What is the Book of Revelation?

Answer 1

A:

The Book of Revelation, a book of the apocalyptic genre, is the last book in the New Testament. It was once attributed to the apostle John, merely because the author signed himself as John, but many of the early Church Fathers doubted the connection, and there is no good reason to accept that attribution. The author is now widely known as John of Patmos, to differentiate him from the apostle John and from the author of John's Gospel. In his Ecclesiastical History (VII, xxv), Eusebius quotes Bishop Dionysius the Great of Alexandria (d. 264-265): "Some indeed of those before our time rejected and altogether impugned the book, examining it chapter by chapter and declaring it to be unintelligible and illogical, and its title fake. For they say that it is not John's, no, nor yet an apocalypse, since it is veiled by its heavy, thick curtain of unintelligibility; and that the author of this book was not only not one of the apostles, nor even one of the saints or those belonging to the Church, but Cerinthus, the same who created the sect called 'Cerinthian' after him, since he desired to affix to his own forgery a name worthy of credit. . . . But for my part I should not dare to reject the book, since many brethren hold that the interpretation of each several passages in some way hidden and more wonderful."

Barbara R. Rossing (The Rapture Exposed) says that Revelation is a very much misunderstood book. The emphasis of many commentators is on prophecy supposedly contained in the book, as well as the images of war and destruction. She says that book was written about purely contemporary issues and that the real message of Revelation is one of love and suffering.