In Rev 14:4,
we have the following description of the 144,000:
These are they which were not defiled with women; for they are
virgins. These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever he goeth. These
were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb.
Some have
used this as a valid “proof-text” for priestly celibacy (e.g., Mario Romero, Unabridged Christianity [Queenship,
1998]). However, a good argument can be used that παρθενος is being used metaphorically. As
Craig Koester noted in his Anchor Bible commentary on Revelation:
14:4. They
were not defiled with women. Defilement (molynein) can occur through contact with something unclean or
through sinful actions such as immorality, adultery, theft, idolatry, and
murder (Isa 59:3; 65:4; cf. Rev 3:4). Defilement makes a person unfit to enter
a holy place or the company of holy people. Nothing unclean is brought into New
Jerusalem (21:27). Revelation does not assume that women are inherently
unclean, since images of a woman giving birth and a woman at her wedding
banquet are used in positive ways for the people of God, and New Jerusalem is
pictured as a bride (Rev 12:1-6; 19:7; 21:2, 9-10). Rather, Revelation uses
marital imagery in a positive way and links defilement to behaviors that
violate the marriage relationship (c. Ep.
Arist. 152; 3 Bar. 8:5). On one
level the writer lists impurity along with sexual immorality (Rev 21:8, 27;
22:15). On another level he transfers connotations from illicit sexual
relations to unfaithfulness toward God when using adultery, immorality, and prostitution
metaphorically, as is the case with defilement here (2:14, 20-22; 17:4; 18:3;
cf. Jer 3:1-10; Ezek 23:2-21; Hos 1-2).
Some interpreters assume that Rev 14:4 depicts
those who have not defiled themselves with women as male virgins, since the
term Parthenos, or maiden, appears in
the next line. With that assumption, there are several approaches to
interpreting the imagery. First, some discern a military aspect in the image,
since soldiers on duty were to abstain from sexual relations (Deut 23:9-10; 1
Sam 21:5). From this perspective the 144,000 are like troops in a holy war, and
counting 12,000 from each of the twelve tribes is like taking a census of
warriors (Rev 7:4-8; Num 1:2-3). The group gathers at Mount Zion, where Israel’s
king is to defeat his foes (Ps 2:6-9). There could also be a sacred dimension,
since the redeemed are a priestly community, and defilement would prevent them
from carrying out their priestly duties (Rev 5:10). Such purity was expected in
the Dead Sea community, which saw itself as a priestly fellowship anticipating
eschatological battle (1QM VIII, 3-6; Bauckham, Climax, 230-32). Although this approach is suggestive, it should
not be passed, since military and priestly imagery is at best implicit in Rev
14:1-5, and purity regulations applied more broadly (Lev 15:18).
A second approach is that the 144,000 are
contrasted with the angelic Watchers, who in primeval times defiled themselves
with women and fell under divine judgment (Gen 6:2; 1 En. 15:2-7; Olson, “Those”). But nothing in the context suggests
that the faithful are being contrasted with heavenly beings. The threat of
defilement from women comes most directly from the woman Jezebel and the “woman”
Babylon, whose practices are compared to immorality and adultery (Rev 2:20-23;
17:1-6).
A third approach, which draws on gender and
postcolonial studies, proposes that the imagery counters imperial ideals of
masculinity. Depicting the faithful as those who have not defiled
themselves with women is considered misogynistic yet identifying them as virgins
gives the males a feminine quality, since virginity was regularly ascribed to
women, not men. The dominant Roman discourse emphasized that “real” men
married, fathered children, and were the heads of their households; they were
sexually dominant. Although Revelation is seen as androcentric, picturing Jesus’
followers as male virgins fits the book’s anti-imperialism by challenging models
of masculinity associated with the empire (L. Huber, “Sexually”; Stenstrŏm, “Is
Salvation;”; Stenstrŏm, “Masculine”) . . . Maidens, or virgins, is a collective
image for ion and Israel, as well as for Christians who are pure in their devotion
to Christ, just as young women are to be singularly committed to their
betrothed (2 Kgs 19:21; Lam 2:13; Amos 5:2; 2 Cor 11:2). Since virginity was
expected of young women approaching marriage. Revelation uses it as a metaphor
for Christians who refrain from idolatry and other unfaithful practices, for
they are well-suited to be the bride of the Lamb (Deut 22:13-21; Sir 7:24; Rev
19:708). Some interpreters think that John commends virginity as an ascetic
ideal showing total commitment, since at least some in the Dead Sa community
and the early church practiced celibacy (Matt 19:12; 1 Cor 7:8, 38; cf.
Cyprian, FC 36:34-35; Methodius, ACW 27:47-38; Fulgentius, FC 95:316-17; Müller;
Roloff; Yarbro Collins, Crisis,
129-31; TLNT 3:52). Most, however, take virginity as a metaphor
for fidelity to God and Christ, since John uses antithetical terms such as
immorality, adultery, and prostitution as metaphors for religious unfaithfulness
(Caesarius, PL 35:2437). (Craig R. Koester, Revelation:
A New Translation with Introduction and Commentary [AB 38A; New Haven: Yale
University Press, 2014], 609-10, 611, emphasis in bold added)
