What Do “Waters” Mean in the Bible?
The question
You’re reading Revelation, and you hit a woman sitting on “many waters.” Is that an ocean? A river? A literal flood? It sounds like geography — but something about it doesn’t quite fit.
The verse
“Come hither; I will shew unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters.” — Revelation 17:1, KJV
Literal or symbolic?
🟡 SYMBOLIC — and you don’t have to guess. The Bible tells you flat out, fourteen verses later.
What the Bible says it means
“The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues.” — Revelation 17:15, KJV
That’s it. No commentary needed. The Bible just handed you its own dictionary entry: waters = crowds of people.
And it’s not a one-time thing. Isaiah says the same:
“The nations shall rush like the rushing of many waters.” — Isaiah 17:13, KJV
Two different books, two different prophets, hundreds of years apart — same picture. Water that moves in crowds, roars, and rushes. That’s people.
The word behind the word
The four words in Revelation 17:15 cover every kind of human group there is:
| Word | Strong’s | Means |
|---|---|---|
| peoples | G2992 (laos) | a body of people |
| multitudes | G3793 (ochlos) | a crowd, a throng |
| nations | G1484 (ethnos) | a race, a nation |
| tongues | G1100 (glossa) | a language group |
Put all four together, and you’ve got all of humanity. Nobody’s left out.
Why it matters
Once you know waters means people, other passages open right up.
In Revelation 13:1, a beast comes up “out of the sea.” In Revelation 13:11, a different beast comes up “out of the earth.” Same chapter, two different starting points, and now you know why that detail is there. One rose up among crowded, populated nations. The other came up in a dense area that was not fully populated.
That’s not a small thing. That one word is a location clue, which many people overlook and read the verse as having a literal meaning.
Go deeper
- Next: What does “beast” mean in the Bible? →
- Related: What does “wind” mean in the Bible? →
- 📥 Free download: The Bible Explains Itself — 12 Symbols Defined in Scripture’s Own Words