καὶ οἱ δώδεκα πυλῶνες δώδεκα μαργαρῖται· ἀνὰ εἷς ἕκαστος τῶν πυλώνων ἦν ἐξ ἑνὸς μαργαρίτου. καὶ ἡ πλατεῖα τῆς πόλεως χρυσίον καθαρὸν ὡς ὕαλος διαυγής. (Revelation 21:21, Nestle GNT)
"And the twelve gates were twelve pearls, each of the gates made of a single pearl, and the street of the city was pure gold, like transparent glass." (ESV)
Compare Revelation 21:18-καὶ ἡ ἐνδώμησις τοῦ τείχους αὐτῆς ἴασπις, καὶ ἡ πόλις χρυσίον καθαρὸν ὅμοιον ὑάλῳ καθαρῷ·(WH).
John uses ὅμοιον ὑάλῳ καθαρῷ in Rev. 21:18; ὡς ὕαλος διαυγής occurs in Rev. 21:21.
E.W. Bullinger on Revelation 21:21: "as it were. Not that it is glass, but gold of a kind unknown to us."
Robertson's Word Pictures of the New Testament: "Transparent (διαυγής — diaugēs). Old word (from δια — dia through, αυγη — augē ray, shining through), here alone in N.T."
Stephen Smalley, Revelation, page 556:
52 comments:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E1%BD%95%CE%B1%CE%BB%CE%BF%CF%82
There is no evidence like no evidence - https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g5194/lxx/lxx/0-1/
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0063:entry=vitrum-cn
I think we can safely say the reference is to glass. There is enough evidence for that claim.
See the entry about glass here: https://oxfordre.com/classics/browse?btog=chap&pageSize=10&sort=onlinepubdatedescending&t0=ORE_CLA:REFCLA009
See https://pure.manchester.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/86865466/FULL_TEXT.PDF
Page 262
Sorry, again, NO. When you know the history of glass and its rarity it far more likely to mean alabaster. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alabaster
'a kind of crystalline stone' - correct, but it NOT glass. Alabaster makes a nice lamp shade or a drinking cup.
https://www.etsy.com/uk/listing/1194136755/blue-alabaster-lamp-piece-of-art-adus
In Revelation, I doubt it means alabaster. Did you read the LSJ entry for this word? https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/morph?l=u%28%2Falos&la=greek&can=u%28%2Falos1&prior=vitrum&d=Perseus:text:1999.04.0058:alphabetic%20letter=*u:entry%20group=1:entry=u(/alos&i=2#lexicon
ohn employs the word in a visionary context: rarity has little to do with his use there.
Let's also not overlook ἡ πλατεῖα τῆς πόλεως χρυσίον καθαρὸν in Rev. 21:21. Are you suggesting gold that resembles alabaster?
Of course rarity has plenty to do with it, especially if people of the time did not know what was being talked about. Here's a little project for you. Find one example of a piece of plate glass from the first or second century. Sure you get little bottles for the wealthiest in society, but show me one piece of plate?
https://sculpturesupply.com/products/harvest-gold-alabaster
Or did someone in wealthy circles write the revelation ? https://www.metmuseum.org/toah/hd/rlux/hd_rlux.htm
Maybe this will satisfy your request: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plate_glass
See the Roman fragment there.
I've also seen no indication that no one would have understood a reference to glass. LSJ says the word can refer to both alabaster stone and glass; the dissertation I posted likewise said glass. So does Mounce.
"dated to 1st to 4th century CE" - Nothing decisive here? It was a material of the rich. Even in Tudor England most drank from pewter, pot or wood, in order of descending cost.
https://bmcr.brynmawr.edu/2018/2018.09.33/
And bear in mind that there was more wealth on display on Pompeii than Rome - The holiday homes of the rich and famous.
https://www.theartnewspaper.com/2022/08/10/excavations-unearth-secrets-of-everyday-life-in-pompeii-including-exceptionally-well-preserved-glass-and-ceramics
I am not going to debate any further on the chink of light proposals as to why something is POSSIBLE although highly improbable, unless written by an elite.
See here - https://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue40/1/3-6.html
A total of 713 glass fragments (not many in fragment form), including ninety-six sherds of window glass, was recovered from 323 contexts. The assemblage covers the entire Roman period, with the peak of glass use occurring in the >>2nd to mid-3rd centuries<<.
https://www.facebook.com/TheVindolandaTrust/posts/curators-pick-gladiator-glass-bowlthe-gladiator-glass-is-the-most-striking-piece/746600535421091/
The Gladiator glass is the most striking piece of painted glass to come from Roman Britain. Imported from the Rhineland, this would have been an expensive and valuable object.
So far, even considering your sources, I've seen nothing that overthrows understanding it as glass. It's visionary and glass is part of the word's semantic range. LSJ lists alabaster as a possible meaning along with glass.
https://www.internationalstandardbible.com/G/glass.html
https://biblehub.com/text/job/28-17.htm
So proverbs is not that old or the author of your article is conflating two materials
https://www.dailysabah.com/life/2020/02/14/history-of-love-hidden-in-lachrymatory-bottles
https://dia.org/collection/lachrymatory-66101
Proverbs 23:31 CF. Deuteronomy 25:13
Proverbs doesn't mention the lachrymatory bottles and that is not what the article said: Proverbs talks about the "wine cup" and it's actually Psalms that mentions the tear bottles (Ps. 56:8). Hence, the author did not conflate materials.
