[B-Greek] Rev 17:9 hWDE

Harold R. Holmyard III hholmyard at ont.com
Wed Jun 2 11:52:10 EDT 2004


Dear Daniel,

>What do you think of this translation?:
>
>REV 17:9 Here! The Mind! The-One-having Wisdom! ... The Seven Heads are
>Seven Mountains ... where The Woman sits on them ... and they-are Seven
>Kings.
>When I read Rev, I see an author who constantly writes in sentence fragments
>... kind of how people talk. The word "Here!" (an exclamation) refers to the
>riddle that follows in the same verse. "The Mind!" (another exclamation)
>refers to the person who can figure out the meaning of the riddle. The
>riddle (three short simple statements) refers (in my opinion) possibly to a
>geometry diagram based on gematria.

HH: I'm not really taken with the translation. In the other three 
similar uses of hWDE that Iver mentions (Rev 13:10, 18; 14:12) the 
verb ESTIN is present, and 13:18 uses the same word SOPIA that occurs 
in this verse (17:9). So I am inclined to supply the verb mentally. 
Furthermore, I would not be prone to separate the noun from its 
modifier in a fairly normal attributive construction: "the mind that 
has wisdom." But it is good to be aware of the possibly excited 
nature of John's speech in such a context of visions about the end of 
the age.

				Yours,
				Harold Holmyard




More information about the B-Greek mailing list