4 | Και
ειδον θρονους και εκαθισαν επ αυτους και κριμα εδοθη αυτοις, και τας
ψυχας των πεπελεκισμενων δια την μαρτυριαν ι(ησο)υ και δια τον λογον του
θ(εο)υ, και οιτινες ου προσεκυνησαν το θηριον ουδε την εικονα αυτου,
και ουκ ελαβον το χαραγμα επι το μετωπον και επι την χειρα αυτων, και
εζησαν και εβασιλευσαν μετα του χ(ριστο)υ χιλια ετη. |
5 | αυτη η αναστασις η πρωτη· |
6 | μακαριος
και αγιος ο εχων μερος εν τη αναστασει τη πρωτη· επι τουτων ο δευτερος
θανατος ουκ εχει εξουσιαν· αλλ εσονται ιερεις του θ(εο)υ και του
χ(ριστο)υ, και βασιλευσουσιν μετ αυτου χιλια ετη.
|
Fully non-extant witnesses:
P18. P24. P43. P47. P85. P98. P115. 04. 025. 052. 0163. 0169. 0207. 0229. 0308. 69. 1828. 2019. 2351. 2924. L546
|
1 |
a |
om.
01. 02. 046. 35. 61. 82. 93. 104. 141. 177. 201. 218. 250. 325. 452. 456. 469. 498. 522. 620. 632. 792. 808. 911. 1006. 1424. 1719. 1732. 1734. 1780. 1795. 1849. 1852. 1854. 1872. 1888. 2042. 2048. 2050. 2053. 2057. 2070. 2076. 2138. 2200. 2256. 2329. 2344. 2350. 2377. 2436. 2495. 2582. 2672. 2681. 2723. 2845. 2846. 2847. 2886. 2917. 2919. 2921. NA28NS
|
|
b |
ξβ
051. 91. 367. 506. 1611. 1637. 1773. 2026. 2028. 2037. 2056. 2067. 2071. 2073. 2074. 2077. 2080. 2081. 2286. 2429. 2432. 2595. 2814
|
|
c |
ξγ
254
|
|
— |
|
|
2-22 |
a |
οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
02. 2846. NA28NS
|
|
b |
οι δε λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
469. 1888
|
|
c |
οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθηναι τα χιλια ετη
1611
|
|
d |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
051. 35. 91. 254. 367. 506. 632. 911. 1006r. 1637. 1773. 1854. 2026. 2050r. 2056r. 2057. 2067. 2071r. 2073. 2076. 2077. 2081. 2286. 2329r. 2436. 2723. 2919
|
|
e |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη χιλια ετη
2595
|
|
f |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθωσι τα χιλια ετη
1732. 2042. 2070
|
|
g |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι συντελεσθωσι τα χιλια ετη
2074
|
|
h |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθηναι τα χιλια ετη
2080
|
|
i |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ ανεζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
2429. 2432
|
|
j |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ ανεστησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
2028
|
|
k |
και οι λοιπει των νεκρων ουκ ανεστησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
2814
|
|
l |
και οι λοιποι των νεκρων ουκ ανεστησαν αχρι τελεσθωσι τα χιλια ετη
2037
|
|
m |
και οι λοιποι των ανθρωπων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθη τα χιλια ετη
250r
|
|
mo |
και οι λοιποι των ανθρωπων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθει τα χιλια ετη
046r
|
|
n |
και οι λοιποι των ανθρωπων ουκ εζησαν αχρι τελεσθωσι τα χιλια ετη
792
|
|
o |
τα χιλια ετη
2200
|
|
p |
οτι
104. 620
|
|
q |
om.
01. 61. 82. 93. 141. 177. 201. 218. 325. 452. 456. 498. 522. 808. 1424. 1719. 1734. 1780. 1795. 1849. 1852. 1872. 2048. 2053. 2138. 2256. 2350. 2377. 2495. 2582. 2672. 2681. 2845. 2847. 2886. 2917. 2921
|
|
r |
και [οι] [λοιποι] των νεκρων ουκ εζησαν αχρι [τελεσθη] [χιλια] ετη
2344V
|
|
— |
|
|
24-32 |
a |
αυτη η αναστασις η πρωτη
…. 051r. 2256V. 2344V. 2595r. 2672r. 2847r. NA28NS
|
|
b |
αυτη η αναπαυσις η πρωτη
2026. 2350
|
|
c |
αυτη η αναστασις πρωτη
2329
|
|
d |
αυτη αναστασις η πρωτη
792
|
|
e |
αυτη αναστασις πρωτη
2056
|
|
f |
αυτη [η] [ανασ]τ̣ασις η πρωτη
2377V
|
|
— |
|
|
33 |
a |
om.
