Revelation 11

403 Pages·2012·7.59 MB·English

Revelation 11:1-13:
History of Interpretation
Seth Turner, St. John's College
Submitted for DPhil Thesis in Theology Trinity Term 2004 / <'+~ ^O°$ \
DEPOSITED
THESIS
Revelation 11:1-13: History of Interpretation - Short Abstract
CiVlooC)
Submitted for DPhil in Theology, Trinity Term 2004 by Seth Turner, St. John's
College
The thesis provides a descriptive survey of the history of interpretation of
Revelation 11:1-13. Prior to 1000 AD it aims to be comprehensive, but after this date
concentrates on Western interpretation.
Ch. 1 - Prior to 1000 AD.
Rev 11:1-13 is examined in relation to the wider complex of traditions
concerning Antichrist and the return of Enoch and Elijah. The commentary tradition
on Revelation is examined, including an extensive reconstruction of Tyconius. The
passage is applied in two ways: 1. to two eschatological figures, usually Enoch and
Elijah. 2. to the Church from the time of Christ's first advent until his return.
Ch. 2 -1000-1516
Exegesis similar to that of chapter 1 is found. There is new exegesis from
Joachim of Fiore, who believes that the two witnesses will be two religious orders,
and Alexander Minorita, who reads the entirety of the Apocalypse as a sequential
narrative of Church history, arriving at the sixth century for 11:1-13.
Ch. 3 -1516-1700
Protestants interpret the beast as the papacy/Roman Church, and the two
witnesses as proto-Protestants prior to the Reformation, often interpreting their 1260
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day ministry as 1260 years. Catholics respond by applying the passage either to the
eschatological future or the distant past.
Ch. 4 -1701-2004
Protestants continue to see the 1260 days as 1260 years, although this
interpretation declines markedly in the nineteenth century. Both Catholics and
Protestants apply the passage to the distant past of the early Church. Historical critical
exegesis introduces a new exegesis, where John is regarded as having incorrectly
predicted the return of two individuals shortly after his time of writing. Applications
to the entirety of the time of the time of the Church increase in popularity in the
twentieth century.
Revelation 11:1-13: History of Interpretation - Long Abstract
CiVlooC)
Submitted for DPhil in Theology Trinity Term 2004 by Seth Turner, St. John's
College.
The thesis provides a descriptive survey of the history of interpretation of
Revelation 11:1-13, primarily summarizing the expositions which have been put
forward. It pays relatively little attention to the social and historical context of
interpreters. This is not from any belief that these are unimportant in understanding an
interpretation, but because to have included extensive background material would
have meant the omission of many exegetes due to lack of space. Prior to 1000 AD it
aims to be comprehensive, but after this date concentrates on Western interpretation.
Chapter 1 - Prior to 1000 AD
Rev 11:1-13 is examined in relation to the wider complex of traditions
concerning Antichrist and the return of Enoch and Elijah outside of the commentary
tradition on Revelation. This is important for two reasons with regard to the history of
interpretation of Revelation 11:1-13. Firstly, it shows how Revelation 11 influences
traditions about Antichrist. This blending of Revelation 11 with a wider complex of
traditions concerning Antichrist is in itself a form of interpretation of the passage.
Secondly, it clarifies the forms of the Antichrist tradition available to commentators
on the Apocalypse. This is important as it helps to explain why patristic and medieval
commentators often deviate from what would seem to be the more obvious sense of
the text of Revelation. I argue that there was a Jewish tradition of the death of Elijah
and companion(s). This was used by John to delineate two witnesses with
characteristics of Elijah and Moses, and by the Antichrist tradition to speak of Enoch
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and Elijah as two individuals who would come and be killed by Antichrist. The
Jewish tradition of the death of Elijah and companions), with no following
resurrection and ascension, explains why the Antichrist tradition usually differs from
Revelation 11 in omitting the resurrection and ascension of the two.
