Interpreting the Book of Revelation (Guides to New Testament Exegesis)

J. Ramsey Michaels

• Publisher: Baker Academic
• Year: 1998
• Print ISBN: 9780801062933
• eBook ISBN: 9781441215079
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Biblical Criticism & Interpretation

An introduction to the study of Revelation reviewing the book's linguistic structure, vocabulary, and variant readings, as well as differences of opinion regarding its message.

1

Genre and Authorship

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The first thing many students want to know about a biblical book is who wrote it. But the question of the authorship of the Book of Revelation cannot be separated from another question: “What sort of book is this?” The Guides to New Testament Exegesis series is based on an awareness of, and sensitivity to, the varied literary types or genres comprising the books of the New Testament (see p. 7). Because the author is more likely to be identified in some genres than in others, questions of authorship and genre are intertwined. Nowhere is this more true than in the case of the Book of Revelation. The subject of genre must be addressed with special care in connection with this last book of the New Testament because it seems to represent a mixed genre to many readers, sending off mixed signals as to what it intends to be. This is reflected even in the variety of names by which it is known: the “Book of Revelation”; the “Revelation of John”; the “Revelation of Jesus Christ”; the “Apocalypse”; the “Apocalypse of John,” or the “Apocalypse of Jesus Christ.”

Apocalypse, Letter, or Prophecy?

Much of the debate over genre concerns whether to translate the Greek word ἀποκάλυψις (apokalypsis, 1:1) into English as “revelation” or merely to transliterate it as “apocalypse.” Another issue is whether the emphasis should be placed on Jesus Christ as the divine source of the work or on John as the human author. Whatever the name given, the first three verses of the first chapter form the point of departure.

If, however, the next three verses (1:4–6) set the starting point, the result will be quite different, because they bear the unmistakable marks of a New Testament letter, like the letters of Paul. No one refers to the Revelation as the “letter of John,” and it would be confusing to do so, because tradition identifies three other short New Testament epistles as John’s letters. Yet, ironically the Book of Revelation bears the name of John while 1 John, 2 John, and 3 John do not! A glance at verse 4 shows the same formal characteristics of a letter as all the letters of Paul:

John,

to the seven churches that are in Asia:

Grace and peace from . . . .

Where Paul customarily says, “Grace [mercy] and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ,” or something similar, this letter has a far more elaborate formula in keeping with the themes and language of the work as a whole: “from the One who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits that are before his throne, and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the first-born of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth” (vv. 4b–5). And where Paul continues with a blessing or thanksgiving of some kind, this letter continues with a doxology: “Το him who loves us and loosed us from our sins in his blood, and made us a kingdom, and priests to his God and Father, to him be glory and power forever and ever. Amen.”[1] The letter form is all but forgotten as John proceeds to recount his visions, yet at the end he again takes up the conventions of the Pauline letters with a final benediction: “The grace of the Lord Jesus be with God’s people. Amen” (22:21).

If we make “apocalypse” our starting point, we must at the same time acknowledge that the book calls itself an apocalypse once (1:1), but a prophecy or book of prophecy five times (1:3; 22:7, 10, 18–19, and possibly 19:10). This raises the question of whether a distinction is intended between “apocalypse” and “prophecy,” or whether the latter, in the author’s mind, interprets the former. The continuity between “apocalypse” in 1:1 and “prophecy” in 1:3 suggests that the terms are almost interchangeable. Paul includes both “apocalypse” and “prophecy” in 1 Corinthians 14:6 (along with “knowledge” and “teaching”) in a list of different kinds of utterances by prophets in the congregation (see also vv. 26–33: “psalm,” “teaching,” “apocalypse,” “tongue,” “interpretation”). In such instances the Greek word ἀποκάλυψις (apokalypsis) or apocalypse should be translated, not merely transliterated, into English as “revelation,” on the assumption that a revelation is an oracle of some kind granted to a Christian prophet. Similarly, the Book of Revelation seems to present itself as a long oracle of one such prophet, not unlike the prophetic books of the Hebrew Bible.[2] Apocalypse is here interpreted to mean simply “a prophecy,” not in the narrow sense of a prediction of the future—although the Book of Revelation surely claims to be that—but in the broader sense of a direct revelation from God about past, present, or future events, to an individual or group qualified to disclose the revelation to a larger community of believers.

