Recommended commentary on Revelation

Some time ago, I wrote a small commentary on the book of Revelation — but that is not the one I want to commend here.

Recently, however, I’ve been teaching Revelation as part of our Diocesan Lent courses, and I decided to go over and revise my old notes. In the process, I came across the commentary by Stephen Smalley, published by SPCK, 2005.

It is certainly in the category of ‘big and fat’, and this reflects in the price (up to £40). Nevertheless, I would thoroughly recommend it for the interested student or preacher who wants to go deeper than the excellent, but less technical, commentary by Michael Wilcock.

Still, do feel free to buy mine (currently £3.00 from The Good Book Company), just to complete the set.

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Discount on Revelation Unwrapped for UK customers

I note that the UK publishers of Revelation Unwrapped, my introductory commentary to the book of Revelation, are doing a deal on it, at £3 instead of the usual £4 cover price.

If you’d be interested, check it out here.

You can also read a couple of customer reviews here (you have to click the 'more' button to see all six reviews).

And just as a taster, here’s my take on Armageddon from the appendix of the last UK edition:

In the English language the word ‘Armageddon’ is now synonymous with battle. Everybody ‘knows’ that it is where the great conflict will take place which ushers in the end of the world. And, as I have acknowledged in the main text, it is often identified with Megiddo, celebrated in the triumphal Song of Deborah (Jdg 5:19) and the place where king Josiah was mortally wounded fighting Pharaoh Neco (2 Chron 35:22).

Revelation 16:16 itself says, “they gathered the kings together to the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon”. The problem is that if the Greek armagedon is made to correspond to the Hebrew har megido we should be talking about a Mountain (Hebrew, Har) of Megiddo, whereas Megiddo itself is a plain.

Drawing on earlier work by C C Torrey, however, Meredith Kline argues that armagedon is much more likely to be a transliteration of har mo’ed, the Hebrew for the Mount of Assembly or Gathering. (See ‘Har Magedon: The End of the Millennium’, Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, June 1996, 207-222.) The Hebrew glottal sound was often turned into a Greek ‘g’, and in Hebrew the ending ‘-on’ was sometimes attached to place names, hence ‘Har Mo-g-ed-on’ would give us ‘Armageddon’. This also fits well with the action described in the context: “they gathered the kings together to the place that in Hebrew is called ‘The Mount of Gathering’”.

This in itself seems quite a satisfying solution to the identity of ‘Armageddon’. Kline goes on to argue, however, that this has more than passing significance, for in Isaiah 14:13 the Mount of Assembly is identified with God’s “sacred mountain”. (The phrase yarkete zaphon can also mean “far north”, but as Kline points out, the contrast here is between the heights of v 14 and the depths of v 15.) In Isaiah, moreover, it is the king of Babylon (14:4), and behind him, doubtless, the original Tempter himself (v 12), who aspires to God’s throne. The Mount of Assembly is thus the focus of rebellion and is to be identified with the Sacred Mountain of God.

Going on from this, Kline makes a further connection with the figure of Gog in the book of Ezekiel. As Psalm 48 makes clear, the earthly equivalent of God’s Sacred Mountain is Zion. However, in Ezekiel 38-39 we find the phrase yarkete zaphon, this time translated “far north” in the NIV, used for the location from which Gog, the archenemy of God’s people, will come. Just as the foreign kings gather against God’s Holy Mountain in Psalm 48, so Gog’s hoards gather at their own yarkete zaphon (Ezek 38:6, 15; 39:2) to advance against the “mountains of Israel” (38:8; 39:2).

Kline thus finds a link not only (as is undeniably the case) between Ezekiel 38-39 and Revelation 19-20, but also between Gog and the battle of ‘Armageddon’, or rather the ‘Mount of Gathering’, in Revelation 16:16. In both cases, the enemies of God’s people assemble at a mountain. In the first instance (Rev 16:16) they assemble at a rebellious ‘Mount of Gathering’, corresponding to Gog’s yarkete zaphon, or “far north” in Ezekiel 38-39. In the second (Rev 20:9) they surround “the camp of God’s people, the city he loves”, namely Mount Zion, which is God’s yarkete zaphon of Psalm 48.

