I ran across a blurb in wiki that stated that the Book of Revelation was long regarded as unauthentic and was not accepted until 1200 A.D.
Has anyone explored this?
Your thoughts, please.
Book of Revelation--UNAUTHENTIC
by cameo-d 18 Replies latest watchtower bible
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AllTimeJeff
Cameo, I agreee that Revelation is a book written by a druggie, for druggies, but I think that date is in error. It was accepted canonically several hundred years before that....
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dutchstef
Cameo-d
In the Netherlands there are still some reformed/ protestand Churches who still don't use the revelation book...
Don't know the exact name of those churches but I renember having descusions with them in the feeldservice.
I thought one of them is named Church of artikle.....( and then a number)
I can try to find out for you...
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cameo-d
Very interesting, Dutchstef! I had not heard of that.
ATJeff: Do you have any research to confirm date of cannonization? I don't think it's for druggies. I do think there is a scripted plan encoded. And it's not from a benevolent god.
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reniaa
Revelation prophecies of armageddon and sorting out the earth etc are very conflicting with 'you die and get a heaven or hell ticket' doctrine. So yes they are not popular but date wise of when they were actually written puts them firmly still within inspiration period of the first century. Unlike the hebrew scriptures greek books are all confirmed on early date when they were written since the appocrypha were written later.
Reniaa
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cameo-d
Renaii: "they are not popular but date wise of when they were actually written puts them firmly still within inspiration period of the first century"
Documentation, please? Need source.
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hamsterbait
In the ORIGINAL "All Scripture is Inspired" book, the Society admitted that the Revelation was accepted as part of the Bible by church tradition. Revelation is asserted as written by the Apostle, "this MUST BE the apostle John." yet nowhere in the book is this stated.
However according to my reference books the Greek of Revelation is dreadful. Since the Apostles are described in Acts as uneducated and ordinary, I dont find it surprising. John was an ignorant fisherman.
The inspiration or otherwise of the book is another thread in itself, but it must be said that since the Gospel of John is a text written in much superior greek, most references spotlight the serious doubt that they could have been written by the same person at the same time. ( 96 for Revelation and 98 for the Gospel.)
Justin Martyr 150 :"one of the apostles of the Christ, prophesied in a Revelation that was given to him." Tertullian and Clement of Alexandria also state this emphatically.
The first definite challenges came in the 3rd century. Gaius of Rome and Dionysus of Alexandria denied that Revelation could be the work of the Apostle John who wrote the Gospel. Eusebius hesitated to include it in the canon, showing his uncertainty as to authorship.
According to Prof. H T Andrews the grounds for ascribing it to John the Apostle are no better than the grounds for assigning the Apocalypse of Peter to that apostle. The style contents and theological outlook of the book are diametrically opposed. "It is not toomuch to say that if the Gospel and Revelation were written by the same hand , the personality of the author must have completely changed in the interval."
There is nothing in the book that makes a claim to apostolic authorship. Dionysus of Alexandria suggests John Mark the reputed author of Mark.
"Peak's Commentary on the Bible" is a reference for students of Biblical languages, and so goes into useful detail.
HB
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PSacramento
From what I gather, Revelation was not one of the original canoical books because of the controvery and "issues" with authenticity.
There was issues when it was comapred to the Book of Enoch (1Enoch) and how they shared some simalrities.
In regards to the authorship, it has been viewed that the John that wrote the Gospel of John and the letters is not the same John that had the Revelation, the greek in the Gospel and letters is viewed as "beautiful and near perfect", while in Revelations it is not highly regardred, there is also issues with some of the terms used, the word for Lamp in Revelation is not the same one that is used in The Gospel of John.
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VIII
Having recently (yesterday) had a discussion on this with my JW mother, I decided to look it up on a Catholic encyclopedia:
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/01594b.htm
Very interesting read.
I won't cut and paste any of it. Anyone interested in Revelation and needing to speak to a JW about it can use this to point to how JWs have it wrong.
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reniaa
here's some wiki on it....
The author of Revelation identifies himself several times as "John" (1:1, 4, 9; 22:8). The author also states that he was on the island of Patmos when he received his first vision (1:9; 4:1–2). As a result, the author of Revelation is referred to as John of Patmos. John explicitly addresses Revelation to seven churches of AsiaMinor: Ephesus, Smyrna, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Philadelphia, and Laodicea (1:4, 11). All of these sites are located in what is now Turkey. The traditional view holds that John the Apostle—considered to have written the Gospel and epistles by the same name—was exiled on Patmos in the Aegean archipelago during the reign of Emperor Domitian, and wrote the Revelation there. Those in favor of a single common author point to similarities between the Gospel and Revelation. For example, both works are soteriological (e.g., referring to Jesus as a lamb) and possess a high Christology, stressing Jesus' divine side as opposed to the human side stressed by the Synoptic Gospels. In the Gospel of John and in Revelation, Jesus is referred to as "the Word of God" ( ? λ?γος το? Θεο? ), although the context in Revelation is very different from John. The Word in Rev 19:13 is involved in judgment but in John 1:1, the image is used to speak of a role in creation and redemption. [ 10 ] Explanations of the differences between John's work by proponents of the single-author view include factoring in underlying motifs and purposes, authorial target audience, the author's collaboration with or utilization of different scribes and the advanced age of John the Apostle when he wrote Revelation. Like his Old Testament counterpart Daniel, John is held to have been kept alive to receive the prophetic vision.
A natural reading of the text would reveal that John is writing literally as he sees the vision (Rev 1:11; 10:4; 14:3; 19:9; 21:5) and that he is warned by an angel not to alter the text through a subsequent edit (Rev 22:18-19), in order to maintain the textual integrity of the book. [ 11 ]
[edit] Early views
A number of Church Fathers weighed in on the authorship of Revelation. Justin Martyr avows his belief in its apostolic origin. Irenaeus (178) assumes it as a conceded point. At the end of the 2nd century, we find it accepted at Antioch, by Theophilus, and in Africa by Tertullian. At the beginning of the 3rd century, it is adopted by Clement of Alexandria and by Origen of Alexandria, later by Methodius, Cyprian, and Lactantius. Dionysius of Alexandria (247) rejected it, upon doctrinal rather than critical grounds. Eusebius (315) inclined to class the Apocalypse with the spurious books. [ 3 ] Jerome relegated it to second class. [ 3 ] Most canons included it, but some, especially in the Eastern Church, rejected it. It is wholly absent from the Peshitta. [ 3 ]