Over the head of the living creature there was the likeness of an expanse, like the awesome crystal to look on, stretched out over their heads above.
⛓ Read Ezekiel 1 forward — the whole chapter and its afterlife →Where this passage surfaces again, sorted by the strength of the link. Each kind of reuse — formal quotation, deliberate allusion, faint echo, figural pattern — carries its own mark. Follow any reference to read it in place.
Allusion1
A deliberate verbal borrowing without a citation formula.
“Sea of glass, similar to crystal” draws the word crystal (krystallos) directly from Ezekiel's firmament “like an awesome crystal” spread over the living creatures' heads. Verbal distinctiveness is high: krystallos is the rare shared term, and Ezekiel's expanse stands in the same throne-vision John is reworking, so coherence is total. John relocates the crystalline expanse from above the creatures (Ezek) to before the throne (a sea), combining it with the Sinai pavement (Exod 24:10). LXX Ezek 1:22 uses krystallos, so John follows the Greek lexeme closely.
High confidenceEcho1
A fainter, low-volume reuse, carried by recurrence or thematic coherence.
The crystalline expanse 'like the awesome gleam of crystal' over the living creatures supplies the throne-vision imagery behind the 'sea of glass' (hyaline thalassa), cf. Rev 4:6. 'Mixed with fire' adds Ezekiel 1's fire/amber. Imagery transfer.
Medium confidence