Apocalyptic Literature

The “Apocalypse” has also given its name to a large body of Jewish and Christian literature outside as well as within the Hebrew and Christian Bibles. Even beginning students become familiar with the umbrella term Jewish apocalyptic literature, comprising the biblical book of Daniel and a number of early Jewish works bearing the names of well known or less familiar characters from the Hebrew Bible. These include collected cycles of tradition about Enoch, “in the seventh generation from Adam” (see Jude 14), who “walked with God; and he was not, for God took him” (Gen. 5:24). Stories about Enoch’s heavenly visions were collected in the apocalypses known as 1 Enoch (now fully extant only in Ethiopic manuscripts) and 2 Enoch (known largely from Old Slavonic texts). Many of Enoch’s visions centered on the evil union between fallen angels and human beings hinted at in Genesis 6:1–4, and on God’s consequent punishment of both angels and humans at the time of the flood.

Other Jewish apocalypses dealt with God’s judgment on Israel and Jerusalem in the time of the exile. These include the Latin 4 Ezra (sometimes called 2 Esdras), attributed to Ezra the scribe, which found its way into the Old Testament Apocrypha. Two others not included in the Apocrypha, the Syriac 2 Baruch and Greek 3 Baruch, were attributed to Jeremiah’s scribe with that name. The apocalypses of Ezra and Baruch all come from a time shortly after the Book of Revelation and share with Revelation a strong interest in the fate of Jerusalem. Fourth Ezra, with its visions of Jerusalem, and 1 Enoch, with its journeys to heaven, are probably the most relevant apocalypses for the student of the Revelation.

Other Jewish apocalypses attributed to major figures in Jewish tradition are the Testament (or Assumption) of Moses, the Apocalypse of Abraham, the Apocalypse of Adam, and the Apocalypse of Elijah. These and many more Jewish apocalyptic writings are available to students in a recent comprehensive collection in English translation.[3] Apocalyptic features can also be found in earlier Jewish works that are not themselves considered apocalyptic: passages in Isaiah and Ezekiel, such writings of early Judaism as Jubilees and the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, the Dead Sea Scrolls,[4] and passages in the New Testament itself.[5]

In ancient Christianity, the term apocalypse eventually was applied to a number of works recounting visions. These were ascribed to famous Christian apostles (for example, the Apocalypse of Peter, the Apocalypse of Paul) or Old Testament figures (for example, the Ascension of Isaiah).[6] The designation of these works as apocalypses is probably attributable to the tendency of popular noncanonical (apocryphal) Christian writings to duplicate the genres represented in the canon of the New Testament. There are apocryphal gospels (for example, of Thomas, Peter, and Philip), apocryphal Acts (for example, of Thomas, Peter, Paul, and John), apocryphal letters (allegedly from the Apostles or from Paul to the Corinthians and the Laodiceans). It is not surprising, therefore, that there should be apocryphal apocalypses as well. Another early Christian practice was to subject Jewish apocalyptic writings to Christian interpolation and revision to give them a Christian slant and claim them for the church. Brief Christian apocalypses were even prefixed or appended to Jewish apocalypses for the same purpose. The best examples of the latter procedure are chapters 1–2 and 15–16 of 4 Ezra, sometimes known as 5 Ezra and 6 Ezra, respectively.

Apocalyptic literature, Jewish or Christian, is a field of study with which the student of Revelation must gain familiarity.[7] Yet limits must be drawn, or the student will be swallowed up in the sea of apocalyptic literature and never get to the text of Revelation itself. The matter is complicated by the fact that the study of apocalyptic literature has undergone significant changes in the past two decades, and many questions remain. The crucial question is whether apocalypse is properly called a genre, or whether it is simply a mood or temperament—or perhaps a religious perspective or theology—that expresses itself in a variety of forms and genres. Is the Book of Revelation an apocalypse or is it simply “apocalyptic” in its view of God and the world, and in the imagery it employs?

Recent attempts have been made to define apocalypse. A widely used definition is that proposed by the Apocalypse Seminar of the Society of Biblical Literature in 1979: “Apocalypse is a genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial, insofar as it involves another, supernatural world.”[8]

In 1986 the definition was enlarged by adding that the genre called apocalypse was “intended to interpret present earthly circumstances in light of the supernatural world and of the future, and to influence both the understanding and the behavior of the audience by means of divine authority.”[9]

The beginning student, staggering under such verbosity, will do well to remember that definitions of this kind are almost inevitably circular. Scholars assemble a group of documents suspected of belonging to a genre called apocalypse and list the common features of these documents to define the genre. For example, the definition quoted above appears to be tailored to fit the Book of Revelation, or at least to make sure of its inclusion. This seems natural since Revelation is the first known work in Greek to title itself “apocalypse.”

