Tool Alpha
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 16:15, so that he does not walk naked
The warning to keep one's clothes, so that others do not see one's shame, uses the language of Ezekiel's sentence on faithless Jerusalem.
Revelation 16:15, in every translation this tool compares.
A coach who tells the team to stay dressed and ready is warning them not to be caught out. Ezekiel warned faithless Jerusalem that God would gather her lovers against her, strip her and leave her naked for all to see her shame. In the middle of the bowls Jesus breaks in: he comes like a thief. Happy are those who keep watch and keep their clothes on. Otherwise they will be caught naked, and others will see their shame.
Nakedness, shame, and others seeing it. The Greek of Ezekiel 16:37 has God gathering her lovers so that they see all her shame. Ezekiel 16:39 leaves her naked (gymnen) and stripped of her garments (himatia). Revelation 16:15 speaks of keeping one's garments (himatia), walking naked (gymnos) and people seeing one's shame.
Ezekiel announces a sentence on Jerusalem for idolatry; John gives believers a warning so that it need not happen to them. The thief picture comes from Jesus' sayings, not from Ezekiel. Beale notes that Ezekiel 16:37 also has God gathering nations against the city, as in 16:14, 16. John's word for shame (aschemosyne) is close to Ezekiel's word for left indecent in 16:39.
Beale reads the garments as faithfulness under pressure: refusing the beast's demands, as in 3:4-5 and 3:18. Those who compromise will be shown up as idolaters, like the harlot stripped bare in 17:16. The warning sits in the middle of the gathering for war. The final attack will test the church.
Not advice about clothing. The garments stand for faithful lives, and the shame for being exposed as an idolater. The ESV Study Bible links it to Christ's rebukes of Sardis and Laodicea.
Beale says Ezekiel 16:36-39, cited by Wettstein as a general parallel, is probably alluded to, and lists the links in the Greek: idolatry has made Israel a harlot; her shame is uncovered; God gathers nations against her round about; they see all her shame; her garments are stripped; she is left naked and bare. He thinks the verse also develops 3:3-5 and 3:18 and the Gospel saying about the thief (Matthew 24:43; Luke 12:39-40; 1 Thessalonians 5:2). He weighs and sets aside the custom of burning the clothes of temple guards found asleep (Mishnah Middot 1.2). Keener traces the nakedness to the stripping of captives or of an unfaithful woman (Isaiah 47:3; Ezekiel 16:37; Habakkuk 2:16). The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible cites Ezekiel 16:37, Hosea 2:3 and Isaiah 47:3. The grade is drawn here: Beale says probably, and the key words are shared.
Beale finds the main background in the letters to Sardis and Laodicea and in Ezekiel 16. Keener and the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible also name Isaiah 47:3, where Babylon is stripped, and Keener adds Habakkuk 2:16. Some, Beale reports, read the temple-guard custom behind the verse.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/revelation-16-12-21\/","n":"Revelation 16:12-21, the Euphrates dried and Armageddon","s":"The sixth bowl dries up the Euphrates to make way for the kings from the east, and three frog-like spirits from the dragon, the beast and the false prophet gather the kings of the world to battle at the place called Armageddon. The seventh bowl brings a voice saying it is done, the greatest earthquake ever, the splitting of the great city and hundred-pound hailstones.","r":"Revelation 16:12-21"}
- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 16:15
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 16:15
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on Revelation 16:15
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 16:15
- Septuagint, Ezekiel 16:37 and 16:39, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 16:15