Hence Kline argues, as I have on other grounds, that the gathering at Armageddon in Revelation 16:16 is the same event as the gathering against Mount Zion in Revelation 20. And therefore there is no ‘millennial’ thousand-year interval between an initial rebellion of Satan and his final rebellion. Rather, John presents us with one event from two different perspectives.

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Revelation and Temple

Phil Almond raised what I think is a valid criticism of what I’ve posted about the Temple and the Second Coming in his comment on my Re-placing the Temple. He wrote,

Mark 13 and Matthew 24 have material in common. Mark 13 is in answer to the some of the disciples’ question, ‘Tell us, when these things will be, and what the sign when all these things are about to be completed?’ In Matthew the question is expressed as, ‘Tell us, when these things will be, and what the sign of thy presence and of the completion of the age?’ Mark 13:27 has the Son of Man sending the angels to assemble the chosen. Matthew 13:40-41 says at the completion of the age the Son of Man will send his angels to gather and cast those doing lawlessness into a furnace of fire and then the righteous will shine forth. In the light of this your statement that Mark 13:26 is not a reference to the Second Coming seems over-dogmatic.

With reference to his conclusion, though I would not use the word ‘dogmatic’, I do think an interpretation and application of Mark 13:26 which excludes the Second Coming is overly restrictive.

Both the Mark passage itself, and the parallels in Matthew (24:1-44) and Luke (21:5-36), make it clear that the return of the Son of Man is in view. Yet it seems to me that a reference to the Son of Man entering the heavenly Temple is also more or less required by the language and the overall biblical context.

I would argue that we need to take into account that the disciples have asked a valid question, which demands an answer, but also that they are starting from assumptions (about Israel and the nations) which make a simple answer elusive (rather, I would suggest, like the child who asks, “Mummy, how did I get into the cabbage patch?”). Their question (I would hold) assumes a straightforward sequence in which the Glory returns to the Temple, followed by the establishment of God’s dominion over the world with Israel as its geo-political centre. This assumes a direct connection of Temple-restoration with the End of the Age, which both Jesus' words and subsequent experience deny.

Jesus’ answer embraces three things: (1) the fact that this scenario is wrong, (2) his actual entry into the heavenly Temple-presence of God and (3) the eventual ‘End of the Age’.

The wrongness of the disciples’ scenario is born out by predictions that the earthly Temple will be destroyed and rendered inoperable (the Abomination which causes Desolation). Incidentally, I do not think this is a reference to the crucifixion (contra Peter Bolt) unless there is also a double-reference here.

The entry into the heavenly Temple is referred to in the Son of Man coming with the clouds of heaven, following the parallel in Daniel 7. Stephen’s vision in Acts 8:56 ( “I see heaven open and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God”) is a practical consequence of this, but so is the theology of Hebrews 8:1-2 (“We do have such a high priest, who sat down at the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in heaven, and who serves in the sanctuary, the true tabernacle set up by the Lord, not by man”) and Revelation 5:1-14 (see also 11:19, “Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and within his temple was seen the ark of his covenant”).

Christ’s presence in the heavenly Temple is thus not only an accomplished fact but an ongoing reality.

However, this is a reality which is hidden from sight. Thus what happens (I suggest) when Christ returns is not that we move on to another stage, but that this reality is revealed (see, eg, 2 Thess 1:7; 1 Pet 1:7,13; 4:13).

We have to bear in mind that the Temple is not a place of ‘worship’ in the sense that its focus is on praise, but is the house and palace of God — his dwelling place from which he extends his rule. Thus when Christ’s reign is finally established, it is appropriate to describe it (symbolically) in ‘Temple’ language:

I did not see a temple in the city, because the Lord God Almighty and the Lamb are its temple. ²³The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. ²⁴ The nations will walk by its light, and the kings of the earth will bring their splendour into it. (Rev 19:22-24)

Thus the narrative in Mark 13 and parallels embraces both the forthcoming reality of Christ entering into the heavenly Temple and the future reality of his reigning in the heavenly Temple being revealed at the End of the Age.

As to the angels, the translation may sometimes appropriately be ‘messengers’, as in evangelists, but will (obviously) sometimes be ‘angels’ as in heavenly beings.

I hope this may help.

John Richardson
30 September 2008

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