Exegesis in the commentary tradition is of two sorts. Eschatological exegesis
applies the passage to events of the end of time, usually interpreting the two witnesses
as two future individuals who will have a 1260 day ministry, nearly always Enoch and
Elijah, although Moses and Jeremiah also appear as possible partners for Elijah.
Ecclesiological exegesis applies the passage to the entirety of the time of the Church,
from Christ's first advent until his return, taking the 1260 day ministry of the
witnesses as symbolic of this period. The two witnesses are usually interpreted as the
Church. Tyconius, whose exegesis is reconstructed from fragments of his commentary
and his use by later authors, is the first to give a primarily ecclesiological exegesis of
Rev 11:1-13, understanding the two witnesses as the Church. Bede, who is followed
by many later authors, gives both an eschatological application of the passage in
which the two witnesses are Enoch and Elijah, and an ecclesiological exegesis in
which the two witnesses symbolize the Church. In his eschatological exegesis Bede
follows the exegesis of Tyconius, and interprets the resurrection of the witnesses as
the general resurrection. This ties in with the dominant form of the Antichrist tradition
which does not have a resurrection or ascension of Enoch and Elijah. In the Eastern
commentary tradition, the passage is interpreted eschatologically of Enoch and Elijah.
With no influence from the exegesis of Tyconius, this includes the resurrection and
ascension of the two witnesses.
Ill
Chapter 2-1000-1516
Exegesis similar to that of Bede continues. In ecclesiological exegesis, authors
begin to see the two witnesses as symbolic of only a section of the Church, such as the
doctors of the Church, instead of the Church as a whole. In the twelfth century there is
a shift as regards the exegesis of the resurrection of the witnesses. In the
eschatological application of the passage to Enoch and Elijah, the resurrection and
ascension of the witnesses come to be interpreted of Enoch and Elijah in particular.
The more obvious sense of the text of the passage becomes dominant over the form of
the Antichrist tradition which omits the resurrection and ascension of Enoch and
Elijah.
Joachim of Fiore introduces a new form of exegesis. Joachim understands
history as consisting of three status, one of the Father, one of the Son, and one of the
Spirit. Joachim believed his own time (late twelfth century) to be on the cusp of the
transition between the second and third status. The two witnesses are Elijah and
Moses, symbolic of two religious orders, one active, one contemplative, who will help
to usher in the third status of greater spiritual understanding. After Joachim's death
followers adapted his expectation of two different sorts of order, contemplative and
active, to apply to the Franciscans and Dominicans, who combined the contemplative
and active ways of life. The expectation of two orders was separable from the
commentary tradition on Revelation 11, and indeed, outside of the commentary
tradition, stands in varying degrees of closeness to the text of Revelation. Whilst
widespread, exegesis inspired by Joachim was by no means dominant. A combined
ecclesiological and eschatological exegesis of the passage persisted as the most
popular even after Joachim.
IV
Alexander Minorita introduced a new type of exegesis, which I have called
linear-historical. The entire Apocalypse is seen as a sequential narrative of Church
history. By Revelation 11, Alexander has reached the sixth century, and identifies the
two witnesses as Patriarch Mennas of Constantinople and Pope Silverius. Alexander
is followed by Nicholas of Lyra and Peter Aureol.
Chapter 3 -1517-1700
The Reformation brought with it new readings of Rev 11:1-13.
Protestants identified the papacy/Roman Church as the Antichrist, the beast of Rev
11:7. The two witnesses are Protestants, and those identified as proto-Protestants in
the period prior to the Reformation. The passage thus serves the interests of a
Protestant historiography. The Protestant Church is to be found in the few faithful
witnesses of previous ages and their followers, who have a historical continuity equal
to that of Catholicism. The passage thus helps answer the Catholic question of
"Where was your Church before Luther?" In the sixteenth century many authors
thought that the 1260 days of the witnesses symbolized all the time of the Church, or
were an indefinite period that began at the point when the papacy was thought to have
taken on the role of Antichrist, after a golden period of the early Church. Towards the
end of the sixteenth century and into the seventeenth it became increasingly popular
amongst Protestants to argue that the 1260 days of the witnesses were 1260 years,
based on a day equalling a year, as in Ezekiel 4. Catholics responded to Protestant
exegesis in two ways. The first, and more popular, was to reaffirm traditional
eschatological exegesis of the passage. If the beast of 11:7 was the future Antichrist,
then it could not be the papacy. The other alternative, pioneered by Alcazar at the
beginning of the seventeenth century, was to apply the passage to the distant past of
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the Church, again removing any potential contemporary relevance that was so
important for the Protestant interpretations that associated the beast with the papacy.
