Tool Alpha
Echoes of Revelation
Revelation never quotes the Old Testament outright, yet no New Testament book refers to it more. See both texts side by side, why they don’t match, and what John does with them.
Revelation 1:15, feet like bronze refined in a furnace
The bronze feet come from Daniel 10 and Ezekiel 1; the furnace may recall the fiery furnace of Daniel 3.
Revelation 1:15, in every translation this tool compares.
A builder who reuses beams from three old barns can still make one sound frame. The feet like gleaming bronze come from the shining man of Daniel 10. Ezekiel's living creatures, who carry God's throne, also have feet that sparkle like bronze. And the furnace may call to mind Daniel 3, where a fourth figure walked in the fire.
Bronze. Daniel 10:6 has arms and legs like the sight of gleaming bronze; Ezekiel 1:7 has feet that sparkle like bronze. Revelation has feet like fine bronze. Daniel 3 and Revelation both have a furnace of fire.
Daniel 10 speaks of arms and legs, not feet. John's word for bronze, chalkolibanon, is rare, and appears in neither Daniel nor Ezekiel. The furnace is John's addition; Beale thinks it echoes the furnace of Daniel 3, and wonders whether the odd grammar of John's furnace phrase is meant to point there.
Bronze tested in fire stands for strength and purity. Beale reads it as moral purity that Christ will ask of the churches he walks among (compare 3:18). The ESV Study Bible says such feet will crush every opponent. The CSB Study Bible contrasts them with the statue's crumbling feet in Daniel 2.
Not an exact source text. The phrase draws on several pictures at once, so no one verse matches it.
Beale says the feet follow Daniel 10:6 in Greek, and the furnace again echoes Daniel 3:25 (verse 92 in the Greek numbering of Theodotion), with Ezekiel 1:27 perhaps near. He notes the genitive pepyromenes after the dative kamino, an irregular construction, and asks whether it imitates the genitive phrase for the burning furnace in the Greek of Daniel 3. Keener links the bronze feet both to the creatures under God's throne in Ezekiel 1:7 and to the angel of Daniel 10:6. The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible connects the feet to Daniel 10:6 and Ezekiel 1:7, and the glowing metal to God's own glory in Ezekiel 1:27. The grade is drawn here: probable for the bronze, possible for the furnace.
Beale offers the furnace of Daniel 3 as a likely echo. The study Bibles do not mention it. Beale himself asks the grammar question without settling it.
- {"u":"https:\/\/jayms.com\/bible-study-tools-2\/ancient-world-passages\/revelation-1-9-20\/","n":"Revelation 1:9-20, Patmos, the Lord's day, lampstands and stars","s":"On the island of Patmos, in the Spirit on the Lord's day, John hears a voice like a trumpet telling him to write to seven churches. He turns and sees one like a son of man among seven golden lampstands, holding seven stars, who holds the keys of death and Hades and explains what the stars and lampstands mean.","r":"Revelation 1:9-20"}
- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 1:13-15
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 1:13-15
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on Revelation 1:15
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 1:15
- CSB Study Bible, note on Revelation 1:15
- NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible, note on Revelation 1:15
- Septuagint, Daniel 10:6, Daniel 3:25 and Ezekiel 1:7, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
