Above the expanse that was over their heads was the likeness of a throne, as the appearance of a sapphire stone; and on the likeness of the throne was a likeness as the appearance of a man on it above. I saw as it were glowing metal, as the appearance of fire within it all around, from the appearance of his waist and upward; and from the appearance of his waist and downward I saw as it were the appearance of fire, and there was brightness around him. As […]
⛓ 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.
Allusion2
A deliberate verbal borrowing without a citation formula.
Foundational throne-vision template. Volume (Ezekiel's inaugural call vision is the master text behind all of Rev 4-5), verbal recurrence, and structural agreement are all strong: a heavenly throne with One enthroned, surrounded by encircling brightness explicitly likened to a rainbow (iris/qeshet). The gemstone description — sapphire throne, glowing metal, fire all around — supplies the radiant-jewel idiom Revelation translates into jasper, sardius, and emerald. Reticent (Hays): John shows the One on the throne only by mineral light, declining to describe a human form as Ezekiel does (anthropomorphism muted, perhaps deliberately reverential). LXX of Ezek 1:26 uses sappheirou; Rev shifts the stone vocabulary toward Exod 28 breastplate gems.
High confidenceThe rainbow encircling the divine glory (Ezek 1:28, the bow in the cloud) supplies the angel's rainbow-crowned head and luminous appearance; strong on availability/recurrence (Ezekiel pervades Rev) and thematic coherence (theophanic glory). LXX iris matches Rev's iris.
High confidence