What Does Revelation 16:1 Mean in the King James?
And I heard a great voice out of the temple saying to the seven angels, Go your ways, and pour out the vials of the wrath of God upon the earth.
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
The Greek joins heat to pouring: God’s anger is pictured as a force released from the temple into the earth.
THE MEANING
A voice from the temple commands the seven messengers to pour out the bowls of God’s anger upon the earth. The scene gives that anger a physical trajectory: it leaves the bowls and reaches the world. The violence remains explicit, the earth receives the judgment.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It dissolves the belief that divine anger is only an inward feeling: here it becomes an act that reaches the earth.
THE ROOT
ἐκχέετε
ekcheete
GROWS FROM
χέω
cheō
Pour or spill; joined with ἐκ- (ek, “out”), it means pour outward.
“pour out” in this verse is ekcheete. The verb traces a movement from what is contained to what reaches the earth. The same verb describes God pouring out breath upon all flesh in Acts 2:17, showing a shared image of release even as the contents and consequences differ.
ALSO GROWS
cheō: Pour; spill.
χέω
This base verb supplies the action inside the command to pour the bowls out.
ekcheō: Pour out; shed.
ἐκχέω
The compound adds outward movement, matching the bowls’ contents reaching the earth.
θυμοῦ
thymou
GROWS FROM
θυμ-
thym-
Anger, heat, or a surge of passion.
The Greek word presents wrath as anger with heat and force. Paired with “pour out,” that heat is given a direction: it moves from the bowls onto the earth.
ALSO GROWS
thymos: Anger, heat, or passion.
θυμός
This is the noun whose genitive form names what the bowls contain.
thymoō: Become angry; be moved to anger.
θυμόω
The related verb presents the same anger as something that rises into action, as in Matthew 2:16.
THE PATTERN
What God releases reaches the world and makes its effects visible.
Upon the wicked he shall rain snares, fire and brimstone, and an horrible tempest: this shall be the portion of their cup.And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:And the angel took the censer, and filled it with fire of the altar, and cast it into the earth: and there were voices, and thunderings, and lightnings, and an earthquake.THE THREAD
And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams:The same Greek verb, ἐκχέω (ekcheō, “pour out”), appears in both verses. Acts uses it for God pouring out breath upon all flesh; Revelation uses it for the bowls poured upon the earth. The shared verb makes release the common action while the contents and consequences remain distinct.
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