Revelation 22:2

2. On either ( each)

side of the river The river cleaves the street lengthwise into two long strips; so that there is a breadth of street on each side of the stream. On both the banks of the river, the tree of life grows in rows, extending in line between street and river.

Twelve manner of fruits Rather, twelve fruitages, or (as Stuart) fruit-harvests. The idea is not that there were different species of fruits, but successive crops.

The twelve tribal nations of the celestial earth have a salubrious clime and a lofty, luminous capital, with a gate for each tribe into it, labeled with the tribal name. On what immortal fruit do these immortals live? The tree of life furnishes twelve fruit-harvests a year, a harvest for each tribe. Here is a beautiful coincidence between the natural and symbolic twelve.

But are the river and the tree confined to the capital? And must the nations, each one, pay an annual visit to the capital to obtain its harvest, just as the old Jews paid their annual visit to old Jerusalem at the Passover? And is it at these visits that the kings and nations (Revelation 21:24; Revelation 21:26) bring their glory and honour into it? Or does the river flow into all parts of the earth, refreshing the nations with renewed immortality? The former seems to be the view indicated by most of the statements. At the same time, this presents a pleasing idea of movement, and of perpetual reverence to the resident King. And, as the fruit of the tree is the ambrosia, and the river furnishes the nectar, so the very leaves of the tree are a medicine, warding off every decay, disease, or lesion. So the tree of life in the original Eden was the source of Adam’s immortality, exclusion from which was exposure to certainty of decay, disease, and death.

Genesis 3:22-24. Here, then, is paradise restored. The resurrectional immortality the immortality of body with soul seems conditioned on the tree and river of life, the source of which is God’s own throne.