Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
And I John—"John" is omitted in A, B, Vulgate, Syriac, Coptic, and ANDREAS; also the "I" in the Greek of these authorities is not emphatic. The insertion of "I John" in the Greek would somewhat interfere with the close connection which subsists between "the new heaven and earth," Revelation 21:1, and the "new Jerusalem" in this verse.
Jerusalem . . . out of heaven— (Revelation 3:12; Galatians 4:26, "Jerusalem which is above"; Hebrews 11:10; Hebrews 12:22; Hebrews 13:14). The descent of the new Jerusalem out of heaven is plainly distinct from the earthly Jerusalem in which Israel in the flesh shall dwell during the millennium, and follows on the creation of the new heaven and earth. John in his Gospel always writes [Greek] Hierosoluma of the old city; in the Apocalypse always Hierousaleem of the heavenly city (Revelation 3:12). Hierousaleem is a Hebrew name, the original and holy appellation. Hierosoluma is the common Greek term, used in a political sense. Paul observes the same distinction when refuting Judaism (Galatians 4:26; compare Galatians 1:17-18; Galatians 2:1; Hebrews 12:22), though not so in the Epistles to Romans and Corinthians [BENGEL].
bride—made up of the blessed citizens of "the holy city." There is no longer merely a Paradise as in Eden (though there is that also, Revelation 2:7), no longer a mere garden, but now the city of God on earth, costlier, statelier, and more glorious, but at the same time the result of labor and pains such as had not to be expended by man in dressing the primitive garden of Eden. "The lively stones" were severally in time laboriously chiselled into shape, after the pattern of "the Chief corner-stone," to prepare them for the place which they shall everlastingly fill in the heavenly Jerusalem.
Other Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown entries containing Revelation 21:2:
Song of Solomon 3:2
Song of Solomon 6:4
Isaiah 33:17
Isaiah 52:1
Isaiah 61:10
Isaiah 62:4
Jeremiah 31:40
Daniel 2:35
Galatians 4:26
Ephesians 5:26
Ephesians 5:27
Hebrews 9:8
Revelation 3:12
Revelation 12:1
Revelation 17:5
Revelation 18:23
Revelation 19:7
Revelation 22:2
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