Heavenly Jerusalem

Painting by Nalini Jayasuriya (1927 – 2014), used with permission by the Overseas Ministries Study Center (OMSC) at Princeton Theological Seminary. You can purchase this and many other artworks by artists in residence at the OSMC in high resolution and without a watermark via the OSMC website .

“Nalini M. Jayasuriya was an internationally known artist from Sri Lanka, who exhibited her soul-stirring paintings in Manila, London, Bangkok, Paris, Toronto, Tokyo, Jerusalem and New York. (…) While growing up in Sri Lanka, Nalini never took an art course. As an eight-year old assigned to draw a still life in drawing class, she ended up erasing a hole in her paper, and was told to take her books and leave. She spent the rest of the year’s drawing class time in the library. Her real talent was music; from about age four, she could play almost any piece of music that she heard. At about age fifteen, she wrote a number of poems that were published, and later wrote a secondary-level reader consisting of letters from her cat, Ingy.

“The direction of Nalini’s life changed when, as a young ESL teacher, she was offered an unsolicited British Council grant to study in England. She saw this as one of the many miracles in her life. For three years in London, she experienced a whole new world. She added evening classes to her schedule, including coursework in stained glass and enamel on metal, thinking that she would never again have such an opportunity. Later, she received seven scholarships and fellowships, (none of which she applied for) and she went on to live in thirty-six different countries.

“’I come from a land of rich, ancient, and diverse cultures and traditions. While I carry the enriching influences of both West and East, I express myself through an Asian and Christian consciousness with respect for all confessions of religious faith.’ Nalini Jayasuriya)” (Source )

jewels in the New Jerusalem

The Greek text that describes the city of the New Jerusalem in terms of jewels and other precious materials is translated in the German New Testament translation of Berger / Nord (publ. 2005) by using color references: “The city wall is made of jasper, and the city itself of gold that is as pure as glass. The foundations of the city wall are of great beauty, for they are built out of precious stones in many different colours. The first foundation-stone is jasper, the second blue sapphire, the third red agate, the fourth light green emerald, the fifth reddish brown onyx, the sixth yellowish red carnelian, the seventh yellow-gold quartz, the eighth beryl as green as the sea, the ninth shining yellow topaz, the tenth chalcedony, shimmering green-golden, the eleventh deep red jacinth, the twelfth purple amethyst. The twelve gates are twelve pearls, each gate is made from a single pearl. The main street of the city is of gold as shining as glass.” (for the German version see below.)

Chistiane Nord (in Open Theology 2016; 2: p. 566ff.) explains: “One of the purposes of this passage is certainly a referential-descriptive one. John sees the city in a vision and describes it to his readers. The referential function of this rather technical description works quite well for most readers, and certainly best for those with a specialist knowledge of precious and semi-precious stones. But apart from the referential purpose, the author may have had the intention to express his admiration for the city he has seen. Asked about their associations when reading or listening to the text, most people answer that they are thinking of the enormous value represented by the gold and the stones.

“This, again, is a rather modern perspective. We might wonder why a follower of Jesus, who showed so much contempt for ‘the world’ and its riches himself, would precisely describe his vision of God’s ‘new creation’ as something so rich in material terms. Precisely the great variety of different stones would seem to suggest that perhaps the author’s focus might have been rather on the colours than on the value. On the grounds of the assumption that his addressees knew the colours of all the stones he is describing, he need not mention them explicitly. But if modern translators want their target audience to share the author’s admiration of the beauty and colourfulness of his vision, they would have to make explicit what is implicit in the text. (…) Here it becomes clear that the text has also an expressive-evaluative or emotive function apart from the referential one. But even the expressive purpose may not be the most important one. The vision of the New Jerusalem is presented at the end of last book of the Christian Bible, following the horrors of the apocalypse, and it seems to be the absolute culmination of the Christian message. We may assume, therefore, that there is also an appellative purpose underlying the text, since the New Jerusalem presents the ideal of God’s new creation, for which a large number of martyrs through history were prepared to give their lives. An appellative intention cannot be carried out by a technical description -– for this purpose, we definitely need to know the colours. Therefore, our translation makes explicit the colours. Some critics found that this procedure reduces the poetic effect of the passage. However, the use of adjective compounds to describe the different shades of the stones (e.g., gelbrot, “yellow-red”, or meergrün, “ocean-green”, glasrein, “glass-pure”) is intended to compensate for any loss in poeticity.”

