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49. See Virginia Wiles, Making Sense of Paul (Peabody, MA: Hendrickson, 2000), p. 57: “The problem is not that people are sinners because they do wrong things. Rather, people do wrong things because they are sinners.” In my judgment, Wiles’s book is one of the two or three best contemporary introductions to Paul.
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50. The entire passage is found in Rom. 7.7–24. Quoted words are from vv. 15, 18–20, 23, 24.
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51. See, for example, Rom. 6.6–7, 18, 22; 8.2; Gal. 5.1.
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52. II Cor. 5.18–19. See also Rom. 8.35–39, whose theme is that nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ.
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53. II Cor. 5.17–18. See also Gal. 6.15. New-creation imagery connects not only to Genesis but also to Second Isaiah and the return from exile. See also Rom. 6.4, 7.6
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54. For the contrast, see Gal. 5.16–26 and Rom. 8.4–17.
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55. Gal. 5.19–21.
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56. “Freedom” is emphasized earlier in Gal. 5 (vv. 1, 13–14); the list is found in 5.22–23.
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57. I Cor. 13.13. The extended context of 12.1–14.40 is important, for it puts Paul’s oft-quoted and romanticized tribute to love in the framework of spiritual gifts, thus making it clear that Paul is talking not simply about ethics and not at all about romantic love. Love as Paul writes about it cannot be willed but flows out of a new way of being.
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58. Gal. 2.19–20.
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59. Rom. 6.3–4. The whole of 6.1–14 is relevant.
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60. Rom. 12.1–2.
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61. Phil. 2.5–11.
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62. I Cor. 12.12–13; Rom. 12.4–5.
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63. Gal. 3.26–28.
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64. Passages speaking of the subordination of women and wives are all found in letters most likely not written by Paul. The possible exceptions are I Cor. 14.34–35 and I Cor. 11.2–16. The first text says that women should not speak in church but should ask their husbands about matters after they get home; many scholars think that these verses are a later, non-Pauline addition to the letter. In the second text, Paul says that women should not pray or prophesy in church with their heads unveiled and their hair therefore exposed. Whether this text speaks of subordination depends upon the translation of the Greek word kephale (pronounced “kefalay”) in v. 3: the husband/man is the kephale of the wife/woman. Often translated “head,” here it almost certainly means “source”; if so, it echoes the Genesis creation story in which the man (adham) is the source of the woman (who is made from his rib) and does not mean subordination. Strikingly, v. 12 affirms the equality of man and woman: “just as woman came from man [in the creation story], so man comes through woman [in birth].” But whatever the judgment about the correct translation of kephale, it is important to underline that Paul does not say that women should not pray or prophesy in church, only that they should be veiled when doing so. Finally, it is interesting to note that Paul grew up in a city (Tarsus) in which women wore the complete chador in public, completely covering them from head to foot (including their faces). Thus it is possible that Paul found unveiled women rather shocking.
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65. I Cor. 11.17–34. Quoted words are from vv. 17, 20–22, 27, 29. The “words of institution” of the Lord’s supper are in vv. 23–26. Because Paul reminds the Corinthian church of them in this context, it is tempting to think that he is also calling to mind the egalitarian quality of Jesus’ open meal practice. If not, why mention these words here?
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66. Rom. 8.35, 38–39.
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67. Gal. 2.16, 3.10–11, 2.21.
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68. Gal. 5.4, 12. Paul’s language could get hot. Earlier in the letter, he accuses his Christian opponents of “perverting the gospel” and pronounces a curse on them (1.7–9), addressing his audience as “you foolish Galatians!” (3.1, 3).
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69. Rom. 3.9, 19–20, 23. The argument begins in 1.16 and continues through 5.11.
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70. Rom. 3.24–25.
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71. Abraham is the topic of Rom. 4; quoted verses are 4.3 and 9.
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72. Rom. 4.5; 5.8, 10.
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73. Rom. 7.12.
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74. Robin Scroggs, Paul for a New Day (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1977), p. 10. Along with the book by Virginia Wiles mentioned in note 49, it is one of the most accessible introductions to this aspect of Paul’s message.
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75. I Cor. 2.2, 1.23.
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76. I Cor. 2.6–8.
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77. I Cor. 1.24 in the context of 1.18–31. Because the wisdom of God is the opposite of the wisdom of the world, Paul can also refer to the wisdom of God as “the foolishness of God.”
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78. Rom. 5.8.