…. NA28NS
|
|
b |
επι τουτο
2495
|
|
— |
|
Source: ntvmr.uni-muenster.de
Codex Sinaiticus
Greek New Testament (UBS6): Sixth Revised Edition
After more than ten years of intensive preparation, a new edition of the UBS Greek New Testament (6th edition) is now available. It offers the most up-to-date Greek text with the textual changes from the Editio Critica Maior volumes on the Acts of the Apostles (2017), the Gospel of Mark (2021), and Revelation (2024). The text differs from the text of the 5th edition in more than 100 places and is identical to that of the 29th edition of the Novum Testamentum Graece (NA29), which is in preparation for 2026.
The apparatus includes clearly structured entries on all major variants of the text. The selection of the passages was guided by the question of their relevance for translation and interpretation. The importance of the so-called Textus Receptus has also been given greater consideration compared to previous editions. The selection of manuscripts was focused on the most important witnesses, which are now supplemented by new manuscripts (papyri 128 to 141).
This sixth edition begins with an accessible introduction in English and is edited by an international and interdenominational committee, which is also responsible for NA29 and works closely with the Institute for New Testament Textual Research: Holger Strutwolf, Hugh Houghton, Christos Karakolis, David Parker, Stephen Pisano, David Trobisch, and Klaus Wacht.
4 comments:
The textual decision reflected in UBS6 / the forthcoming NA29 to print Revelation 20:5 without the clause traditionally numbered “20:5a” (“the rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were finished”) is best understood as neither an arbitrary abbreviation nor a doctrinally motivated excision, but as a disciplined application of modern textual criticism to an exceptionally difficult textual tradition. It is also, in practical terms, a materially important blow to eschatological systems—Jehovah’s Witness (JW) eschatology included—that LEAN HEAVILY on Rev 20:5a as the clearest “timestamp” separating two resurrections by a literal millennium.
To frame the issue correctly, one must first observe what UBS6 actually is and why its text carries special weight. The German Bible Society’s description of the sixth revised edition explains that UBS6 offers “the most up-to-date Greek text,” incorporating the Editio Critica Maior (ECM) decisions for Acts (2017), Mark (2021), and Revelation (2025), and that its text differs from UBS5 “in well over 100 places.” Crucially, the same description states that UBS6’s text is identical to NA29, which is “in preparation for 2026,” and it identifies the editorial committee working in close collaboration with the Institute for New Testament Textual Research (INTF). This is not a minor point: it means the omission of Rev 20:5a is not a marginal preference of one apparatus, but the emerging standard critical text for Revelation as judged by the leading international editorial body responsible for both UBS and Nestle-Aland.
With that in view, the most important methodological clarification is that Revelation’s textual tradition is uniquely unstable and idiosyncratic compared with much of the rest of the New Testament. Even scholars who are otherwise conservative in practice generally concede that Revelation forces the textual critic to rely not only on raw manuscript counting, but on a nuanced evaluation of genealogical relationships, scribal tendencies, and internal coherence—especially because the earliest recoverable evidence is comparatively thin and the book’s complex, visionary style invites secondary clarification. That is precisely the environment in which expansions and explanatory glosses flourish. When a line seems to “help” the reader by making an implicit distinction explicit—especially in a passage as contested as Revelation 20—scribes have historically been prone to add it, not subtract it.
This is the first major reason the UBS6/NA29 decision is text-critically intelligible: the shorter reading has strong transcriptional plausibility. The disputed clause functions like an editorial caption that removes ambiguity by spelling out the temporal separation between the martyrs’ “coming to life” and the fate of “the rest of the dead.” But such “helpful” clarifications are exactly the sort of additions that appear when a text is read liturgically, debated polemically, or copied by scribes who want to stabilize interpretation. By contrast, accidental omission of an entire semantically complete clause is certainly possible, but here it is not the most economical explanation. The clause reads like a parenthetical narrative aside whose main effect is to enforce a timeline. In the economy of Revelation’s discourse, that is precisely the kind of thing later hands tend to supply.
Second, the external evidence does not behave as one would expect if the longer reading were original. Even in the material you provided, the transmission pattern is telling: the clause is absent in a notable set of witnesses, and where it is present it appears in multiple forms (small shifts such as the presence or absence of καί, substitution of ἀνέζησαν for ἔζησαν, changes in verb forms, and other micro-variants). A reading that is both (a) widely absent and (b) textually fluid where it appears is often a sign that the tradition is dealing with a secondary element whose exact wording was not anchored early. If the clause were original and essential, one would expect its form to be more stable. A text that enters circulation later—or enters as a marginal gloss that is progressively absorbed—commonly exhibits exactly this kind of instability.
Third, the internal structure of Rev 20:4–6 becomes more coherent when the parenthetical “20:5a” is removed from the main line. The visionary sequence moves from the thrones and judgment, to the beheaded witnesses who “lived and reigned with Christ,” and then directly to the interpretive declaration: “This is the first resurrection,” followed by the beatitude, “Blessed and holy is the one who has a share in the first resurrection; over these the second death has no power.” That literary movement is rhetorically tight: it interprets the preceding vision and then draws out its consequence. The inserted clause about “the rest of the dead” interrupts this rhetorical flow by introducing a second group not otherwise developed until the later judgment scene. It is not that the thought is impossible in context; rather, the question is whether the author’s argument requires it at this moment. The UBS6/NA29 form reads like an authorial exposition of the vision; the longer form reads like a later harmonizing note trying to force the passage into a rigid two-stage chronology.
