude, “nor,” is changed to read the negative correlative
adverb ouvte, oute, “neither” (the two words are synonyms), by Uncial Manuscript 051
and the “Majority Text” (A). The variant reading does not change the meaning of Revelation
at all, and may be a result of the copyists’ working “by ear,” since in Greek the two words
sound almost identical.
2295
There is an ambiguity in the text at this point. Does John mean to further describe
the martyrs by this phrase, or does he mean an additional group of followers of Jesus--those
who refused to worship the beast, or his image, but who did not share with the earlier group in
having been beheaded for their faithful testimony? The language can be taken in both senses.
Aune says “It is more natural to construe the text as referring to a single group of martyrs,
who had been executed for both positive reasons (verse 4b: their obedience to the commands
of God and their witness to Jesus) and negative reasons (verse 4c: their refusal to worship the
beast or its image and to receive its brand on their foreheads and right hands.” (P. 1068)
On this matter of worshiping the beast and his image, see Revelation 13:4 (the dragon),
4 (the beast), 8 (the beast), 12 (the beast), 15 (the image of the beast). Aune calls this a
“‘back reference,” which the author “used to link this section with the same motifs found earlier
in the narrative in Revelation 13...” (P. 1088)
2296
Aune translated by “his brand” (p. 1071).
2297
Following the noun ìÝôùðïí, metopon, “forehead,” the genitive plural personal
pronoun auvtw/n, auton, “their,” is interpolated into the text by Uncial Manuscript 051, Minuscule
1854, the “Majority Text” (A), some manuscripts of the Latin Vulgate, the Philoxenian Syriac
and Beatus of Liebana (8 century A. D.). The interpolation does not change the meaning
th
of Revelation at all, but only makes explicit what is already implicit in the original text.
1013