What Does Revelation 17:5 Mean?
And on her forehead is written a name, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND OF THE STENCHES OF THE EARTH.
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 upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.THE KEY
The mystery is written in plain sight: her public name reveals a nature that multiplies itself.
THE MEANING
Her forehead makes her nature legible: she is named as Babylon the Great, the source of harlotry and the earth’s abominations. “Mystery” stands openly written, while “mother” shows that this nature reproduces itself through what she brings forth.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that being called “great” means being life-giving: her maternity produces harlotry and abominations.
THE ROOT
ὄνομα
onoma
GROWS FROM
ὀνοματ-
onomat-
Name, designation, or recognized identity.
Here, a name carries more than a label: it makes her nature legible. The titles that follow, Babylon, mother of harlots and abominations, unfold what that nature produces.
ALSO GROWS
onomazō: To name or call by name.
ὀνομάζω
The act of naming makes an identity publicly recognizable, as the inscription does here.
onomastos: Named, renowned, or well known.
ὀνομαστός
A name can carry a reputation; this inscription spells out the nature behind hers.
γεγραμμένον
gegrammenon
GROWS FROM
γράφω
graphō
To write, inscribe, or record.
Her name is displayed rather than merely spoken: the written form makes her character visible. The inscription stays before the reader as a public mark of what she embodies.
ALSO GROWS
graphē: Writing or a written text.
γραφή
The name on her forehead is a written statement about her nature.
gramma: A letter or written document.
γράμμα
The word’s family links the abstract name to marks that can be seen and read.
μήτηρ
mētēr
GROWS FROM
μητρ-
mētr-
Mother; a source that brings forth.
“Mother” makes the image generative: her nature produces more than one isolated act. The verse names her as a source whose offspring bear the character of harlotry and abomination.
ALSO GROWS
mētra: Womb.
μήτρα
The word’s family evokes what brings forth, reinforcing the image of a nature that produces offspring.
mētropolis: Mother-city; a city that is a source or center.
μητρόπολις
This branch echoes the image of Babylon as a source from which others take their character.
THE PATTERN
A mark or name on the forehead makes visible the nature or allegiance that shapes a person.
And the LORD said to him, Pass through the midst of the city, through the midst of Jerusalem, and set a mark upon the foreheads of the men who sigh and moan over all the loathsome things done in her midst.And I perceive, and behold, the Lamb stands upon Mount Zion, and with him one hundred and forty-four thousand, having his name and his Father's name written upon their foreheads.And they will look upon his face, and his name will be upon their foreheads.THE THREAD
And I perceive, and behold, the Lamb stands upon Mount Zion, and with him one hundred and forty-four thousand, having his name and his Father's name written upon their foreheads.The same word for “name” and the same word family for “written” recur in the forehead inscription. The name shifts from Babylon’s nature to the Father’s, setting two opposing identities side by side.
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