What Does Revelation 12:1 Mean in the King James?
And there appeared a great wonder in heaven; a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars:
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Heaven is not scenery around the woman; it becomes her clothing, her footing, and her crown.
THE MEANING
You meet a sign in which the heavens take bodily form: a woman wears the sun, stands with the moon beneath her feet, and bears twelve stars as a crown. The image makes the sky intimate and embodied, while leaving the woman’s identity open.
THE ROOT
σημεῖον
sēmeion
GROWS FROM
σημ-
sēm-
sign, mark, or indication
The word rendered “wonder” is sēmeion, a sign that points beyond itself. Its word family carries the sense of making something known through a sign, so this vision arrives as a message-bearing image.
ALSO GROWS
sēma: mark, sign, or token
σῆμα
This related noun makes the sign’s marked, recognizable character visible in the root family.
sēmainō: to signify, indicate, or make known
σημαίνω
This verb shows how a sign communicates; the woman and the celestial bodies form an image that can be read.
sēmeioō: to mark or take note of
σημειόω
This verb keeps the sense of a sign that distinguishes something for attention, matching the vision’s presentation as a great sign.
THE PATTERN
Celestial bodies function as a language of signs, gathering cosmic order into an image a person can behold.
And he dreamed yet another dream, and told it his brethren, and said, Behold, I have dreamed a dream more; and, behold, the sun and the moon and the eleven stars made obeisance to me.Who coverest thyself with light as with a garment: who stretchest out the heavens like a curtain:And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;THE THREAD
And there shall be signs in the sun, and in the moon, and in the stars; and upon the earth distress of nations, with perplexity; the sea and the waves roaring;Revelation calls its vision a sēmeion, a sign; Luke uses the same Greek word family for signs in the sun, moon, and stars. In both passages the sky is legible, and here its celestial sign takes the shape of a woman.
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