What Does Revelation 17:3 Mean?
So he carries me away in breath into the wilderness, and I perceive a woman sitting upon a scarlet beast, full of names that speak harm, having seven heads and ten horns.
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
So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet coloured beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns.THE KEY
The breath carries you into the wilderness so the beast’s blasphemous names expose the nature of the power beneath the woman.
THE MEANING
The vision meets you in the wilderness: breath opens sight onto power made visible, with a woman seated on a scarlet beast covered in blasphemous names. Seven heads and ten horns give that power an ordered, multiplied shape, while its names disclose the character of its claims.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that domination’s self-given titles make it true; the verse calls those names blasphemous.
THE ROOT
πνεύματι
pneumati
GROWS FROM
πνεῦμα (pneuma), from πνέω (pneō)
To breathe or blow; breath and moving air.
“in breath” in this verse is pneumati. The Greek form is en pneumati, “in pneuma”: one word can mean breath, wind, or spirit. The word keeps the seer’s perception joined to breath in motion as he is carried into the wilderness.
ALSO GROWS
pneō: to breathe, blow
πνέω
The verb behind pneuma keeps the vision’s movement connected to breath in motion.
pnoē: breath, blowing
πνοή
This related word shows how the same breath-root can name moving air as well as the inward breath.
ὀνομάτων
onomatōn
GROWS FROM
ὄνομα
onoma
Name; a designation by which someone or something is known.
The verse says the beast is full of names, not simply that it has generic force. The names disclose the character of what bears the woman: its authority makes itself known through blasphemous claims.
ALSO GROWS
onomazō: to name, designate
ὀνομάζω
Naming makes an identity known, so the beast’s names reveal what its authority claims to be.
anōnymos: unnamed, anonymous
ἀνώνυμος
The contrast with being unnamed brings out that this beast’s character is openly declared through its titles.
βλασφημίας
blasphēmias
GROWS FROM
βλασφημία
blasphēmia
Slanderous or abusive speech, especially speech against what is sacred.
“speak harm” in this verse is blasphēmias. The beast is described through blasphemous names, so its claims already profane the sacred. Its identity is disclosed in what it calls itself before any later action is shown.
ALSO GROWS
blasphēmeō: to speak abusively, blaspheme
βλασφημέω
The related verb makes clear that blasphemy is speech that attacks or dishonors the sacred.
blasphēmos: slanderous, blasphemous
βλάσφημος
This adjective describes the character carried by the beast’s names.
THE PATTERN
The breath carries or opens a seer’s perception so unseen realities become visible.
The hand of the LORD was upon me, and brought me out in the breath of the LORD, and set me down in the midst of the valley, which was full of bones.I was in the breath on the Lord's day, and I heard behind me a great voice, like a trumpet,And he carries me away in the breath to a great and high mountain, and points out to me the great city, the set-apart Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven.THE THREAD
And he carries me away in the breath to a great and high mountain, and points out to me the great city, the set-apart Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven.The phrase “carried me away in the spirit” repeats the same Greek word, pneuma, as this verse. Here the breath carries the vision into the wilderness to expose power under blasphemous names; there it carries the vision toward holy Jerusalem, a city of wholeness.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us