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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 7:9, a crowd no one could count
The great multitude that no one could number recalls God's promise to Abraham and Jacob of descendants too many to count.
Revelation 7:9, in every translation this tool compares.
A promise kept on a bigger scale than anyone expected is still the same promise. God told Abraham to count the stars if he could, and told Jacob his offspring would be like sand too many to number. John now sees a crowd so large no one could count it. It is drawn from every nation and tribe, every people and tongue. Beale hears in it the promise of a countless family coming true.
A multitude too large to number. The Greek of Genesis 32:12 and 16:10 has a seed that will not be counted (ouk arithmethesetai) for its multitude; John has a crowd which no one could count (arithmesai).
The promise in Genesis is to Abraham's offspring, Israel. John's crowd comes from every nation. Genesis looks ahead; John sees the crowd already standing before the throne in white robes.
Beale reads the crowd as the final fulfillment of the promise to Abraham. The descendants he was promised turn out to include people from every nation who belong to the Lamb. For Beale that makes the crowd one more way John calls the church God's Israel.
Not a denial that the crowd is huge but real. Keener notes that innumerable meant too many to count, not infinite.
Beale hears in the uncountable crowd the promise made to Abraham and to Jacob, citing above all the Greek of Genesis 32:13 (32:12 in English) and 16:10, with 13:16, 15:5, 22:17, 26:4 and Hosea 1:10. In the vault's Septuagint, Genesis 32:12 and 16:10 both have ouk arithmethesetai apo tou plethous. He reports Bauckham's view that 7:9 alludes to the promise of a multitude of nations (Genesis 17:4), signposted by putting nation first in the list, and qualifies it. He notes Jewish writings that saw the census of Numbers as a fulfillment of the same promise, which links the counted tribes to the uncountable crowd. The CSB Study Bible's cross-references at 7:9 list Genesis 15:5 and 32:12. The phrase every nation, tribe, people and language comes from Daniel, as at 5:9. The grade is drawn here: the idea is traceable to the patriarchal promise.
Beale, the ESV Study Bible and Wright read the crowd as the same people as the 144,000, heard and then seen. Heiser, with Aune, reads them as Gentiles alongside the Jewish 144,000. Keener notes both readings. MacArthur reads two groups: the Jewish 144,000 on earth and, here, their converts from every people, saved in a tribulation still to come and now in heaven.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 7:9 and The Abrahamic Promise
- CSB Study Bible, cross-references at Revelation 7:9
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 7:9-12
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 7:9
- N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone, comment on Revelation 7:1-8
- Septuagint, Genesis 15:5, 16:10 and 32:12, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 7:9
- John MacArthur, The MacArthur Study Bible (ESV), note on Revelation 7:1-17 and 7:9