Even though I got my reference wrong doe not change the fact that he is conflating and that the "glass" is a drinking skin.
Not really what he says.
Katherine Larson has an article on the Oxford website I mentioned above and I wanted to know more about her. She says that hualos refers to transparent glass: I found out that she's written about glass in antiquity. See https://people.cmog.org/bio/katherine-larson
https://whatson.cmog.org/exhibitions-galleries/dig-deeper-discovering-ancient-glass-workshop
"a glass workshop in Jalame, near Haifa in modern Israel, which was active between 350–400 CE."
Antiquity is abroad term and she does nothing to overturn my points.
https://www.themagazineantiques.com/article/curious-objects-new-perspectives-on-ancient-glass-with-katherine-larson/
Duncan, the last thing I'm going to state about this subjject for now is that we've discussed the term "antiquity" before. It's not that hard top pin down if examined contextually. I studied antiquitous Christianity in grad school: the period stretched from circa 100-600 CE. It is to be distinguished from the middle ages, Renaissance, etc. Antiquity is commonly used that way.
Secondly, I doubt that you've read her bookk about glass and neither have I. So, it's a little difficult to say she did not overthrow what you said earlier. Larson writes that hualos refers to transparent glass. I understood you to gainsay that claim. At any rate, she doesn't seem to indicate that the glass was really alaster stone. Maybe one day I will read her book to learn more about the subject, but she writes on the Oxford site:
"Glassmaking has traditionally not been considered a major accomplishment of Greek craft, but new research and archaeological discoveries have established Greek contributions to the history of glass. While there is no single ancient Greek term for glass, the term ὕαλος (hyalos) refers to a transparent, hard, luminous material, such as glass or rock crystal. In the 6th century bce, core-formed glass perfume and cosmetic containers began to appear throughout the Mediterranean, particularly in funerary contexts and dedicatory assemblages. Later, colourless glass, cast in moulds and sagged over forms and often decorated with gilding or cutting, appears as a major technical innovation in the late 5th to early 4th century bce. Although no workshops have been found, Rhodes and Macedonia were likely important producers of these products.The Hellenistic period saw a gradual diversification of forms, expansion of colours, and experimentation with new techniques. Always important luxury trade goods, glass drinking vessels and small objects such as beads and gaming pieces become more accessible to a wider segment of the population by the beginning of the 1st century bce, an important prelude to the spread of glassblowing under the Roman empire."
should be alabaster stone
I don't need to read here book and if you read all the sites about her work and footnotes her field is "late antiquity" upto 1250 CE and her earliest is possibly 350 CE. So I can be fairly confident that any references as to earlier dates will be second hand regurgitations. So, she still does nothing to overturn my point.
The glass of those early times, we have no idea where it was actually made, Egypt, Germany, who knows? Trade routes that we know know about are still seriously underestimated by many archeologists.
https://www.academia.edu/27579476/_Primary_glass_workshops_in_Graeco_Roman_Egypt_Preliminary_Report_on_the_Excavations_on_the_site_of_Beni_Salama_Wadi_Natrun_2003_2005_9_dans_I_Freestone_J_Bailey_et_C_M_Jackson_%C3%A9d_Glass_in_the_Roman_world_in_honour_of_Jennifer_Price_Oxford_2015_p_1_22
www.academia.edu/9809316/Ancient_Glass_in_a_Philological_Context
This article deals with occurrences of hualos in the bce part of antiquity. Seems to back what Larson and others write about the Greeks and glass. Ok, I'm really done this time.
Coffins - https://www.soane.org/sarcophagus-seti-i
The production of glass in ancient Greece is at the same period of bronze production. This is the period when the majority of Greece was denuded of trees. Fuel for the high energy requirements of production, the high temperatures required to achieve this production. What was called a bronze age really was not as the majority never had access to the most expensive materials. Physics dictates much of this and the ability for any kind of mass production.
"Coal has been used for heating since the cave man. Archeologists have also found evidence that the Romans in England used it in the second and third centuries (100- 200 AD). In the 1700s, the English found that coal could produce a fuel that burned cleaner and hotter than wood charcoal."
We're now getting away from glass or the potential meaning of hualos, but why was that period called the Bronze age?
"The Bronze Age (c. 3000-1000 BCE) is the period when cultures were either using, producing, or trading bronze."
This was an historical first.
https://www.worldhistory.org/Bronze_Age_Aegean/
The majority did not have to use or possess Bronze for it to be given that appellation: that is not the point of the nomenclature as many sites demonstrate.
Here is Larson''s doctoral dissertation: https://www.academia.edu/122181533/From_Luxury_Product_to_Mass_Commodity_Glass_Production_and_Consumption_in_the_Hellenistic_Worldv
It demonstrates that her competence spans more than late antiquity because she studied the bce period as well and discusses it.
