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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 19:13, a robe dipped in blood and the winepress
The rider's blood-soaked robe and his treading of the winepress come from Isaiah 63:1-3, where God returns from Edom with garments stained from trampling the nations.
Revelation 19:13; Revelation 19:15, in every translation this tool compares.
A soldier coming home in a mud-caked uniform tells the town what battle he has fought. In Isaiah 63 a figure comes from Edom in red garments. He has trampled the grapes alone, and the nations' blood has spattered his clothes. That figure is God himself. John's rider wears a bloodied robe and tramples the grapes of God's anger. Isaiah's divine warrior is Jesus.
A garment stained with blood, and a lone figure treading the winepress (lenos) as judgment on the nations. Isaiah 63:2-3 asks why the garments are red. The answer is that the nations' blood stained them. John's rider wears a bloodied robe and treads the winepress of God's fury.
Isaiah's warrior is God; John's is Christ. Isaiah says the blood was spattered on the garments. John says the robe was dipped. Beale calls dipped John's own equivalent of the Hebrew sprinkled; some copies of Revelation change it back to sprinkled. Isaiah tells the story after the battle. John shows the stained robe before the battle is told.
Beale reads the stains as God's justice, about to be carried out on the oppressors of his people. In Isaiah the warrior acts for vengeance and redemption; both are here. John does not soften the picture, but he puts it in the hands of the Lamb.
Not proof that the blood must be the enemy's alone. Some readers take it as Christ's own blood or the martyrs'. Beale and the NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible think the enemy's blood most likely.
Beale calls this a clear allusion to Isaiah 63:1-3 and says the allusion continues in verse 15 with the winepress of God's wrath (Isaiah 63:2-6). The Hebrew of Isaiah 63:3 reads veyez nitzcham al begaday, their juice spattered on my garments. The vault's Septuagint has my garments are defiled, without spattered. Beale notes a Palestinian Targum on Genesis 49:11 also changes the verb to dipped when it uses Isaiah 63 of the Messiah. He says Jewish readers took Isaiah 63 of the final judgment, sometimes of Rome or of Gog and Magog. Keener, the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, the ESV Study Bible, the CSB Study Bible and Wright all name Isaiah 63. Walton notes Assyrian kings boasted of lands dyed red with enemy blood. The grade is Beale's: clear allusion.
Whose blood? Beale and the NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible say the enemy's, as in Isaiah 63. The CSB Study Bible says the robe looks back to Jesus' death and forward to the winepress. Wright reads the real weapons as Jesus' own blood and self-giving love. Caird and Sweet, as Beale reports, take it as the blood of Christ or the martyrs. MacArthur says the blood is the enemies' but not from Armageddon, which begins only in verse 15; it stands for the battles Christ has already won over sin, Satan and death.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 19:13 and 19:15
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 19:13
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Revelation 19:11-21 and 19:13
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 19:15
- CSB Study Bible, note on Revelation 19:11-13
- NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible, note on Revelation 19:13
- N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone, comment on Revelation 19:11-21
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, on Isaiah 63:3-6
- Septuagint, Isaiah 63:2-3, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- Hebrew text of Isaiah 63:3, Miqra according to the Masorah (Sefaria)
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 19:13 and 19:15
- John MacArthur, The MacArthur Study Bible (ESV), note on Revelation 19:13
