Revelation 4:8

A description of the sounds and songs of heaven follows the picture of its sights. γέμουσιν, either with τὰ τ. ζ. (ἔχων for once a real participle) or an asyndeton (if ἔχων here, as elsewhere in the Apocalypse, must be supplied with a copula). κυκλ. κ. ἐ. = “round their bodies and on the inside” (i.e., underneath their wings). For the ceaseless praise, which resembles that of Nin-ib, the Assyrian deity, cf. on Revelation 4:7 and Revelation 4:11, also Enoch xxxix. 12 (the trisagion sung by the sleepless ones, i.e., angels), Slav, En. 17, and Test. Leviticus 3; Leviticus 3 (where endless praise is the function of denizens in the fourth heaven). The first line of the hymn is Isaianic, the second (ὁ ἦν κ. τ. λ.) is characteristic of the Apocalypse. In En. xli. 7 the sun and moon in their orbits “give thanks and praise and rest not; for to them their thanksgiving is rest”. In the Apocalypse, however, the phenomena of nature are generally the objects or the scourges of the divine wrath. The precedence of ὁ ἦν over ὁ ὤν may be due to the emphasis of the context upon (Revelation 4:11) the definite creative action of God. Since the πρεσβύτεροι worship God as the eternal (Revelation 4:10), while the ζῷα acknowledge him as the ἅγιος, the latter epithet probably retains its O.T. sense, i.e., absolute life and majestic power (Revelation 16:5). The trisagion occurs in the Babylonian recension (Revelation 4:3.) of the Shmone-Esreh, among the daily prayers of the Jewish community. See further Encycl. Rel. and Ethics, i. 117, 118.