We are not getting away from anything. Mycenaean Greece had glass production too because they had the technology but far more importantly they had the energy resources to do it. The same goes for Rome in the late second century CE onwards.
"The Romans were not interested in Germania's coal. The Romans took between 220 BC to 19 BC to conquer Hispania. They put up with a brutal insurgency. Since it's rich in minerals."
", a primary goal of this dissertation is to redress this bias in the scholarship by
focusing on the Hellenistic glass industry as a crucial transition between two vastly different production modes, when glass was truly transformed from a luxury product used in elite burials and royal feasts in the fourth and third centuries to a ubiquitous part of household assemblages of the Roman empire by the end of the first century CE". - problem is that the resources required to change the production method was not readily available until well into the second century CE.
What I meant is that we're getting away from the original focus of my post and the discussion about what hualos possibly meant to the Greeks. Now the bronze age, coal (etc.) has been broached, which is not going to shed light on what the text in Revelation means. That's what I was pointing out.
According to Larson, the Greeks were producing glass before the CE period and I've read this same point elsewhere. I quoted her above to this effect.
John Lee likewise has an extensive article about hualos that I perused the other day. See https://brill.com/display/book/edcoll/9789004335936/B9789004335936_007.xml
I found another paper, which states:
The word vitrum developed quite late in Latin. Its earliest known occurrence is in Lucretius’ poem de Rerum Natura (4,602) of about 58 BC, just before Caesar’s trip to Britain. Before
then glass was generally called hyalus, from Greek υαλος, which probably came from the same root as υω ‘to rain’, cognate with Latin sucus ‘juice’. Ancient people seem to have
mentally linked water and glass at many levels. Gemstones (crystal, κρυσταλλος, something hard, related to crust) were perceived as created from water inside the earth, thus involving
two of the four ancient elements. And of course frozen water is ice. The notion of glass as a supercooled liquid, rather like a metal, played into the ancient religious fascination with flowing water. The Christian Bible (Revelation 4,6) has a passage
‘And before the throne [there was] a glassy (υαλινη) sea like unto crystal (κρυσταλλωι)’, which picks up on Old Testament passages in Ezekiel and Job. Bible commentaries discuss
those two Greek words, plus a one-occurrence Hebrew word and the Latin words used to translate them.
https://d1wqtxts1xzle7.cloudfront.net/80921068/Glass-libre.pdf?1645013811=&response-content-disposition=inline%3B+filename%3DGlass_Metals_and_Amber_but_not_Woad.pdf&Expires=1728762344&Signature=aA1g8nRR9HwQjTb~ufARUYeoAEZrhk4tEaWPEFV3PDodgtsgav~H9nod8jJ9X1EUChmd~b4pHyrTISMj5RMZno6iVICbPZoKcpmULrbFdpWFtk6YkfmZkaVfBsDmX~da7XSmRt~s9Uh0NiJ2fqWZI9DJ7te3H33qlyWarsGvhB-qrrRQm8s2Y-572E1rk~Ji~JOvJneIJDTvl5QDBHTO~AOe5t1zMy-LnQX5Pj2UgX5xmmUEPRijdPhKyNJrBZrr2r6OLxCP4UNIMmGYFS0yYHTDX1nsLsKKE82hkaPTjgBzOpZEXXD57qb4fjRH7bbdUXbaZjW-RGbATPeg0IeoXQ__&Key-Pair-Id=APKAJLOHF5GGSLRBV4ZA
Was that the point? I thought the point was that the same term had several possible meanings? But the majority of non elites in the fist and even second century Roman empire would not have understood it to mean molten silica & not even Amber, another extremely rare commodity, So Alabaster seems the natural choice.
https://zaksantiquities.com/shop/other-antiquities/ancient-roman-alabaster-bowl-jerusalem/#:~:text=Dating%20back%20to%20the%201st,for%20its%20beauty%20and%20versatility.
You advanced the idea that John (others) was talking about alabaster. While I agreed that hualos might have that signification/referentiality at times, I submitted that John likely had glass in mind, not alabaster. That is why I've posted what Larson and others have written.
John writes about streets made of gold, which resemble transparent hualos. That sounds like glass to me. Are you aware of a scholar who thinks hualos refers to alabaster in Revelation?
That's as long as this - https://biblehub.com/greek/katharo__2513.htm means transparent or translucent? Also bearing in mind that within the context we have Jasper/Lapis another mineral stone.
Note what it mentions about katharos here: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Revelation%2021%3A18&version=NET
https://www.billmounce.com/greek-dictionary/katharos . Don't you think I have already researched the word? Clean and transparent are two very different concepts. Note the other usages in Revelation & its general usage.
And this is not the only translation to move this way - https://www.bible.com/bible/1849/REV.21.18-22.TPT
I'm glad you researched the word. You still might like what LSJ has on katharos: https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.04.0057:entry=kaqaro/s
Again and above seem like distinct concepts to me, yet anothen can have either meaning
It's all boils down to probabilities.
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