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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 12:5, she gave birth to a son, a male
John's odd phrase a son, a male copies Isaiah 66:7, where Zion gives birth to a male child before her labor begins.
Revelation 12:5; Revelation 12:2, in every translation this tool compares.
When a speaker keeps an old saying even though it breaks a grammar rule, the slip itself tells you he is quoting. Isaiah 66 pictures Zion giving birth to a male child, a sign of a nation reborn. John writes that she bore a son, a male one. In Greek the word male is in the wrong gender for son. Beale reads the clash as a deliberate pointer back to Isaiah.
In labor, to give birth, and she gave birth to a male. The Greek of Isaiah 66:7 has odinousan tekein and eteken arsen; John has odinousa, tekein and eteken huion arsen.
Isaiah's mother gives birth before her pains come. John's mother cries out in pain first. John adds son, huion, a masculine noun, and then keeps Isaiah's neuter arsen beside it, which breaks Greek agreement. Beale says the addition comes from Isaiah 66:8, where Zion bears sons. In 12:13 John writes the masculine form correctly, so the clash in 12:5 is not a slip.
In Isaiah the male child is Zion reborn, the nation restored after exile. John gives the promise to one person, Christ, who stands for Israel as its king. Beale ties this to verse 17, where the woman also has other children, as Zion bears sons in Isaiah 66:8.
Not careless Greek. Beale points out that John uses the right form in 12:13, and others have concluded the odd neuter comes from Isaiah.
Beale calls the allusion to Isaiah 66:7 evident from the verbal match and from the combination of son and male, based on the parallel of male in 66:7 and sons in 66:8 in the Hebrew. The Hebrew in Sefaria reads vehimlitah zakhar, she delivered a male, and then Zion bore et baneha, her sons. The Targum reads the male as Zion's king. Beale lists this among John's deliberate solecisms, like 1:4, meant to jolt the reader back to the source; he notes Fekkes reads arsen as a noun in apposition instead. Beale also links Zion's flight in Isaiah 66:7 Greek, exephyge, to the woman's flight in 12:6. Keener and the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible cite Isaiah 66:7-10. The grade is drawn here: the Greek is nearly verbatim and the grammar points to it.
Fekkes, as Beale reports, sees no grammatical slip and takes arsen as a noun in apposition to son. Beale answers that John uses the masculine with the article in 12:13, so the neuter in 12:5 is best explained by Isaiah.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 12:2, 12:5 and 12:17
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 12:2
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on Revelation 12:1-2
- Septuagint, Isaiah 66:7-8, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- Hebrew text of Isaiah 66:7-8, Miqra according to the Masorah (Sefaria)
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 12:5 and 12:13
