Revering the ruler was less a matter of worshipping a human being than of showing respect for the gods who had placed him there, and so shaped the destiny of nations. The distinction between religion and politics would have made no sense to them - or, for that matter, to most of their contemporaries. But Oxford historian Simon Price has brilliantly shown that the matter looked very different to the Asian citizens who built the Sebasteion. Historians have often assumed that reverence for emperors as gods or heroes was a matter of political expedience, not piety. Who wrote this book? Why - and how - do so many people still read it today? And what is revelation? Are any so-called revelations what they claim to be: messages from God? How can we know whether these visions actually communicate truth about reality or only one person’s projection or delusion? (3)Īnyone hearing these prophecies might well wonder: What kinds of visions are these, and what kind of man was writing them? John was a Jewish prophet writing visions he claimed to have received on the island of Patmos, about seventy miles from the city of Ephesus, off the coast of Asia Minor in present-day Turkey but we begin to understand what he wrote only when we see that his book is wartime literature.
Martin Luther wanted to throw the Book of Revelation out of the canon, saying “there is no Christ in it,” until he realized how he could use its powerful imagery against the Catholic Church, while Catholic apologists turned it back against him and other “protesting” Christians. How did this book speak to people when it was written two thousand years ago, and how does it continue to do so today? These questions led to this book, for, whether we love or hate it, the Book of Revelation speaks to something deep in human nature.
Into the Apocalypse With an Unruffled Tour Guide – NY TimesĮlaine Pagels on the Book of Revelation – Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly Chapter One – John’s Revelation: Challenging the Evil Empire, Rome The Big Reveal: Why Does the Bible End That Way? – The New Yorker
Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, & Politics in the Book of Revelation.
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