The following is my planned opening argument in the Revelation 16:5 debate:
The angel of the waters said (and John heard), “hosios” (or perhaps hesed) and John wrote by inspiration of the Holy Spirit and command of Jesus Christ, “hosios.” Therefore, Beza was wrong to replace “hosios” with “esomenos,” and the King James translators ought not to have followed Beza’s reading.
Today’s debate is significant because of Revelation’s warning against adding to or diminishing from God’s word. Today’s debate is also significant because this is one of the places where the evidence is overwhelmingly against the King James text. In fact, unlike most textual variants, we can pinpoint the particular document that introduced this textual variant into the textual tradition: a manual markup by Theodore Beza of his own previous printed edition. The external and internal evidence could hardly be any stronger than they are in this example.
The External Evidence
The overwhelming majority of Greek manuscripts (including the four earliest manuscripts) have hosios. The few that do not have hosios do not substitute esomenos for hosios.
The same is true of the translations of the Bible before the age of printing: Syriac, Armenian, Georgian, Ethiopic, Multiple Old Latin translations, Jerome’s Vulgate, and Old Church Slavonic have an equivalent of hosios. There are two branches of Coptic, one of which has the equivalent of hosios, and one which does not. Likewise, Arabic appears to have the equivalent of hosios. On the other hand, one Middle English version does not have the equivalent of hosios, but it also does not replace it with the equivalent of esomenos.
The same is true of the commentaries on the text. The commentaries, whether in Greek or in any other language, either reflect the presence of the word hosios or, if they do not, do not reflect esomenos as a substitute for hosios. Aside from commentaries, there are no patristic quotations of the text of Revelation 16:5 (that I could find).
In 1505, Erasmus published Lorenzo Valla’s comments on Revelation 16:5. As published by Erasmus in 1505, Valla seems to be suggesting that his Greek manuscript of Revelation had hagios not hosios. As there is no such manuscript tradition, my suspicion is that Valla (or Erasmus) had notes in Latin and back translated from sanctus to the more common Greek word hagios.
That’s not to suggest that there is no textual difficulty with hosios in Revelation 16:5. There are a cluster of variant readings (all including hosios), presumably because using the adjective hosios with an article is not standard Greek. This bothered Beza, who called attention to this issue when arguing for his substitution of esomenos for hosios. This, of course, leads us to the question of the internal evidence.
The Internal Evidence
Revelation 13 had introduced to us that the Beast demanded everyone’s worship and killed those who didn’t worship him. Revelation 14 warned of the coming judgment for the beast worshippers. Revelation 15 introduces seven angels with seven bowls full of the wrath of God. Revelation 16 then provides discussion of these seven angels pouring out these bowls of God’s wrath.
Revelation 15:2-4
And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, [and] over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps of God. And they sing the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, Great and marvellous [are] thy works, Lord God Almighty; just and true [are] thy ways, thou King of [ages]. Who shall not fear thee, O Lord, and glorify thy name? for [thou] only [art] holy: for all nations shall come and worship before thee; for thy judgments are made manifest.
The word translated “holy” in “thou only art holy” is the word hosios. It is the only other time that John uses the word hosios, and the word is only used a few other times in the New Testament:
[Act 2:27 KJV] 27 Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One[G3741] to see corruption.
[Act 13:34-35 KJV] 34 And as concerning that he raised him up from the dead, [now] no more to return to corruption, he said on this wise, I will give you the sure mercies[G3741] of David. 35 Wherefore he saith also in another [psalm], Thou shalt not suffer thine Holy One[G3741] to see corruption.
[1Ti 2:8 KJV] 8 I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy[G3741] hands, without wrath and doubting.
[Tit 1:8 KJV] 8 But a lover of hospitality, a lover of good men, sober, just, holy,[G3741] temperate;
[Heb 7:26 KJV] 26 For such an high priest became us, [who is] holy,[G3741] harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners, and made higher than the heavens;
It may not be immediately obvious, but hosios carries the sense of “keeping the covenant” (i.e. the same meaning as Hebrew hesed) or otherwise being “religiously correct.” That’s why the word is translated as “holy one” in Acts 2:27 and 13:35 but as “sure mercies” in Acts 13:34, both of which are quoting from the Old Testament where the Hebrew word is hesed or hasid (Psalm 16:10 “Holy One” (ḥāsîḏ) and Isaiah 55:3 “mercies” (ḥeseḏ)). Paul and the author of Hebrews, not quoting from the Old Testament, use the word in its more general sense of religious correctness.
In context, in Revelation 15, the word hosios is connected with God’s covenant-keeping duty of bringing judgment on those who hurt his covenant people: as it is written, Vengeance is Mine, saith the Lord, I will repay. Thus, it does not carry its more general sense of religious correctness (as in the epistles), but rather to the covenantal relationship between God and His people.
In Revelation 16, the angels pour out their bowls of wrath. The third angel is described this way:
Revelation 16:4-7
And the third angel poured out his vial upon the rivers and fountains of waters; and they became blood. 5 And I heard the angel of the waters say, Thou art righteous, [[O Lord,]] which art, and wast, [[and shalt be O Holy One!]], because thou hast judged thus. For they have shed the blood of saints and prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink; for they are worthy. And I heard another out of the altar say, Even so, Lord God Almighty, true and righteous [are] thy judgments.
