Revelation Introduction Lesson

As promised, here is the outline of an overview of the book of Revelation. Please take note that the purpose of our study is not to pin down a date, time, nor even a chronology of events to interpret the Last Days syndrome. So please, at the risk of courting controversy, I am asking you to please get this notion out of your heads before we even proceed.

Right. Now that we've straightened that out, let's sort out some foundational ideas.

1. Stop approaching Revelation with preconceived ideas. All of us, myself included, have a coloured view of the book whether we like it or not. While most of us will fall into any of the 4 major views of interpreting the book, we will try our best to be as unbiased as we can, as each view has its own strengths and weaknesses. Our approach will be inductive. We shall go through the 4 views, and each student will have to decide at the end of the book study, which view (or if there are others) that he / she intends to take.

2. There are plenty of details and icons from FantasyLand in the book of Revelation. Because they make good fodder for speculation and fire up the imagination, it is easy to get sucked into the details and lose sight of the Big Picture. Don't get mired in the maze. Always pull back and ask yourself... what is the book of Revelation about???

3. The main aim of the study is to get as close as possible to what the text meant to its original reader. That means, my friends, you have to step into the shoes of a persecuted Christian circa AD90 thereabouts.

4. That also means, although the main bulk of our study is from the book of Revelation, we also have to check out the external evidence, ie, historical records to gain a more accurate picture of what exactly went on and why the author made all those bizarre and symbolic references.

In order to navigate through the apocalyptic visions of the book, let us first understand how to read it like its original reader.

Revelation is a very special book because it contains a mix of the different genres of literature found in the Bible. As we all know, the Bible contains 66 books written by different people from different backgrounds and eras, over a time frame of a couple thousand years. What binds it together is that it is authored by the Holy Spirit (2 Tim 3:16). And therefore, if we look closely enough, it will have an underlining recurring theme. However, the Bible contains literature of different genres - historical narratives (Genesis, Exodus, etc), Prophetic (Daniel, Ezekiel), Wisdom (Psalms, Ecclesiastes) and Epistles (Paul's letters), just to name a few. (Think action flicks, romantic sitcoms, fantasy adventure, horror where movies are concerned).

Again, Revelation is very special coz it has narratives, prophetic/ apocalyptic, epistles and wisdom genres all crammed into one book. *Gasp* In order to wade through all that muck (to quote a friend), we will have to understand the different ways each kind of genre is meant to be understood.

I find the most helpful way of understanding Revelation is always zooming out to the Big Picture of the book. Look at an overview of the book... if you get lost / confused (and it will happen), do not despair... tweak the lens of your mind to the widest possible, and look at the entire book's overview again, in order to find your bearings.

Next, we will detect where the different genres of literature are located throughout the book. With this as a structural indicator, we can hopefully avoid the pitfall of getting lost in the descriptions and imagery which border on the weird and kooky. We will also explore the authorship of the book, its purpose and intention. Stay tuned.

Recommended Reading: How to read the Bible for all its worth, by Gordon D.Fee & Douglas Stuart