Tool Beta
The Ancient World Behind the Text
Pick a passage anywhere in the New Testament. See the customs and ideas a first reader knew without being told.
Revelation 21:9-27, the city of gold and twelve stones
An angel carries John to a high mountain to show him the bride, the holy city Jerusalem, shining with God's glory, with twelve gates named for Israel's tribes and twelve foundations named for the Lamb's apostles. The city is a cube of pure gold, its foundations set with twelve precious stones and its gates each a single pearl; it has no temple, since God and the Lamb are its temple, and its gates never shut as the nations bring their glory into it.
Revelation 21:9-27, in every translation this tool compares.
An angel shows John the bride of the Lamb, which turns out to be the holy city, glowing with God's glory, its gates named for Israel's tribes and its foundations for the Lamb's apostles. Measured, it forms a vast perfect cube of gold, gems and pearl. It has no temple, because God and the Lamb are present everywhere in it, and no need for sun or moon; its gates stay open as the nations bring their treasures in, but nothing unclean ever enters. Whether the city and its measurements are literal or symbolic is debated.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/heavenly-jerusalem\/","n":"The heavenly Jerusalem","s":"Jews looked for a Jerusalem built by God for the age to come, and some spoke of it as already waiting in heaven. Exiles and resident aliens knew what it was to look for a city that would be home.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/temple-and-courts\/","n":"The temple and its courts","s":"Herod's huge rebuilt temple in Jerusalem, believed to be God's dwelling, laid out in courts that kept Gentiles, women and Jewish men at set distances.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/high-priest\/","n":"The high priest","s":"The head of Israel's priests, from Aaron's line, who offered for his own sins and then the people's and alone went into the holy of holies, once a year. By the first century Herod and Rome named and removed him at will.","r":""}
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-ideas\/the-twelve\/","n":"The Twelve","s":"Jesus chose twelve men to be with him and to be sent out. The number matched Israel's twelve tribes.","r":""}
Jewish writers after Ezekiel pictured the new Jerusalem: Tobit 13, a Qumran blueprint, the Temple Scroll's twelve gates (Keener; the cultural backgrounds notes). The bride is shown as the prostitute was (17:1-3), but from a high mountain, not a wilderness (Keener; Beale). The city's "cubic shape recalls the Most Holy Place" (the cultural backgrounds notes), so it needs no temple; Heiser notes the prophets already merged temple and city (Jeremiah 3:16-17). Ezekiel's city was 18,000 cubits around (Ezekiel 48:35); John's, some 1,400 miles a side, is "nearly 2,000 times larger", granting "What the world could not accomplish in Babel" (the cultural backgrounds article Dimensions of the New Jerusalem). Keener, Beale, Wright and Heiser read the size as symbolic; the ESV Study Bible allows a literal city, which premillennialists, says the Zondervan dictionary, set above Jerusalem. The twelve stones largely match the high priest's breastplate (Exodus 28:17-20; Keener; Beale); Heiser hears Ezekiel 28's stones of Eden instead. Josephus tied the twelve to the zodiac (Antiquities 3.7.7), and Ephesian Artemis wore the zodiac as a necklace (Arnold), but John avoids astrology (Keener; Beale). The CSB Study Bible keeps Israel and the church distinct in the gates and foundations; Heiser reads one people.
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, introduction to Revelation 21:9-27, and on 21:10, 21:11, 21:12-13, 21:16, 21:19-20, 21:21, 21:22, 21:24 and 21:25-26
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Revelation 21:9-21, 21:10, 21:11, 21:12, 21:16, 21:19-21, 21:21, 21:22, 21:24, 21:25 and 21:26
- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text, on Revelation 21:9-10, 21:16 and 21:18-20, section The Background of the Precious Stones
- Michael S. Heiser, The Unseen Realm, ch. 6, Gardens and Mountains, and ch. 26, Mountains and Valleys
- N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone, comment on Revelation 21:6-21
- N. T. Wright and Michael F. Bird, The New Testament in Its World, ch. 34, The Story of the Book of Revelation, section 12
- ESV Study Bible, study notes on Revelation 21:10, 21:15-17 and 21:19-21
- CSB Study Bible, notes on Revelation 21:9-11a and 21:11b-14
- Josephus, The Wars of the Jews 5.5.3, 5.5.6 and 5.5.7, trans. William Whiston
- Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 3.7.7, trans. William Whiston
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, article Dimensions of the New Jerusalem
- Zondervan Illustrated Bible Dictionary, entry Jerusalem, new
- Clinton E. Arnold, Powers of Darkness, ch. 3, Astrology, The Quest to Alter Fate
- Michael S. Heiser, Revelation 21-22: The New Heaven and the New Earth, video lecture (Naked Bible Revelation series)
