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Revelation

About this book
Chapter 21

1 Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had ceased to exist, and the sea existed no more.⁠ 2 And I saw the holy city—the new Jerusalem—descending out of heaven from God, made ready like a bride adorned for her husband.⁠ 3 And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying: “Look! The residence of God is among human beings. He will live among them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them. 4 He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death will not exist any more—or mourning, or crying, or pain, for the former things have ceased to exist.”⁠ 5 And the one seated on the throne said: “Look! I am making all things new!” Then he said to me, “Write it down, because these words are reliable and true.” 6 He also said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.⁠ To the one who is thirsty I will give water free of charge from the spring of the water of life. 7 The one who conquers will inherit these things, and I will be his God and he will be my son. 8 But as for the cowards, unbelievers, detestable persons, murderers, the sexually immoral, and those who practice magic spells, idol worshipers, and all those who lie, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur. That is the second death.” 9 Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls full of the seven final plagues came and spoke to me, saying, “Come, I will show you the bride, the wife of the Lamb!” 10 So he took me away in the Spirit to a huge, majestic mountain and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God.⁠ 11 The city possesses the glory of God; its brilliance is like a precious jewel, like a stone of crystal-clear jasper.⁠ 12 It has a massive, high wall with twelve gates, with twelve angels at the gates, and the names of the twelve tribes of the nation of Israel are written on the gates.⁠ 13 There are three gates on the east side, three gates on the north side, three gates on the south side, and three gates on the west side. 14 The wall of the city has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 The angel who spoke to me had a golden measuring rod with which to measure the city and its foundation stones and wall.⁠ 16 Now the city is laid out as a square, its length and width the same. He measured the city with the measuring rod at 1,400 miles (its length and width and height are equal). 17 He also measured its wall, 144 cubits according to human measurement, which is also the angel’s. 18 The city’s wall is made of jasper and the city is pure gold, like transparent glass.⁠ 19 The foundations of the city’s wall are decorated with every kind of precious stone.⁠ The first foundation is jasper, the second sapphire, the third agate, the fourth emerald, 20 the fifth onyx, the sixth carnelian, the seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprase, the eleventh jacinth, and the twelfth amethyst. 21 And the twelve gates are twelve pearls—each one of the gates is made from just one pearl! The main street of the city is pure gold, like transparent glass.⁠ 22 Now I saw no temple in the city, because the Lord God—the All-Powerful—and the Lamb are its temple. 23 The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, because the glory of God lights it up, and its lamp is the Lamb.⁠ 24 The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their grandeur into it.⁠ 25 Its gates will never be closed during the day (and there will be no night there).⁠ 26 They will bring the grandeur and the wealth of the nations into it, 27 but nothing ritually unclean will ever enter into it, nor anyone who does what is detestable or practices falsehood, but only those whose names are written in the Lamb’s book of life.

Texts in conversation

Compare 1 Enoch 71:5 and Revelation 21:10

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses · New Testament

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Summary

In 1 Enoch 71, Enoch is taken to the highest level of heaven where he sees a crystal structure surrounded by living fire, described as a heavenly temple. Revelation 21 describes a similar vision where John is taken to heaven to see the new Jerusalem.

Passages

1 Enoch 71:5

Pseudepigrapha, Apocalypses
3 The archangel Michael took me by my right hand, lifted me up, and led me through all the secrets, showing me all the secrets of righteousness. 4 He revealed to me all the secrets of the ends of heaven, and all the chambers of the stars and the lights, from where they come out before the holy ones. 5 My spirit was taken into the highest heaven, where I saw a structure built of crystals with tongues of living fire between them. 6 I saw the band of fire surrounding this fiery house, with streams of living fire on all four sides.
300 BCE – 100 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in 1 Enoch

Revelation 21:10

New Testament
10 So he took me away in the Spirit to a huge, majestic mountain and showed me the holy city, Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God. 11 The city possesses the glory of God; its brilliance is like a precious jewel, like a stone of crystal-clear jasper. 12 It has a massive, high wall with twelve gates, with twelve angels at the gates, and the names of the twelve tribes of the nation of Israel are written on the gates. 13 There are three gates on the east side, three gates on the north side, three gates on the south side, and three gates on the west side. 14 The wall of the city has twelve foundations, and on them are the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb. 15 The angel who spoke to me had a golden measuring rod with which to measure the city and its foundation stones and wall.
92–96 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Revelation

References

"... There are many references to God's heavenly throne in texts such as 1 Enoch 60:2, 62:3, and 84:2, as well as the Apocalypse of Abraham 18:12, but not all include a temple or city. In 1 Enoch 14:14-23, Enoch is swept up into heaven and beholds a vast white house encircled by fire. Inside, he finds another house of fire with a throne at its center, flanked by cherubim and the Glorious One seated upon it, signifying the heavenly temple. Enoch witnesses this once more in 1 Enoch 71:5-11. The heavenly throne doesn't always conjure an image of a heavenly temple, but it might encompass acts of service, prayer, and worship. This portrayal of the heavenly temple and city offers a solution to the problem of human defilement of the city by envisioning the city as fundamentally heavenly, isolated from earthly human contact. Additionally, the universal importance of Jerusalem is highlighted by emphasizing its significance and uniqueness in this world. Jerusalem is posited at "the middle of the earth," as suggested by the Sibylline Oracles 5:250, and echoed in 1 Enoch 26:1, 2 Enoch 72:35, and Jubilees 8:12, 19, a notion occasionally found in the Old Testament, such as in Ezekiel 38:12 and Judges 9:37. Jerusalem is distinctively God's city, as declared in 4 Ezra 10:7, where Ezra states, "From all the cities that have been built you have consecrated Zion for yourself." Additionally, 1 Enoch 25:3 portrays it as the earthly location of God's throne ..."
Lois Katharine Dow, “Eternal Jerusalem: Jerusalem/Zion in Biblical Theology with Special Attention to ‘New Jerusalem’ as the Name for the Final State in Revelation 21-22” (PhD diss., McMaster Divinity College, 2008), 158–159.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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1 Enoch 71:5 and Revelation 21:10

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