Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Revelation 1:15

χαλκολιβάνῳ. The ancients were not clear whether this word meant brass (or, strictly speaking, bronze) as clear as a scented gum, or a scented gum that shone like brass; the former sense is decidedly most probable from the context, the various and the parallel passages. Anyway the word seems to be a compound of χαλκὸς and λίβανος, which is borrowed from a Hebrew word meaning white, which is feminine. Possibly this may account for the well-attested reading πεπυρωμένης. Perhaps the real meaning is “white brass,” i. e. the Latin orichalcum (vid. Verg. Aen. XII. 87), which was like gold (Cic. Off. III. xxiii. 92)—i. e. perhaps was our “brass” as distinct from bronze. In Ezekiel 1:4; Ezekiel 1:27; Ezekiel 8:2 we have a word which probably (comparing ibid. Ezekiel 1:7; Ezekiel 40:3; Daniel 10:6) means the same, but which the LXX. translate electrum—meaning perhaps by this not amber, but an alloy of gold with silver or other metal. Some think that sense suitable here, as symbolising the divine and human natures of our Lord.

πεπυρωμένης. The genitive absolute is not in the general style of the writer; the construction must be “like unto fine brass as though it [the brass] had been burnt in a furnace.” Anyway incense cannot be meant, which would be burnt in a censer not a furnace and consumed not refined by burning.

ἡ φωνὴ αὐτοῦ.… Cf. Ezekiel 43:2 (Heb.; but LXX. φωυὴ τῆς παρεμβολῆς ὡς φωνὴ διπλασιαζόντων πολλῶν).

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Cambridge Greek Testament Commentary

Revelation 1:15

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