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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 Revelation 21:21 and Genesis Rabbah 44:12

New Testament · Rabbinic

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Summary

Revelation’s description of a heavenly city made of gold is similar to Rabbinic tradition in Genesis Rabbah, which interprets God bringing Abram “outside” as lifting him above the solid firmament where the stars are, also described as a heavenly city.

Passages

Revelation 21:21

New Testament
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.
92–96 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Revelation

Genesis Rabbah 44:12

Rabbinic · Aggadah
“He took him outside, and said: Look now to the heavens, and count the stars, if you can count them, and He said to him: So will your offspring be” (Genesis 15:5). “He took him outside” – Rabbi Yehoshua of Sikhnin in the name of Rabbi Levi: Did He take him outside the world, that the verse should say: “He took him outside [haḥutza]”? Rather, he showed him the streets of the heavens, just as it says: “While He had not yet made earth and the outer ranges [ḥutzot]” (Proverbs 8:26). Rabbi Yehuda said in the name of Rabbi Yoḥanan: He took him up above the dome of the heavens. That is what He said to him: “Look [habet] now to the heavens” – [the expression] habata refers only to looking from above to below. The Rabbis say: [God told him:] ‘You are a prophet, not an astrologer,’ as it is stated: “Now, restore the man's wife, as he is a prophet” (Genesis 20:7). In the days of Jeremiah, Israel sought to adopt this mindset, but the Holy One blessed be He did not allow them to do so.
500 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Genesis Rabbah

References

"... Genesis Rabbah (44:12) also interprets the reference to YHWH bringing Abram 'outside' in an overtly cosmological manner, in a way that appears both to presuppose and to censure his use of astrology outright (Such an interpretation of the lifting above the firmament is, in fact, represented in the so-called Midrash Aggadah of Solomon Buber (based on a Mediaeval manuscript from Aleppo), which explicitly says (ad loc.) that although most humans are "under their constellation" (bënê ädäm tahat mazzäläm) which 'therefore judges them' (lëpikäk hammazzäl dän ötäm), Abra(ha)m is "above the dome of the firmament, in which the constellations are" (lëmalá mikktppat häräqta sehammazzäl säm), and therefore, presumably, exempt from astrological influence) ..."
Ola Wikander, “‘Go Out from Your Sign’: Rashi to Genesis 15:5 as a Reference to Astrological Primary Direction - Its Background in Rabbinic Literature and Parallels in Abraham bar Hiyya,” OTE 33.3 (2020): 1–5.

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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Revelation 21:21 and Genesis Rabbah 44:12

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