Iwan M. Whiteley 36 context. Mussies explored ‘The Morphology of Koine Greek as used in the Apocalypse of St. John’15. He explained his approach by defining ‘mor- phology’ as ‘…the descriptive analysis of the systematic correlations of form and meaning that may be present in the vocabulary of a language’16. A descriptive analysis assumes the presence of a synchronic text; this is problematic because it assumes that the language does not develop during the communicative process. The book of Revelation is pragmatic to an unusual level and consequently any descriptive analysis is prone to falling into difficulty as will be demonstrated in this article. Pragmatics is the study of language in context. Knowing the context is necessary because an author will presuppose that a reader is already aware of what is being said, having read the text up to a particular point. What is unusual is that John utilizes this pragmatic principle to influence the morphosyntax of the text; he introduces the reader to ideas using anacolutha, and then extrapolates the anacolutha to communicate more information. Consequently, the morphosyntax of the text evolves with the context and John assumes that the reader has read and understood his work from the beginning. This study shall start at the beginning of Revelation and we shall trace the development of the anacolutha. As we move into later features of the text, their explanations become increasingly difficult because John’s hermeneutic becomes more intricate. Consequently, this article cannot fully explain many of the later features of Revelation be- cause they would require a comprehensive exegesis of the entire text that precedes it. 1. The Beginning The root of anacolutha in Revelation is found in 1:4, ἀπὸ ὁ ὢν. Ἀπὸ is normally followed by a genitive whereas ὁ ὢν is nominative. Charles says that in classical Greek, John could have adopted ἀπὸ τοῦ ὁ ὢν17. Har- rington18 suggests that the whole sentence may be related to the Targum of Pseudo-Jonathan on Deuteronomy 32:39. It reads, ‘See now that I am he who is and who was and I am he who will be.’ Swete19, Koester20, Boring21, Mussies, The Morphology. 15 Mussies, The Morphology, 63. 16 Charles, A Critical, 10; Also Swete, The Apocalypse, 5. 17 W. J. Harrington, Revelation (Minnesota 1993) 46. 18 Swete, The Apocalypse, 5. 19 C. Koester, Revelation and the End of All Things (Michigan 2001) 20 M. Boring, Revelation (Louisville 1989) 75. 21