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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 4:3, jasper and carnelian
John describes the one on the throne only by the gleam of jasper and carnelian, stones that the Greek of Ezekiel 28 and Exodus 28 lists together with emerald.
Revelation 4:3, in every translation this tool compares.
A friend who can only say a sunset looked like fire and gold is telling you words ran out. John does not describe God's face or form. He says the one on the throne looked like jasper and carnelian, two precious stones. Ezekiel's throne gleamed like a precious stone too. Lists with the same stones appear in Ezekiel 28 and in the high priest's breastplate in Exodus 28.
Precious stones that carry God's glory. In the Greek, Ezekiel 28:13 names sardion (carnelian), smaragdos (emerald) and iaspis (jasper) in one list, the three stones of 4:3. In the Greek of Exodus 28:17-18 the same three stand in the first two rows of the breastplate.
Ezekiel's throne looked like sapphire, and the figure on it like a man. John swaps in jasper and carnelian and gives no human shape. He leaves the sapphire out here and saves it for the city wall in 21:19. English Bibles often name these stones differently, since the old names are hard to match with modern gems.
The stones do not stand for separate things, Beale and the ESV Study Bible agree. Together they show the glory around God. They also point ahead: jasper heads the stones of the new city in chapter 21, where God's glory fills everything. The throne room already shines with what the new creation will be.
Not a code in which each stone means something. Beale and the ESV Study Bible both say the stones work together to show God's splendor, not one meaning apiece.
Beale says references from Ezekiel 1:26, 28, from the Greek of Ezekiel 9:2 and 10:1, and from Ezekiel 28:13 have been combined, with reflections of Exodus 24:10 and especially Exodus 28:17-20. All are theophany or glory texts that mention a sapphire, and Ezekiel 28 and Exodus 28 stand out because all three of John's stones occur in them. The vault's Septuagint bears this out: Ezekiel 28:13 has sardion, smaragdon and iaspin; Exodus 28:17-18 has sardion, smaragdos and iaspis. Jasper ties 4:3 to 21:11, where the city has God's glory, shining like jasper. Walton notes that Ezekiel's sapphire is better taken as lapis lazuli, and that Mesopotamian texts paved the levels of heaven with stones, the lower heaven with jasper. Keener and the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible contrast John's restraint with the lavish thrones of other apocalypses. The grade is drawn here: the stones trace to these lists, but the wording is brief.
Reading Aune, Heiser notes that Jewish throne scenes seldom use precious stones but Ezekiel 1 does, and that jasper, carnelian and crystal return in the new Jerusalem. He reads the stones as language for the place where God lives, and links jasper to Eden's geography in Genesis 2:12. He adds his own point from The Unseen Realm: the stones of Ezekiel 28 are not the high priest's breastplate, because the list does not match it; they describe God's dwelling, Eden, the garden mountain of God.
Beale counts Exodus 28, the high priest's breastplate, among the strongest influences, with Ezekiel 28, since both lists hold all three stones. Heiser denies that Ezekiel 28's stones come from the breastplate and reads them, and John's, as the furnishings of God's home. Keener and the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible read the plain description mainly as a contrast with the emperor's pomp.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 4:3
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 4:3
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, note on Revelation 4:3
- ESV Study Bible, note on Revelation 4:3
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews and Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament, on Ezekiel 1:22 and 1:26-28
- Septuagint, Ezekiel 28:13 and Exodus 28:17-18, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 4:3
- Michael S. Heiser, Revelation 4: The Throne Room of Heaven, video lecture (Naked Bible Revelation series)
