244 REVELATION, BOOK OF
REVELATION, BOOK OF
elders (302 ff.), Harmagedon (263 ff.), the number 3i (266 ff.), the number 666 (374 ff.).
Bousset adopted Ounkel's method in Dtr Antichriit in dtr Ueberlicferung dfi Jtuientumji, dis neu^n Testaments und der neuen liirche (IbUa), and attempted to sliow that an essentially fixed apocal^-pse of Antichrist, originating in Judaism, can be traced from the New Test, down through the Middle Ages ; and that this tradition is essentially independent of Kev,, though Eev. at certain points shows dependence upon it. In his Kritisch-exeiji^tuiche Kmnmentar (Meyer, 1896), Bousset, on the question of composition, follows the method of WeizsJiclier, regarding the hook as a unity, but seeing in many sections apooalj'ptical fragments introduced by the writer from existing tradition, in part Jewish in origin. In several of these frag- meius Bousset finds parts of the Antichrist-tradition (71-^ ll'-" 1311 17 1414.20); others also may well be of Jewish origin (131-i» >» 17 (with which should probalily go also 16'2-21 and IS], 219-2:25), while 12 is of foreign but apparently not of Jewish origin. Bousset's treatment of various matters of detail will be men. tioned in the course of this article.
Holtzniann (,Einleituug in d. XT^, 1892 ; Band-Cmnmentar^, 1893) recognizes indications of a double historical background (soon after the dt-alh of Nero, and in the reign of Domitian), but does not go beyond the recognition of two or more streams in the book, and liolds chiefly to the contemporary -historical method of interj^retation, though now recognizing also the importance of tradition ob a source of the writer's material (Lehrtfuch der neutetit. Theol. i. 403-476).
The relative value of the three methods of interpretation last discussed — the conteinporary- huitorical, the literary-critical, and tlie tradition- historical — is still a matter of debate (see Well- hausen, Skizzen u. Vorarbeilen, vi. 18fi9, pp. '215- 249, and Gunkel, Zeitschr. f. wissen-schl. Theol. 1899). Each in a measure limits or controls tlie application of the other, and the right of each, within its bounds, may fairly be said to be estab- lished. Yet they do not, taken together, wholly cover the ground. On two general Hues, nnuh work remains to be done. One is the psychological study of apocalyptical writing, the other is the hi-storical relations of the Christianity of Rev., — esp the relation of its eschatologj' to that of Jesus and to that of St. Paul, and the relation of its Chiistology and Soteriology to the Pauline and the primitive apostolic. Gunkel at first put for- ward his tradition - historical method as also a psychological explanation of the apocalypse. The writer's belief in the truth and inviolable sanctity of his mysterious message could arise only from actual vision (which the nature of the material and the tendency of the modern mind exclude), or from the real antiquity of the material, before which the writer himself stood with awe. But Gunkel himself is now inclined to allow the actu- ality of visionary experiences (as psycliologists recognize them) in connexion with the writing of apocalypses (see the Introduction to his translation of 4 Ezra in Kautzsch's PseudcpicirapJien d. AT, 1900, and Preface to the 2nd eii. of his Wirkungen des Ileiligcn Gcistes, 1900). The most significant effort in this direction, and the occasion of Gunkel's modification of his former position, is Weinel's Wirkungen des Geiites und der Gcister, 1899.
On the other Iiand, the question so vital to an understanding of the beginnings of Christianity, whether the Chiistology and Soteriology of Kev. are Pauline, anti-Pauline, or independent of Paul- inism, remains quite unanswered ; as does the other still more vital question whether the eschatology of Kev. (given as the dictation of Jesus, 1' 22") is based on that of the Gospels, and ultimately on the teaching of Jesus, or is the source of the eschat- ologj' which the Gospels wrongly ascribe to Him.
The final problem of the interpreter is, of course, to get back as fully as possible into the mind of the writer. Two main paths are now open that lead toward this result in the cose of Revelation.
(1) The study of apocalyptical literature in general ;
(2) the study of the contents, plan, sources (so far as known), historical situation, and teachings of the book itself. These two paths will be pur-
sued in the following discussion. Two other paths invite exploration — (1) the psychological study of trance and ecstatic conditions and phenomena in religious history, (2) the origin and relations of the apocalyptical and the spiritual types of Christian thought in the 1st cent. These two paths must be opened by further research, in the latter oise most of all in the Gospels, before results can be sum- marized in an article like the present.
In following the two main paths just indicated, the following presuppositions will be in part assumed as a result of the history of criticism, in part, it is hoped, proved by the discussion — (1) Kev. is an apocalypse among others, and is to be viewed and mterpreted as such. (2) Rome is that emliodiment of evil against which the book is chiefly diiected, whose overthrow it immediately predicts. (3) The book makes use of apocalyptical materials from various (often probably from Jewish) sources, so that the question as to the place of a given section in the writer's plan, its meaning in his use of it, is to be kept distinct from the ques- tion of its original meaning and use, and the interpreter at many points has a twofold task.