Greek word · G3025

ληνός

lēnos

winepress

A trough or vat. Most often a winepress: a shallow treading floor, usually cut into bedrock, where workers crushed grapes barefoot, draining into a lower vat.

Appears 5 times in 4 verses of the Greek New Testament. ·

What it means

ληνός, -οῦ, ἡ

(in some MSS., LXX and NT, ὁ), [in LXX chiefly for יֶקֶב Numbers 18:27, al.; also for רַהַט (Genesis 30:38, 41), גַּת (Nehemiah 13:15, al.), etc. ;]

a trough or vat; esp. for the treading of grapes: Matthew 21:33, Revelation 14:20 19:16; τὴν λ. . . . τὸν μέγαν (a solecism perhaps inadvertent), Revelation 14:19 (cf. ὑπολήνιον).†

(AS)

From G. Abbott-Smith, A Manual Greek Lexicon of the New Testament (1922), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of Revelation 19:15

Range of meaning

A trough or vat. Most often a winepress: a shallow treading floor, usually cut into bedrock, where workers crushed grapes barefoot, draining into a lower vat.

Against the English

'Winepress' is accurate. BSB and NIV drop 'of the wine' from 'the winepress of the wine of the fury', which loses the link to the 'wine of God's wrath' that people are made to drink elsewhere in Revelation.

Used elsewhere in the period

Isaiah 63:1–6: the divine warrior comes from Edom in red-stained clothes. 'I have trodden the winepress alone… their juice spattered my garments.' Joel 3:13: 'Tread, for the winepress is full.' Lamentations 1:15: 'the Lord has trodden as in a winepress the virgin daughter of Judah.' Revelation 14:19–20: 'the great winepress of the wrath of God', with blood flowing out 'as high as a horse's bridle for 1,600 stadia.'

From the study of Revelation 14:19

Range of meaning

A trough or vat. Most often the winepress: a shallow treading floor, usually cut into rock or built of plastered stone, where grapes were crushed underfoot. The juice ran through a channel into a lower collecting vat. It can also mean a watering trough.

Against the English

'Winepress' is accurate. Modern readers may picture a mechanical screw press, but in biblical Palestine grapes were mainly trodden by human feet, and that is the image here (v.20, 'the winepress was trodden').

How it drifted

Screw and beam presses existed in the Roman period, but treading stayed the basic first stage. The English 'press' leads modern readers to picture machinery rather than trampling.

Used elsewhere in the period

Isa 63:1–6: the divine warrior has 'trodden the winepress alone' and his garments are stained red with the 'juice' of the nations. Lam 1:15: 'The Lord has trodden as in a winepress the virgin daughter of Judah.' Joel 3:13 (LXX 4:13): 'the winepress is full.' Isa 5:2 LXX uses a related form (prolēnion) for the vat God hewed in his vineyard. Rev 19:15 picks the image up again: the rider 'treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.'

From the study of Revelation 14:20

Range of meaning

A winepress or wine vat. It can mean the upper treading floor where grapes were crushed, the lower trough that caught the juice, or the whole installation. Figuratively it was a long-standing prophetic image for God crushing nations in judgment.

Against the English

'Winepress' is accurate. Modern readers, though, may picture a screw or lever machine. The biblical press was a shallow basin cut into the rock and trodden with bare feet, with a channel draining into a vat. The Vulgate's lacus ('trough, vat') focuses on the lower basin.

How it drifted

Later wine making replaced foot-treading with mechanical presses, so 'press' now suggests a machine. The verb in this verse ('was trodden') only makes sense with the foot-treading picture.

Used elsewhere in the period

LXX Isaiah 63:2–3 (the divine warrior's garments are red 'as from a trodden winepress'; 'I have trodden the winepress alone'). LXX Joel 4:13 (Eng. 3:13): 'Send out sickles, for the harvest is ripe; go in, tread, for the winepress is full'. Lamentations 1:15: 'the Lord has trodden as in a winepress the virgin daughter of Judah'. Matthew 21:33 (the vineyard owner 'dug a winepress'). Revelation 19:15, 'the winepress of the wine of the fury of the wrath of God'.

Where it appears

Matthew · 1

  1. Matthew 21:33 ληνὸν a winepress

    Listen to another parable: There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a wall around it, dug a winepress in it, and built a tower. Then he rented it out to some tenants and went away on a journey.

    Here: A treading floor where grapes were crushed by foot, with juice running into a vat below. Having one shows the owner expects a real harvest and the wine it produces.

Revelation · 4

  1. Revelation 14:19 ληνὸν winepress

    So the angel swung his sickle over the earth and gathered the grapes of the earth, and he threw them into the great winepress of God’s wrath.

    Here: The treading floor or vat where grapes were crushed under bare feet. Verse 20 completes the picture: it is 'trodden' and blood instead of juice flows out.

  2. Revelation 14:20 ληνὸς ληνοῦ winepress

    And the winepress was trodden outside the city, and the blood that flowed from it rose as high as the bridles of the horses for a distance of 1,600 stadia.

    Here: The rock-cut treading floor and trough where grapes were crushed underfoot. It is the central image of the verse, borrowed from the prophets' pictures of God treading the nations (Isaiah 63, Joel 3, Lamentations 1).

  3. Revelation 19:15 ληνὸν press

    And from His mouth proceeds a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and He will rule them with an iron scepter. He treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty.

    Here: A vat, usually cut into rock, where grapes were crushed underfoot. A long-standing biblical picture of judgment (Isa 63; Joel 3:13; Lam 1:15).

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.