It would be very easy to assemble a group of Jewish and early Christian writings which had one other common feature: authorship attributed to a great or wise man either of the distant Jewish past (Enoch, Ezra, or Baruch) or of the more recent Christian past (Peter or Paul). This literary device is known as pseudonymity (assigning a false name), and writings that employ this device are traditionally labeled pseudepigrapha (false writings), a term reflecting the Christian church’s negative judgment on their legitimacy and worth. The latter include, but are not limited to, documents of an apocalyptic kind.[10] A collection of such apocalypses would not include the Book of Revelation, nor would it include one other early Christian writing almost equally conspicuous for its apocalyptic features, the so-called Shepherd of Hermas.[11] Neither John, who speaks in the Book of Revelation, nor Hermas, who recounts his visions in the Shepherd of Hermas, is identifiable as a great man of the Jewish or Christian past. No certain knowledge of either exists apart from the works that bear their name.

Who Was John?

Attempts have been made to identify the “John” of Revelation 1:1, 4, 9, and 22:8 with some other John mentioned in the New Testament or early church tradition. Josephine Massyngberde Ford identified him as John the Baptist,[12] but it would be difficult to find even one other scholar who shares that opinion. An ancient tradition going back to Justin Martyr and Irenaeus in the second century identified him as the apostle John, son of Zebedee, who with his brother James and two others left his fishing net to follow Jesus at the beginning of Jesus’ public ministry (Mark 1:19–20). The tradition commonly assumed that this John was the “beloved disciple” who leaned on Jesus’ breast at the last supper, and to whom the authorship of the fourth Gospel is attributed (John 21:20–24).[13] Other ancient theories identified him with the “John Mark” mentioned in Acts 12:12 (also 12:25; 13:5, 13; 15:37, 39),[14] or with a certain “John the Elder,” said to have been confused later in Ephesus with John the son of Zebedee.[15]

All these theories attempted to identify the author of Revelation “from the outside.” This is one way to approach not only the matter of authorship, but many other questions raised by this book. In the case of authorship, it entails a considerable amount of guesswork Still, this path is taken by those with a high degree of respect for church tradition. Ironically, this group includes many evangelicals who have been taught to base their conclusions, not on tradition, but solely on the biblical text. Those who follow the latter approach consistently will try to answer all questions, so far as is possible, “from the inside,” that is, entirely from data supplied by the text of Revelation.

In the case of authorship, this means being content with the information that the author’s name is John. Clearly, John does not feel the need for self-introduction in his greeting (1:4),[16] adding only a brief self-description in 1:9 as “your brother and companion in the persecution and kingdom and patient endurance that are ours in Jesus.” Because his intended audience knows him, the modern reader learns little about him. He is a “servant” of Jesus Christ (1:1b), and as such is part of a group called “servants” (1:1a) of Jesus or God. An angel closely associates him with his “brothers the prophets” (22:9) or his “brothers who have the testimony of Jesus” (19:10). Jesus addresses him with a plural pronoun, apparently as part of this larger group: “I, Jesus, sent my angel to testify these things to you [plural] about the churches” (22:16a).[17]

It is fair to conclude from this inside evidence that the author writes as an early Christian prophet to a group of churches that knew and respected his prophetic authority. Whatever else John may have been—apostle, elder, evangelist, baptizer—is not discovered in the text. Although he knows of “the Twelve Apostles of the Lamb,” and sees their names inscribed on the foundations of the new Jerusalem (21:14), he gives no hint of belonging to their number. He makes no claim to apostolic authority; if he is an apostle he conceals the fact.

Genre: Toward a Conclusion

A pseudonymous apocalypse of John based on traditions about the apostle John, the son of Zebedee, would probably have capitalized on the account in the fourth Gospel of the beloved disciple reclining on Jesus’ breast (Jo...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Editor’s Preface
• Author’s Preface
• Introduction
• Part 1 General Considerations in the Exegesis of Revelation
• Part 2 Specific Examples of Exegesis in Revelation
• Select Bibliography for the Book of Revelation
• Notes
• Back Cover