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79. Rom. 3.25. Because a literal interpretation of this notion leads to unacceptable and indeed incredible implications, I stress that it must be read metaphorically. As a metaphor, its meaning is clear: if God has provided the atoning sacrifice, then nothing can separate us from the love of God in Christ.
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80. Echoing Rom. 10.4: “Christ is the end of the law.” There is a scholarly debate about the meaning of “end” in this verse. Does it mean “end” as in “finished,” or “end” as in telos (meaning “goal” or “fulfillment”)? And does “law” here mean Torah (the Jewish law) or law as a system of requirements? The debate is difficult to resolve. My use of it reads “law” not as Torah but as “system of requirements,” and “end” can thus mean both “fulfilled” and “finished.”
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1. Raymond Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament (New York: Doubleday, 1997), p. 773. Two excellent accessible commentaries on Revelation are Adela Yarbro Collins, The Apocalypse (Wilmington: Michael Glazier, 1979), and Eugene Boring, Revelation (Louisville:Knox, 1989). See also the earlier work by George B. Caird, A Commentary on the Revelation of St. John the Divine (London: Adam and Charles Black, 1966). An excellent highly readable introduction to various ways “the end of the world” has been understood in prophetic and apocalyptic literature and in the history of the church is Reginald Stackhouse, The End of the World? A New Look at an Old Belief (New York: Paulist, 1997).
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2. A 1980 Gallup poll cited by Wes Howard-Brook and Anthony Gwyther, Unveiling Empire: Reading Revelation Then and Now (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, 1999), p. 16.
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3. A U.S. News & World Report survey cited by Stackhouse, The End of the World, pp. 1–2.
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4. Boring, Revelation p. 3.
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5. Adela Yarbro Collins, The Anchor Bible Dictionary, ed. David Noel Freedman (New York: Doubleday, 1992), vol. 5, p. 695.
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6. I owe the phrase “fabulous beasts” to Luke Timothy Johnson, The Writings of the New Testament (Philadelphia: Fortress, 1986), p. 514. On p. 515, he refers to the “apocalyptic menagerie.”
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7. For a study of Jewish apocalypses not included in the Hebrew Bible, see John Collins, The Apocalyptic Imagination (New York: Crossroad, 1984). Apocalyptic literature has antecedents i
n portions of exilic and postexilic books of the Hebrew Bible, including Ezekiel, Joel, Zechariah, and Isaiah (24–27).
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8. The argument that the author of the Fourth Gospel and the author of Revelation are two different people is also ancient, made by an early Christian writer named Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria in the middle of the third century. Dionysius’s denial of apostolic authorship of Revelation was among the reasons for the book’s slow acceptance as scripture in the Eastern church.
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9. Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament, p. 775. Boring, Revelation, p. 27, notes that there are over five hundred allusions to the Hebrew Bible.
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10. Austin Farrer, A Re-Birth of Images (Westminster: Dacre Press, 1949).
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11. About two hours are required to read Revelation aloud. For a contemporary dramatic reading of Revelation that seeks to convey what it was like to hear it at a single sitting, see a videotape featuring David Rhoads, professor of New Testament at the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago, The video is available from SELECT, Trinity Lutheran Seminary, Columbus, Ohio.
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12. Rev. 1.10–20.
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13. For the series of sevens and chapter and verse references, see Boring, Revelation, p. 31.
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14. See the useful two-page tabulation in Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament, pp. 784–85.
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15. Are the vision narratives in these chapters based on actual visionary experiences? Did John “see” all of this in a visionary state of consciousness? Or are the vision narratives literary constructions? It is, I think, impossible to make a discerning judgment. Although I think that John did have visions, the use of repeating structural elements (seven seals, seven trumpets, seven bowls, and so forth) and the frequent echoing of the Hebrew Bible suggest literary construction. But literary construction can be based on real experiences, of course.
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16. Rev. 22.4–5.
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17. The “proof text” for the rapture is I Thess. 4.13–18, in which Paul speaks of followers of Jesus “being caught up in the clouds . . . to meet the Lord in the air.” It is difficult to know how literally Paul meant this language. In any case, he seems (like the author of Revelation) to have believed that the second coming of Christ was near, for he imagines that some of those to whom he is writing (and perhaps he himself) will still be alive when it happens.
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18. This approach to Revelation is the foundation of modern scholarly study of the book and is affirmed by virtually all mainline scholars. Many scholars move beyond this approach and also emphasize the literary and/or aesthetic and/or political meanings of the book, but the past-historical reading is their common foundation.
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19. Rev. 1.1, 3; 22.6, 10, 7, 12, 20.
