The New Testament

The New Testament › Revelation

Revelation 4

1After these things I looked, and there was an open door in heaven. The first voice I had heard, speaking with me like a trumpet, said, “Come up here, and I will show you what must happen.” After these things, 2immediately I was in the Spirit. And there was a throne set in heaven, and someone seated on the throne. 3The one seated there looked like jasper and carnelian, and a rainbow around the throne looked like emerald. 4Around the throne were twenty-four thrones, and seated on the thrones were twenty-four elders dressed in white clothes, with golden crowns on their heads. 5From the throne came flashes of lightning and rumblings and peals of thunder. Seven flaming torches burned before the throne; these are the seven spirits of God. 6Before the throne was something like a glass sea, like crystal.

In the midst of the throne and around the throne were four living creatures, full of eyes in front and behind. 7The first living creature was like a lion, the second living creature like a calf, the third living creature had a face like a human face, and the fourth living creature was like a flying eagle. 8Each of the four living creatures had six wings; around and within they were full of eyes. Day and night they never rest, saying, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord God, the Almighty, who was and who is and who is coming.”

9Whenever the living creatures give glory and honor and thanks to the one seated on the throne, who lives forever and ever, 10the twenty-four elders fall down before the one seated on the throne and worship the one who lives forever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne, saying, 11“You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, because you created all things, and because of your will they existed and were created.”

Translation notes 3

4:1–2 — After these things. The Greek base's punctuation places the second “after these things” with John's next visionary experience. Many editions and translations attach it to “what must happen after these things.” This is a sentence-division choice, not an extra or missing phrase. The order of seeing is not automatically a timetable for every event seen.

4:3–8 — Throne and creatures. The gemstone names describe appearance; their exact correspondence to modern mineral names is uncertain. “In the midst … and around” preserves the unusual spatial description. The living creatures are distinct from the beasts introduced later: the Greek uses different words. Their imagery recalls Ezekiel's throne vision and Isaiah's six-winged attendants.

4:11 — Existed and were created. The order follows the Greek rather than being rearranged into a philosophical account of creation. The whole statement attributes the existence of everything to God's will.