What Does Revelation 17:6 Mean?
And I perceive the woman drunk with the blood of the set-apart ones and with the blood of the witnesses of Jesus, and when I perceive her, I gaze at her in great wonder.
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 I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.THE KEY
The verse’s “martyrs” are witnesses in Greek, making the blood she drinks the blood of testimony.
THE MEANING
The woman’s drunkenness is fed by the blood of those set apart and those who bear witness to Jesus. The seer’s great wonder stands beside that violence, holding astonishment and bloodshed in the same frame.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the assumption that what overwhelms the eye must be admirable: here, wonder sits beside the blood feeding the spectacle.
THE ROOT
μαρτύρων
martyrōn
GROWS FROM
μάρτυς
martys
witness; one who gives testimony
English “martyrs” foregrounds death, while μάρτυς (martys, witness) keeps testimony inside the word. The woman’s violence is directed at witnesses of Jesus, and the blood does not make their witness disappear.
ALSO GROWS
martyria: testimony, witness
μαρτυρία
The same word-family names the testimony borne by witnesses, keeping their message present in the image of their blood.
martyreō: to bear witness, testify
μαρτυρέω
This verb makes the root active: the people named here are identified by the witness they bear.
ἁγίων
hagiōn
GROWS FROM
ἅγιος
hagios
set apart, distinct
“set-apart ones” in this verse is hagiōn. English “saints” can sound like a religious rank; ἅγιος (hagios) means set apart. The verse names those set apart among the people whose blood the woman consumes.
ALSO GROWS
hagiazō: to set apart, consecrate
ἁγιάζω
The verb shows the action held within the word-family: to mark something as set apart.
hagiasmos: consecration, set-apartness
ἁγιασμός
This noun names the state of being set apart, the quality carried by “saints” in the verse.
ἐθαύμασα
ethaúmasa
GROWS FROM
θαυμα-
thauma-
wonder, astonishment; being struck by what is seen
“gaze at her in great wonder” in this verse is ethaúmasa. The Greek uses a form of θαυμάζω (thaumazō, marvel) alongside θαῦμα μέγα (thauma mega, great wonder). It names astonishment, which can stand beside the scene without meaning approval of it.
ALSO GROWS
thaumazō: to marvel, be astonished
θαυμάζω
This verb names the seer’s response as being struck with wonder.
thaumastos: astonishing, marvelous
θαυμαστός
This related word describes something that provokes wonder, echoing the seer’s reaction to the woman.
THE PATTERN
The blood of the slain remains visible and speaks against the power that spills it.
And the LORD said, What have you done? The voice of your brother's blood cries out to me from the ground.And when he opens the fifth seal, I see beneath the altar the living souls of those slaughtered for the word of God and for the witness they held.And in her was found the blood of prophets, and of the set-apart ones, and of all who were slaughtered on the ground.THE THREAD
And they overcame him through the blood of the Lamb, and through the word of their witness, and they did not love their living souls, even unto death.“Testimony” here is μαρτυρία (martyria), from the same word-family as μαρτύρων (martyrōn, “martyrs” or witnesses) in Revelation 17:6. This verse shows that witness remains in the story even through death, opening the woman’s blood-drinking as violence against testimony that continues.
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