Revelation 21:1

ἡ πρώτη γῆ. Aug. omits πρώτη.

καὶ ἡ … ἔτι. A has καὶ τὴν θάλασσαν οὐκ ἴδου ἔτι.

Revelation 21:1. NEW HEAVEN AND EARTH

1. εἶδον. This might naturally be understood as in Revelation 8:2; Revelation 15:1 as an announcement of the contents of the vision whose stages were to be related hereafter. At Revelation 21:5 the Seer hears the promise of a new heaven and earth, the fulfilment of which is announced in Revelation 21:6. It is apparently in Revelation 21:10 that he actually begins to see what we are told in Revelation 21:1-2 that he saw. In the last two Chapter s of this wonderful Book all the mechanical difficulties of interpretation are at their height.

οὐρανὸν καινὸν καὶ γῆν καινήν. Isaiah 65:17; Isaiah 66:22; referred to, as here, in 2 Peter 3:13. It is idle to ask, what amount of change in the physical constitution of the universe is implied: the destruction of the earth, as a seat of life, and its renewal, would imply a complete change of the visible heavens. But a world “wherein dwelleth righteousness” would be a new world, even without any physical change at all.

ἡ θάλασσα οὐκ ἔστιν ἔτι. In the Coptic Zephaniah p. 129 flames break out and dry up the sea before the earth and the works therein are burned up. If the figure is to be taken literally (we hear of a river in the next chapter and a perennial stream implies an abundant reservoir of water somewhere), we might be tempted to think the absence of sea so to speak a defect in the landscape. To the ancients it seemed a pledge of security and unfettered intercourse; cf. Oceano dissociabili, Hor. Od. I. iii. 22. The same dislike to navigation is perhaps expressed Isaiah 33:21, where, it is said, Zion protected by God’s majesty is to be like a city defended by broad rivers and canals, so perhaps nothing is meant but the absence of hostile fleets; there may even be a reference to Sennacherib’s naval expedition against the Chaldees in 694 B.C. At any rate to the exile of Patmos the sea was the Great Divider.