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20. II Pet. 3.8, echoing Ps. 90.4. It is interesting to note that the context is the delay of the second coming of Christ: II Pet. 3.1–10.
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21. Rev. 13.18. Nero was caesar (emperor) from 54 until the time of his suicide in 68 CE, when he was still only about thirty years old. Because “666” refers to Nero, some have thought that Revelation must have been written during his reign rather than some thirty years later, near the end of the reign of the emperor Domitian. However, for two different reasons, the name of the beast as Nero need not conflict with a late-first-century date. On the one hand, there was a rumor that Nero had survived and would return to claim the imperial throne. On the other hand, Nero was the first Roman emperor to persecute Christians, and thus the name Nero could refer to the empire in its role as persecutor of the Christian movement.
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22. In the New Testament, see I Pet. 5.13.
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23. Rev. 17.9, 18.
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24. In what he calls a “strong clarifying statement,” Raymond Brown writes, “God has not revealed to human beings details about how the world began or how the world will end, and failing to recognize that, one is likely to misread both the first book and the last book of the Bible. The author of Revelation did not know how or when the world will end, and neither does anybody else.” An Introduction to the New Testament, p. 810.
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25. For further exposition, Marcus Borg and N. T. Wright, The Meaning of Jesus: Two Visions (San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1998), chap. 13, esp. pp. 194–96.
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26. In The Writings of the New Testament, p. 513, Luke Timothy Johnson comments, “[T]he book of Revelation is one of those rare compositions that speak to something deep and disturbed in the human spirit with a potency never diminished by fact or disconfirmation.”
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27. Excerpted from Richard Horsley, The Liberation of Christmas (New York: Crossroad, 1989), p. 27. Italics added. See also pp. 25–33.
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28. Rev. 1.5.
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29. In sequence, Rev. 4.8, 5.12, 7.12, 11.15, 19.6.
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30. See Walter Wink’s compelling analysis of its presence in comic strips, television cartoons, spy thrillers, and movies, as well as in the policies of contemporary national-security states, in his Engaging the Powers (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1992), pp. 13–31. I am impressed again and again with the brilliance of this book and commend it to everybody. See also Robert Jewett, The Captain America Complex, rev. ed. (Santa Fe: Bear, 1984); and Robert Jewett and John Sheldon Lawrence, The American Monomyth (Garden City: Doubleday, 1977).
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31. Ps. 74.12–13; see also Ps. 89.9–10, where the primordial monster is named Rahab.
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32. Isa. 27.1. See also 51.9: “Was it not you who cut Rahab in pieces, who pierced the dragon?” In Isa. 30.7, Egypt is referred to as “Rahab”; see also Ezek. 29.3, which identifies Pharaoh “as the great dragon.”
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33. Job 7.12, 9.13, 26.12–13, and all of chap. 41.
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34. See especially Gustav Aulen’s classic study of Christian understandings of Jesus’ death and resurrection: Christus Victor, trans. A. F. Hebert (New York: Macmillan, 1969; first published in 1931).
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35. For the way the ancient cosmic combat myth shapes Revelation, see Adela Yarbro Collins, The Combat Myth in the Book of Revelation (Missoula: Scholars Press, 1976). See also compact expositions in Boring, Revelation, p. 151; Wink, Engaging the Powers, pp. 90–93; Collins, Crisis and Catharsis: The Power of the Apocalypse (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1984), pp. 148–50. On p. 148, Collins writes, “This basic plot or pattern is found in every series of visions in Revelation, beginning with the seven seals (in Rev. 6) . . . and in more elaborate form, for example, in the passage that extends from 19.11–22.5” (italics added).
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36. Some scholars deny that there was any official Roman persecution of Christians in the time of Domitian. For a persuasive argument that there was minor (but not massive) persecution, see Raymond Brown, An Introduction to the New Testament, pp. 807–9.
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37. Antipas is mentioned in Rev. 2.13; references in the letters to persecutions to come are found in 2.10 and 3.10. See also 1.9.
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38. The most sustained recent study arguing for this point of view is Howard-Brook and Gwyther, Unveiling Empire. See also Ward Ewing, The Power of the Lamb (Cambridge, MA: Cowley, 1990); and Wink, Engaging the Powers, pp. 89–104. See also earlier books by William Stringfellow, Con
science and Obedience (Waco: Word Books, 1977), and Daniel Berrigan, Beside the Sea of Glass: The Song of the Lamb (New York: Seabury, 1978), and The Nightmare of God (Portland, OR: Sunburst, 1983).
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