What Does Revelation 17:15 Mean?
And he says to me, The waters that you perceived, where the harlot sits, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.THE KEY
The waters beneath the woman are humanity gathered into peoples, crowds, nations, and languages.
THE MEANING
The verse names what surrounds the woman in the vision: a vast human collectivity, gathered as peoples, multitudes, nations, and languages. The image speaks now wherever power is pictured as riding on the scale and reach of populations. The waters remain the symbol; the people are what the symbol holds.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The waters are not only a literal sea; the verse itself identifies them with human populations.
THE ROOT
ὕδατα
hydata
GROWS FROM
ὕδωρ
hydōr
water
The plural keeps the water image while the verse names its human referent: peoples, crowds, nations, and languages. The image holds both at once, a mass of waters that is also a multitude of people.
ALSO GROWS
hydría: water jar
ὑδρία
This water word names a vessel that holds water; here the vision names what its waters hold: human populations.
hydrophoros: water-carrier
ὑδροφόρος
This branch presents water as something carried; the verse reveals the human collectivity carried within the vision’s water image.
THE PATTERN
Prophetic waters can carry the sound and force of gathered peoples.
Woe to the roaring of many peoples, who roar like the roar of seas; and to the crashing of nations, who crash like the crashing of mighty waters!Who stills the roar of the seas, the crash of their waves, and the roar of the peoples.One of the seven messengers who hold the seven bowls comes and speaks with me, saying, Come here. I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits upon many waters.THE THREAD
One of the seven messengers who hold the seven bowls comes and speaks with me, saying, Come here. I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits upon many waters.The opening vision shows the woman sitting on many waters; this verse gives those waters a human referent. The shared water word holds the image together as its meaning comes into view.
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