What Does Revelation 22:18 Mean?
I bear witness to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this scroll. If anyone lays upon them, God will lay upon him the blows written in this scroll.
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
For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book:THE KEY
The same Greek verb names both the human addition and God’s answering addition of the book’s plagues.
THE MEANING
This warning speaks to each person who hears these words now: adding to the prophecy brings the plagues written in the book upon that person. The same verb names the human addition and God’s answer, making the consequence a mirror of the act.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the belief that a sacred message can be enlarged without consequence: this verse binds adding to the prophecy to the plagues written in the book.
THE ROOT
ἐπιθῇ
epithē
GROWS FROM
τίθημι
tithēmi
To put, set, or place; with ἐπί (epi), “upon,” the compound can mean to place upon or add.
“lays upon” in this verse is epithē. The Greek verb pictures adding as placing something upon the prophecy. The same compound returns for what God adds to the person who does it, so the consequence mirrors the act in the verse’s own language.
ALSO GROWS
epitithēmi: To put upon; to add.
ἐπιτίθημι
This is the verb used for both the person’s addition and God’s response in this verse.
prostithēmi: To add or put to.
προστίθημι
This related form also describes adding, showing how the root’s basic image of placing becomes the language of addition.
THE PATTERN
Adding to a received divine word is treated as an alteration with consequences.
You shall not add to the word which I command you, nor shave anything away from it, that you may guard the commandments of the LORD your God which I command you.Do not add to his words, lest he reprove you, and you be found a liar.But even if we, or a messenger from the heavens, preach any other gospel to you than what we have preached to you, let him be given over.THE THREAD
And if anyone takes away from the words of the scroll of this prophecy, God will take away his portion from the tree of life and from the set-apart city, and from the things written in this scroll.The next verse completes the boundary by naming removal as a matching violation. Together, the warnings account for adding to the prophecy and taking words away from it.
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