Revelation

Revelation, last book of the New Testament. It is rich in allegory and subject to numerous legitimate interpretations. The book is sometimes called the Apocalypse. Both English titles are derived from the first word in the Greek original, apokalypsis (“revelation”).

The author calls himself John, and ecclesiastical tradition has held St John the Evangelist to be the author. Many scholars, however, considering such evidence as the linguistic differences between Revelation and the Gospel of John, also traditionally ascribed to John the Evangelist, have been inclined to attribute Revelation to some other prominent early Christian. They suggest, for instance, the Apostle John Mark or John the Elder. The place of composition is generally supposed to have been the island of Pátmos, one of the Dodecanese islands in the Aegean Sea, to which the author had been banished “on account of the word of God and the testimony of Jesus” (1:9). There, perhaps in the reign (ad 69-79) of Roman Emperor Vespasian, but most probably in the reign (ad 81-96) of Roman Emperor Domitian, “a loud voice like a trumpet” reportedly was heard by the author saying “write what you see in a book and send it to the seven churches, to Ephesus and to Smyrna and to Pergamum and to Thyatira and to Sardis and to Philadelphia and to Laodicea” (1:10-11).

Revelation was written to prepare Christians for the last intervention of God in human affairs. The early Church believed this event to be close at hand. When it occurred, a new age of the world, in which Christ and the Church would be triumphant, would begin. Meanwhile, however, the evils and terrors of the existing world order would increase and intensify. The author of Revelation seems to have regarded the worsening of conditions for Christians in the Roman Empire under Domitian as signifying that this catastrophic period had begun. Apparently, he wrote chiefly to encourage Christians to endure this terrifying final crisis in the confident expectation of an imminent, eternally just age.

It is recognized that John, in communicating to his fellow Christians “what you see, what is and what is to take place hereafter” (1:19), deliberately chose a literary vehicle that would tend to conceal his message from the enemies of the Church. This vehicle was an apocalypse, a literary form characterized by an often elaborately symbolic interpretation and prediction of events. He derived his apocalyptic symbols from prophetic books of the Old Testament and from the common Christian tradition. No doubt the earliest readers of the book understood its visions and imagery, but in the centuries since Revelation was written, the key to the original meaning of its symbolism was lost. Efforts to recover it have produced widely divergent systems of interpretation but no general recognition of any one system as nearest to the author's meaning.

Revelation is valued today for its magnificent literary qualities, for its depiction of a historical crisis in Christianity, for its sublime dramatization of the struggle against evil, and for its visions of God and his ultimate eternal redemption of the righteous.