That last point matters because the debate here is not merely about the presence or absence of a single line, but about what kinds of CHRONOLOGY Revelation itself encourages. One of the most consistent results of critical work on apocalyptic literature is that symbolic vision sequences often communicate theological relations rather than strict temporal order. The “thousand years” in Revelation 20 is a symbolic period within a highly figurative book, and it is precisely in such settings that scribes and later interpreters tend to add clarifying “time stamps.” Removing Rev 20:5a therefore does not “prove” any single millennial scheme by itself, but it does remove the most explicit phrase that appears to enforce a neat temporal partition between two resurrections.
This is why the UBS6/NA29 decision is a genuine pressure point for Jehovah’s Witness eschatology. JW end-times teaching is not merely “millennial” in a generic sense; it is structurally dependent on a carefully SEPARATED SEQUENCE of end-time events and classes: a first resurrection connected to a heavenly reign (often associated with the anointed), and a later resurrection associated with life on a restored earth, coordinated with a literal millennium and administrated within a sharply tiered theological system. Whatever secondary texts might be recruited to support this architecture, Revelation 20:5a has functioned as one of the strongest prima facie prooftexts, because it states in plain narrative form what that system needs: the “rest of the dead” do not live until after the thousand years.
But if the earliest recoverable text no longer contains that clause as part of the main text, then the single most direct biblical sentence enforcing that chronology is gone. What remains in Rev 20:4–6, even on a straightforward reading, is that the martyrs “came to life and reigned,” and that “this is the first resurrection,” with the second death having no authority over those who share in it. The passage still distinguishes a “first resurrection” from something else, but it no longer explicitly states that a second group only comes to life AFTER the millennium. This does not automatically collapse every premillennial reading, but it does remove the cleanest textual lever by which a rigid two-stage resurrection separated by a literal thousand-year interval is made to appear “obvious” from the chapter alone. The hermeneutical burden shifts dramatically: instead of pointing to an explicit chronological sentence, one must now rebuild the timeline by inference, system coherence, and external harmonization—exactly the kind of “assembling the doctrine from implications” that JWs frequently criticize in other contexts.
In other words, the omission does not merely create interpretive openness; it creates asymmetry. The amillennial reading loses nothing essential, because it has never depended on Rev 20:5a for its core claim that the millennium is symbolic and that the decisive resurrection/judgment complex is unified at the end. The JW reading, by contrast, loses a sentence it can quote verbatim as a chronological divider. This is one of the reasons the change is not just academically interesting but theologically consequential: it removes a “hard edge” in the text that a particular eschatological system requires in order to present its sequence as the plain sense.
One can also press the point a step further. JW eschatology does not merely separate events; it regularly builds doctrinal weight on precision timing and CATEGORICAL PARTITIONS—who is raised when, who reigns where, who belongs to which group, and what the millennium accomplishes for each. If the critical text itself demonstrates that the key timing clause may be secondary, then the system’s confidence in that precision is weakened at the level where it most wants certainty: the wording of Scripture. Even if one were to continue defending a two-stage resurrection on broader theological grounds, the appeal to Rev 20:5a as the “simple literal statement of Scripture” would be significantly impaired.
It is also worth underlining that UBS6/NA29 is not a niche, confessional product aimed at supporting one theological school. By the German Bible Society’s own description, the text is produced by an international, interdenominational committee, and the apparatus is curated specifically for “relevance for translation and interpretation,” in close coordination with the INTF. That matters because it closes off a common rhetorical escape route: dismissing the decision as a sectarian manipulation. On the contrary, this is precisely what modern critical editions are designed to do—identify the most plausible Ausgangstext (initial text) and present it transparently, even when it destabilizes inherited interpretive habits across confessional lines.
Finally, the broader significance is this. The UBS6/NA29 handling of Rev 20:5 forces a sober reappraisal of what can responsibly be claimed as the “explicit teaching” of Revelation 20 regarding resurrection chronology. When the critical text no longer supplies the sentence that most explicitly enforces the two-resurrection timeline, the argument for a dogmatically rigid, highly scheduled millennial program becomes weaker—especially for traditions that claim to derive their end-time scheme from the plain, unambiguous statements of Scripture. In that respect, the UBS6/NA29 decision is not merely a footnote for specialists; it represents a meaningful reconfiguration of the evidence landscape. The clause that most conveniently served as a chronological hinge is now treated as, at best, a secondary development in the transmission history—precisely the kind of result that should make any historically serious interpreter more cautious, not more confident, about building intricate eschatological systems on a single contested line.
If one wanted a concise way to state the upshot: UBS6/NA29 does not “prove amillennialism,” but it does remove a major prooftext that makes JW-style millennial chronology look textually self-evident. It relocates the debate from “the Bible explicitly says” to “a particular interpretive synthesis infers,” and that shift is exactly why this variant is so consequential.
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