Revelation 2:27

Strong's #G4464 ῥάβδος rhabdos. This means rod, wand, or stick. It is something shorter than a typical walking staff. In the context of Ancient Greek poetry and literature, the term ῥάβδος refers to a line or verse of poetry. This is a more specialized or technical usage of the word.

Ancient Greek texts, including poetry and drama, were often analyzed and discussed in terms of their formal structure. Scholars and commentators would use specific terminology to describe parts of these texts. ῥάβδος (rhabdos) in this literary or scholarly sense refers to a line or verse within a poem or a piece of verse. This use reflects the idea of a "stave" or "line" of written text, analogous to how we use "line" to describe a single row of text in modern poetry.

Pindar the Poet

This usage of ῥάβδος is found in the scholia (commentary) on Pindar's Odes (Pindar's work, Book I, line 4.63). Scholarly annotations and commentaries on classical texts often used specific terms to describe textual elements and their analysis.

Considering the presence of the preposition ἐν "in/within a rod" which was ignored by interpreters, it makes more grammatical sense to take this meaning.

(cf. Logeion ῥάβδῳ)