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Echoes of Revelation
Revelation never quotes the Old Testament outright, yet no New Testament book refers to it more. See both texts side by side, why they don’t match, and what John does with them.
Revelation 10:3, a loud cry like a lion roaring
The angel's lion-like cry echoes Amos 3:8, where the Lord has roared and the prophet must prophesy, the same chapter John draws on in 10:7.
Revelation 10:3, in every translation this tool compares.
When the coach shouts from the sideline, the team knows the next play is coming. Amos asks who will not fear when a lion roars, and who will not prophesy when the Lord speaks. John's angel cries out like a roaring lion, and thunders answer him. A few verses later John is told to prophesy again. The roar is the call that sets the prophet to work.
A lion's roar as the voice from heaven. Amos 3:8 sets the lion's roar beside the Lord who speaks, and Hosea 11:10 has the Lord roar like a lion. John's angel cries out like a lion.
John's verb for the roar, mykatai, is not the Greek verb of Amos 3:8 or Hosea 11:10, ereuxetai, a difference drawn here. In Amos the lion pictures God; in John the roar comes from the angel. John ties the roar to seven thunders, which Amos does not have. Beale's reason for the link is three verses on: 10:7 clearly uses Amos 3:7.
In Amos the roar means God has spoken and the prophet cannot keep silent. John's roar opens his own new commission to prophesy (10:11). Beale reads the lion as another sign that the speaker is divine, like the Lion of Judah in 5:5. The ESV Study Bible says the roar could belong to that Lion.
Not the devil's roar. The CSB Study Bible notes 1 Peter 5:8, where the devil prowls like a roaring lion, but reads this roar as speaking for the Lion of Judah.
Beale calls it probable that the roar alludes to Amos 3:8, since 10:7 clearly alludes to Amos 3:7, and Amos 3:4-8 joins a lion's roar, a trumpet and the prophets as Revelation 10 does; he credits Bauckham. God's voice is likened to a lion's also in Isaiah 31:4 and Hosea 11:10, and 4 Ezra 11:37 and 12:31 picture the Messiah's judgment as a roaring lion. The NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible cites Hosea 11:10, Amos 1:2 and 3:8. The ESV Study Bible pairs Amos 3:7-8 with the Lion of 5:5. The vault's Septuagint of Amos 3:8 reads leon ereuxetai, a lion will roar, while John writes hosper leon mykatai. Walton notes that a lion roars to freeze its prey as it rushes. The grade is Beale's own word: probable.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 10:3-4
- NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible, note on Revelation 10:3
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 10:1-3
- CSB Study Bible, note on Revelation 10:3-4
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, on Amos 3:4
- Septuagint, Amos 3:8 and Hosea 11:10, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 10:3
