their origin, and in every case the important thing is to learn not the original date or shape of a source, or the particular mythological matrix of a tradition, but the new sense attached to it by the pro. phet himself and the precise object to which he adapted it. This consciousness of a purpose is the least obscure and the most Chris- tian feature of the Apocalypse. Strictly speaking, it is an apoca- lypse not of John but of Jesus as the Christ! (i. 1), and it is the triumphant adoration of Christ which gives an inner clue to the choice and treatment of the various messianic categories, Where the problems of structure arise, and where source-criticism of some kind? is necessary, in order to account satisfactorily for the literary and psychological data—is in the juxtaposition of disparate materials (cf. notes on vii., Χ., Xi., Xii., Xili., Xiv., XVil., Xviil.).
The results reached in the following commentary outline a theory of the Apocalypse, in its literary aspect, which falls under (a) the incorporation hypothesis. According to this view, the Apocalypse is substantially a unity, due to one hand, but incorporating several older fragments of Jewish or Jewish-Christian origin. So Weizsacker (ii. 173 f.), Sabatier (Les origines littéraires et la composition de [’ Apocalypse, 1888: Jewish fragments in xi. 1-13, xii., xiii., xiv. 6-20, xvi. 13-14, 16, xvii. 1-xix. 2, xix. 11-xx. 10, xxi. 9-xxii. 5), Schon (L’origine de l’' Apocalypse, 1887: Jewish fragments in xi. 1-13, xii. 1-9, 13-17, xviii. [except ver. 20]), Bousset, Jiilicher (Einleitung in das N. Τ., § 22), C. A. Scott, PF. C. Porter, A. C. M‘Giffert (History of
1 The anti-Jewish note of the Apocalypse is as distinct as, though less loud than, the anti-Roman. Cf. notes, ¢.g., on i. 6, 19 f., ii. 9, iii. 7-10, v. 9, 1Ο, x. 7, Xi. 19, xxi. 22, xxii. 18. The Christian church was the new and true Israel, and thus. served herself heir to great traditions and to high destinies which were only inferior to her own in that they formed a lower slope on the same hill. One of the minor effects (which differentiates the Apocalypse from the Fourth Gospel) of this concep- tion is that Christians are not invited by John to love God or Christ; the temper of their vocation is defined in Jewish terms as a reverent fear of God (cf. xi. 18, xiv. 7, xv. 4, xix. 5). Another is the avoidance of ἐκκλησια as a collective term for the church and the ignoring of ἐπίσκοποι, διάκονοι, πρεσβύτεροι, etc.—for the twenty- four celestial πρεσβύτεροι, of course, have nothing whatever to do with the officials of the same name.
2 English criticisms of VG6lter’s first essays by Warfield (Presbyterian Review, 1884, 228-265), and A. Robertson (Critical Review, Jan., 1895), of Vischer and Sabatier by Salmon (Introd. N.T., pp. 232 f.), of Vischer and of Vélter’s earlier theory by Simcox (pp. 215 f.), and of Vischer by Thomson (Books which influenced Our Lord, pp. 461 f.). Northcote once told Hazlitt that he believed the Waverley novels were written by several hands, on account of their inequalities. “Some parts are careless, others straggling; it is only when there is an opening for effect’ that the master-hand comes in.’”’ There are several criticisms of the Apocalypse which,, with their quasi-reasons, recall this perverse and hapless verdict of a clever man.