In the mid-seventeenth century Hugo Grotius produced a preterist system of
interpretation (i.e. applying to the past) not dissimilar to Alcazar, and this was copied
by Hammond in England, and by the Catholic Bossuet.
The period of the English civil wars and interregnum was particularly fertile
for exegesis of the Apocalypse, and many saw the beast not simply as the
papacy/Roman Church, but as the English state Church insofar as she had failed to
fully break from Rome. This time also saw the emergence of John Reeve and
Lodowick Muggleton, perhaps the two most notable individuals who have claimed
that they are themselves the two witnesses. Muggletonianism persisted until the late
twentieth century.
Chapter 4 -1701-2004
Many Protestants continued to see the 1260 days as 1260 years, identifying the
beast as the papacy/Roman Church and the witnesses as Protestants and proto-
Protestants. This interpretation began to lose favour in the mid-nineteenth century for
two reasons. In academic circles, the inerrancy and absolute unity of the scriptures
came to be questioned, and each book of the Bible came to be seen in its own terms. It
was thus thought unreasonable to interpret the 1260 days of the Apocalypse as 1260
years, when the Apocalypse itself makes no mention of this, and the idea has to be
imported from Ezekiel. For those Protestants who maintained a very high doctrine of
scriptural inerrancy, I argue that the Millerite crisis, culminating in the "Great
Disappointment" of 1844 when Christ failed to return, helped to discredit the year-day
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method, with the date setting that is inherent in it for even the most cautious of
expositors.
Ecclesiological exegesis, interpreting the two witnesses as the Church, drew
little following in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, but its popularity increased
markedly in the twentieth.
Many interpreters continue the preterist exegesis begun by Alcazar and
Grotius. A few apply the passage to the first few centuries of the Church, but the
majority of interpreters apply it to known events of the first century, naming a variety
of figures as the two witnesses, including Jesus and Ananus the Jewish high priests
killed during the Roman siege of Jerusalem, and the Christian martyrs Peter and Paul.
Eschatological exegesis can be divided into those who genuinely believe that
there will be an eschatological fulfilment of the passage, and those who think that
John mistakenly predicted that two literal witnesses would come shortly after his time
of writing. The first group includes some Catholic authors, and also a number of
Protestants. This type of interpretation increased in popularity among Protestants who
hold a strong doctrine of scriptural inerrancy from the mid-nineteenth century
onwards, particularly in its Darbyite dispensationalist form. The perils of date setting
associated with the year-day method were avoided, as it is not specified when the
events of the end-time are to begin. The second sort of eschatological exegesis, where
John is thought to have incorrectly predicted the advent of two literal witnesses
shortly after his time of writing is the product of historical-critical exegesis, first
appearing in nineteenth century Germany. It involves the rejection of a doctrine of
scriptural inerrancy, and has thus found no favour amongst those who maintain such a
doctrine.
VII
Wellhausen's Religionsgeshichtliche interpretation of w. 1-2, where the
verses are identified as a Zealot oracle from towards the end of the Roman siege of
Jerusalem incorrectly predicting that the temple will be spared, has been influential as
a possible origin of w.1-2, although it has usually been thought that even if the
material has this origin, John intends a different meaning for it in the Apocalypse.
There have been numerous idiosyncratic interpretations during this period,
among the most notable of which is that of Bellamy, who believes that the two
witnesses are two volcanoes during an early stage of the earth's life.