The voice from the altar seems to allude to the martyrs mentioned with reference the fifth seal back in Revelation 6:9-11, where the martyrs “cried with a loud voice” for God’s vengeance and were located “under the altar.”
[Rev 6:9-11 KJV] 9 And when he had opened the fifth seal, I saw under the altar the souls of them that were slain for the word of God, and for the testimony which they held: 10 And they cried with a loud voice, saying, How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth? 11 And white robes were given unto every one of them; and it was said unto them, that they should rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren, that should be killed as they [were], should be fulfilled.
The parallel between “true and righteous [are] thy judgments” in Revelation 16 and “just and true [are] thy ways” in the song in Chapter 15 should immediately apparent. Others have noted additional parallels. With that in mind, hosios in Revelation 16:5, while an usual word in itself, is the correct word to make the connection back to Revelation 15.
In addition, referring to God as the one who is Hosios here makes sense because this is the fulfillment of God’s promise of judgment on those who hurt His people.
There is an additional parallel problem to be addressed. The phrase preceding hosios is found similarly in four other passages: Revelation 1:4, 1:8, and 11:17 have the phrase, “ho on kai ho en,” and Revelation 4:8 has the phrase “ho en kai ho on.” God as the “Being One” and “He who has been” are divine titles that, like ego eime (I AM) are connected to the tetragrammaton YHWH.
In itself this, of course, would seem to be basically irrelevant to the wording here. What makes it more relevant is that Beza believed that in all four of those previous instances, the phrase had been followed by “ho erchomenos” (the Coming One). It has been tempting to commentators to link the present participle and imperfect indicative of the verb “to be” together with “the coming one” to form a “past, present, future” set. Moreover, the tetragrammaton has been taken by many as having, including, or at least being based on a future sense, “I shall be,” making some kind of reference to the future seem fitting.
However, Beza was wrong to believe that all four previous instances were followed by the expression, “the coming one.” Although a minority of manuscripts do have “the coming one” in Revelation 11:17, the majority of manuscripts (quite properly) do not have that title there. The reason it is is proper not to have it there is that by Revelation 11, God has already come in judgment. For the same reason, of course, such a title is not appropriate in the mouth of the angel in Revelation 16, because judgment has already begun to have been meted out.
Beza recognized the impropriety of including ho erchomenos here, but still felt that it was not right to leave “the being one” and “He who has been” without a third partner, and so he substituted esomenos for hosios. Beza’s annotations say that this is a reading that was “restored from an old reliable manuscript.”
Is it possible that such a manuscript once existed or even still exists somewhere? Many things are possible. What is startling, however, is that no one who has collated manuscripts of Revelation (including Hoskier, who collated almost all the manuscripts that were known before World War II) has ever seen such a manuscript. On top of that, Beza is not known to have have personally possessed any Greek manuscripts of Revelation.
Henry Stephanus collated manuscripts in that time, and seems to have provided collation notes to Theodore Beza. However, while Stephanus’ published apparatus notes one textual variant at Revelation 16:5, this variant is not identified. It is believed that Stephanus had additional textual variants noted in his unpublished collation notes, but that document itself seems to have been lost.
Ultimately, while it makes for an interesting historical question (whether Beza’s annotations mischaracterize the manuscript record), it’s essentially a moot point. Even if such a manuscript existed, we would not find such a manuscript a persuasive reason to overturn all the rest of the manuscript and version tradition, nor would we find such a reading persuasive on internal grounds.
After all, the conjugation esomenos never appears in the New Testament. Septuagint Job seems to use the word once, but not as title of God. The use of esomenos as potentially a divine title seems to have its origins in Christian adoption of Greek philosophy, particularly (in this instance) Plato’s Timaeus. Aldo Manuzio printed Plato’s collected works, first in 1513, even before Erasmus’ first edition of the Greek New Testament in 1516. We know that Beza read Plato. Jeffrey Mallinson states: “Despite these negative sentiments, there are other instances in which Beza speaks positively of Plato. This practice follows a Renaissance trend to harmonize Plato and Aristotle. An important example of this harmonization is found in Jean de Serres’ … three-volume edition of the works of Plato, which contains translation and accompanying explanation of the text. … A Latin poem lauding Plato and de Serres, composed by Beza, is affixed to the first volume. Also, at de Serres’ request, Beza passed on a copy of the Platonis opera to Peter Young, tutor to Scotland’s James VI, and sent the work with a letter of recommendation.” Faith, Reason, and Revelation, Chapter 2 “Beza’s Academic Challenge” (p. 61)
I have argued for the propriety of the word "hosios" in Revelation 16:5, contending it was wrongly replaced with "esomenos" by Theodore Beza and subsequently adopted by the King James translators. The evidence presented includes the overwhelming support for "hosios" in early Greek manuscripts, ancient translations, and commentaries, contrasted with Beza's singular alteration. Internally, "hosios" connects to its usage in Revelation 15 and other New Testament verses, emphasizing God's covenant-keeping and just judgment, aligning with the context of wrath being poured out in Revelation 16. Beza's substitution is traced to a potentially non-existent manuscript and his philosophical leanings, which are deemed less credible than the weight of existing textual evidence.
