A Study and Assessment of the Retrospective Approach to John’s Revelation

Document Type : Research Paper

Author

Assistant professor, Department of Abrahamic Religions, University of Religions and Denominations

Abstract

The Book of Revelation is a long dream or revelation experienced by St. John during his exile in Patmos Island in the Aegean Sea, according to the traditional view. John’s Book of Revelation is the only prophetic and revelatory writing in official scriptures of the New Testament. John’s Book of Revelation is highly abstruse because of its extraordinarily metaphorical language. There are four traditional approaches to demystify the Book of Revelation: retrospective, prospective, historicist, and spiritualistic. According to the retrospective approach, all prophecies in John’s Book of Revelation are historical facts. On this approach, prophecies in the Book of Revelation are expressions of events that took place in early Church soon after its writing. Moreover, the book is addressed to Christians who were suppressed in the first century by the Roman Empire and were disappointed of future political circumstances. The message of the book was that God was going to alter the circumstances and rescue the faithful from evils. Furthermore, the retrospective approach suggests that God’s covenant with Israel expired in 70, and then the Christian Church replaced the old Israel. In this paper, I outline the contents of John’s Book of Revelation and traditional exegetical approaches thereto, considering various components of the retrospective approach. I finally assess the strengths and weaknesses of the approach.

Keywords

References

منابع

آریان‌پور کاشانی، عباس (1372). فرهنگ بزرگ آریان‌پور، تهران: امیرکبیر.
آریان‌پور کاشانی، عباس؛ دلگشایی، بهرام (1387). فرهنگ پیشرو آریان‌پور، تهران: جهان‌رایانه.
سایزر، استیون (1386). صهیونیسم مسیحی، ترجمه: حمید بخشنده و قدسیه جوانمرد، قم: کتاب طه.
 کتاب مقدس، عهد عتیق (2002). ترجمه قدیم، بی‌جا: انتشارات ایلام.
 کتاب مقدس، عهد جدید، انجیل عیسی مسیح (2006). ترجمه هزاره نو، بی‌جا: انتشارات ایلام.
محمدیان، بهرام (ویراستار) (1381). دائرةالمعارف کتاب مقدس، گروه مترجمان، تهران: سرخدار.
Aune, David E. (1987). The New Testament in its Literary Environment, Philadelphia: The Westminster Press.
Barton, John (ed.) (2002). The Biblical World, vol. 1, London & New York: Routledge.
Bromilley (ed.) (1979-1988). International Standard Bible Encyclopedia, vol. 4, Grand Rapids, Michi: W. B. Eerdmans.
Chilton, David (1985). Paradise Restored: An Eschatology of Dominion, Tyler, TX: Reconstruction Press.
Desrosiers, Gilbert (2000). An Introduction to Revelation, London & New York: Continuum.
Dewick, E. C. (2011). Primitive Christian Eschatology, New York: Cambridge University Press.
Gentry Jr., Kenneth L. (1992). He Shall Have Dominion: A Postmillennial Eschatology, Tyler, TX: Institute for Christian Economics.
Gentry Jr., Kenneth L. (1998). "A Preterist View of Revelation", in: S. N. Gundry & C. M. Pate (eds.), Four Views on the Book of Revelation, Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Gilbertson, Michael (2003). God and History in the Book of Revelation, New York: Cambridge.
Gove, Philip Babcock (1961). Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language,Chicago: Encyclopaedia Britannica, INC.
Gundry, S. N.; Pate, C. M. (eds.) (1998). Four Views on the Book of Revelation, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan.
Hitchcock, Mark (2012). Revelation, Eugene, Oregon: Harvest House Publishers.
Ladd, George Eldon (1994). A Theology of the New Testament, Donald A. Hagner (ed.), Cambridge: The Lutherworth Press.
McKelvey, R. J. (2001). "The Millennium and the Second Coming", in: Steve Moyise (ed.), Studies in the Book of Revelation, Edinburgh & New York: T & T Clark.
McKenzie, Steven L. (2005). How to Read the Bible, Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press.
Pentecost, J. Dwight (1964). Things to Come, Grand Rapids, Michigan: Zondervan.
Simpson, J. A.; Weiner, E. S. C. (1991). The Oxford English Dictionary, second edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Weber, Timothy P. (2008). "Millennialism" in: Jerry L. Walls (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Eschatology, Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press.
Witherington, Ben (2003). Revelation, Edinburgh & New York: Cambridge University Press.
 
Religious Research
Volume 7, Issue 13
October 2019
Pages 71-95

Files

Share

How to cite

Statistics