The text in German: Die Stadtmauer ist aus Jaspis erbaut, die Stadt selbst aus glasreinem Gold. Die Fundamente der Stadtmauer sind von großer Schönheit, denn sie bestehen aus verschiedenfarbenen Edelsteinen. Das erste Fundament ist aus grünlichem Jaspis, das zweite aus blauem Saphir, das dritte aus rotem Chalzedon, das vierte aus hellgrünem Smaragd, das fünfte aus rotbraunem Sardonyx, das sechste aus gelbrotem Carneol, das siebte aus goldgelbem Chrysolit, das achte aus meergrünem Beryll, das neunte aus gelbglänzendem Topas, das zehnte aus goldgrün schimmerndem Chrysopras, das elfte aus dunkelrotem Hyazinth, das zwölfte aus purpurnem Amethyst. Die zwölf Tortürme sind zwölf Perlen, jeder Torturm besteht aus einer einzigen Perle, und die Hauptstraße der Stadt ist aus glasreinem Gold.

See also rows of stones on Aaron’s breastpiece.

clear / pure

In Gbaya, the notion of something very clear, pure (such as crystal, glass or even a clear commandment) is emphasized with the ideophone ŋgɛ́lɛ́lɛ́.

Ideophones are a class of sound symbolic words expressing human sensation that are used as literary devices in many African languages. (Source: Philip Noss)

complete verse (Revelation 21:21)

Following are a number of back-translations of Revelation 21:21:

  • Uma: “The twelve doors were all of a stone that is fine and smooth like an egg, called pearl. Each door was made from one large pearl. The roads in the village were pure gold, shining like transparent glass.” (Source: Uma Back Translation)
  • Yakan: “And the twelve doors were made of twelve pearls. Each door was made of one pearl. And the streets in that city were of unmixed gold, clear like glass.” (Source: Yakan Back Translation)
  • Western Bukidnon Manobo: “And the twelve gates were twelve pearls for each gate was made of a single pearl. And the street in the city was very pure gold because like glass our eyes could see through it.” (Source: Western Bukidnon Manobo Back Translation)
  • Kankanaey: “The twelve entrances also, they were made from one-pearl -each, and the streets of the town, they were cemented with pure gold which gleamed like glass.” (Source: Kankanaey Back Translation)
  • Tagbanwa: “Like oyster pearls were the twelve gates, each one made of one pearl. The streets of the city were first-class gold and sparklingly-clear like mirror/glass.” (Source: Tagbanwa Back Translation)
  • Tenango Otomi: “The twelve gates were all equipped with doors all of pearl. And just one pearl formed each of the doors. the streets of the city were all of gold. The streets reflected the sunlight like glass.” (Source: Tenango Otomi Back Translation)

Translation commentary on Revelation 21:21

The twelve gates were twelve pearls: here gates probably means the gateways, or else the watch towers above the gateways. For pearls see 17.4.

The street of the city: as in 11.8, either the broad main street or a collective term for all the streets (also 22.2); probably the main street.

Pure gold, transparent as glass: similar to the phrase in verse 18.

Quoted with permission from Bratcher, Robert G. and Hatton, Howard A. A Handbook on The Revelation to John. (UBS Handbook Series). New York: UBS, 1993. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .

SIL Translator’s Notes on Revelation 21:21

21:21a

pearls: The word pearls refer to hard, shiny spheres found in the shellfish called oysters. They are often grayish white in color, but sometimes dark gray. The good ones are very valuable. See how you translated this word in 17:4 or 18:12.

with each gate consisting of a single pearl: The Greek clause is literally “each gate was of one pearl.” In English it is more natural to use a passive clause with the verb “make.” The topic is the gate. The topic is not who made it. Other ways to translate this clause are:

each gate was made of one pearl
-or-

⌊The material/substance of⌋ each gate was a single pearl

21:21b

The main street of the city was pure gold: The focus here is on the street and the gold used to make it. The focus is not on who made it or on the fact that it was made. Other ways to translate this clause are:

The main street consisted of pure gold
-or-

⌊The material/substance of⌋ the main street was pure gold

The main street: The Greek phrase is literally “the street.” The Berean Standard Bible and other English versions interpret this phrase as referring to the main street of the city. For example:

the great street (New International Version)

as clear as glass: It is not clear as to how the gold is as clear as glass. The Greek word that the Berean Standard Bible translates as clear occurs only here in the New Testament. It occurs only once in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, where it means “pure.” Many English versions translate as the Berean Standard Bible does. Other ways to translate this phrase are:

gleaming like glass (Phillips’ New Testament in Modern English)
-or-
bright as clear glass
-or-
like transparent glass (New International Version)

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