THE METHODSOF INTERPRETATION, ESCHATOLOGY AND STRUCTUREOF SAINT JOHN’S APOCALYPSE

• Main Author: ANTAL NYEBOLSZIN
• Format: Article
• Language: Russian
• Published: St. Tikhon's Orthodox University 2010-08-01
• Series: Вестник Православного Свято-Тихоновского гуманитарного университета: Серия I. Богословие, философия
• Subjects: Revelation of Saint John; Apocalypse; praeterist approch; futurist approаch; historical approаch; idealist approаch; contemporary-historicist approаch; eschatology; futurist eschatology; realised eschatology; structure of the Apocalypse; structural markers; linear-progressive structures; recapitulation; chiasm; chiastic struc-tures; letters to the seven churches; sets of seven in the Apocalypse; the central chapters of the Apocalypse; Babylon
• Online Access: http://periodical.pstgu.ru/ru/pdf/article/1181

This article reviews the fundamental ways of interpreting St. John’s Apocalypse, and places them in the context of the eschatological meaning and the literary structure of the book. It becomes evident that the Book of Revelation contains various types of eschatology and it is possible to partition the book in diff erent ways. According to the author of this article, a type of unity exists intertwining the ways of interpreting the content of the Apocalypse and the book’s structure and particular eschatology. The author affi rms that the dramatic construction of the Apocalypse occurs on several levels and cannot be fully grasped by any of the methods of interpretation, nor by any of the individual types of structural analysis on its own. The author is of the opinion that it is necessary to combine these various methods of interpretation in order to arrive at an adequate exposition of the Apocalypse