[B-Greek] Revelation 14:4--PARQENOI GAR EISIN

Leonard Jayawardena leonardj at live.com
Sat Sep 13 06:07:03 EDT 2008




_______________________________
> From: Revdougpickrel at aol.com
> Date: Thu, 11 Sep 2008 14:14:11 -0400
> Subject: Re: [B-Greek] Revelation 14:4--PARQENOI GAR EISIN
> To: leonardj at live.com; b-greek at lists.ibiblio.org
>
> Heres a thought, suppose these 144,000 were both men and women from all twelve tribes who have not worshipped Idols of any type, therefore considered to by virgins.  If you would notice that none from the tribes of Dan and Ephraim were sealed and set apart?
>
> Rev. Doug Pickrel, Litt.D.
> Tejas Valley
> San Antonio, Texas

LJ:  I am not sure I understand exactly how you interpret this passage from the little you have written, but I'll try to respond to your question as best as I understand it.

The issue is how exactly we are to understand PARQENOI in Rev. 14:4.  The clause PARQENOI GAR EISIN following immediately on the words hOUTOI EISIN hOI META GUNAIKWN OUK EMOLUNQHSAN at least prima facie suggests that the reference is to a group of men who have preserved their virginity and so kept themselves from being defiled by having sex with women, with the implication that having sex with a woman per se defiles a man. This obvious natural meaning is the reason why Rev. 14:4 is listed in BDAG as an instance of the use of PARQENOS in the sense of "male virgin." All the other documents listed in BDAG for this sense of PARQENOS are all post-GNT Christian literature. An Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon based on the seventh edition of Liddell and Scott's Greek-English Lexicon has the following under PARQENOS: "... as masc., [PARQENOS, hO], an unmarried man, N.T. (Deriv. unknown.)." In my previous posts I have argued, based mainly on the way PARQENOS is used in Rev. 14:4, that PARQENOS could not have included the meaning "male virgin" for John and his readers (in the last half of the first century). Therefore the meaning of "male virgin" for PARQENOS seems to be a later lexical development. 

As you noted correctly, the tribe of Dan is missing from the list of tribes in Rev. 7 though it purports to list "every tribe of the sons of Israel" (v. 4). The twelve tribes are made up by the inclusion of the tribe of Manasseh in addition to the tribe of Joseph (!), though the tribe of Joseph consisted of both Ephraim and Manasseh. The fact that the tribe of Dan is omitted despite the fact that it is included in every enumeration of the twelve tribes in the OT is a huge problem for those who would interpret the list of tribes in Rev. 7 literally. But it is not a problem for those students of Revelation who have understood that the impossibility of a literal application is commonly used in the book to point the reader towards a figurative interpretation, the list of "twelve" tribes in Rev. 7 being a case in point. (I have coined this hermeneutical principle "the principle of the impossibility of a literal application" in my last post, in which I have given further illustrations of this principle both from the book of Revelation and the OT.) This clue along with many others in the book indicate that the 144,000 represent the NT church.

With regard to your idea that these 144,000 are both men and women from all "twelve" tribes, who are considered virgins because they have not worshipped Idols, 

(a) How did you conclude that the 144,000 consist of both men and women? The clause  PARQENOI GAR EISIN sandwiched as it is between the words hOUTOI EISIN hOI META GUNAIKWN OUK EMOLUNQHSAN and hOUTOI hOI AKOLOUQOUNTES TWi ARNIWi ... imply that the 144,000 are a group of men--though, of course, they are not as we learn from other clues in the book. Therefore to understand the words hOUTOI EISIN hOI META GUNAIKWN OUK EMOLUNQHSAN as including women also you have to show what hermeneutical principle you apply and what scriptures you appeal to for such a non-literal interpretation. You cannot just interpret these words in a figurative sense arbitrarily just because you do not like the implications of a literal interpretation.

(b) In what sense do you understand "virgins" in your interpretation? Spiritual virgins? The figure of a female virgin is used of the church in 2 Corinthians 11:2, GAR hUMAS QEOU ZHLW hHRMOSUNHN GAR hUMAS hENI ANDRI PARQENON hAGNHN PARASTHSAI TWi CRISTWi, which is based on the relationship between God and Israel of the OT,  and this is exactly how I think PARQENOI is used in Rev. 14:4. But a male virgin is never used in the Scriptures anywhere as a symbol of spiritual purity. My position is that a figurative intepretation of PARQENOI in Rev. 14:4 becomes available only if that word PARQENOS could not have the sense "male virgin" at the time Revelation was written.  In the previous post I have replied to the suggestion by another lister that PARQENOI in Rev. 14:4 is a predicative adjective (q.v.). I have shown that even as an adjective the word would refer to sexual virginity in Rev. 14:4.

(c) How did you arrive at the conclusion that the 144,000 are called virgins because they have not worshipped any idols? What is your basis for it? I too interpret the words hOUTOI EISIN hOI META GUNAIKWN OUK EMOLUNQHSAN in a figurative way but I have given the justification for it in the previous post, in which you will see my interpretation of Rev. 14:4 in some detail.


Leonard Jayawardena
Sri Lanka
 

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