Ponder Anew 1!

David R. Larson            Loma Linda, California 

According to the search engine I use, 381,717 web sites on the Internet discuss Revelation 13, our assignment for this morning’s lesson. That’s not all! The same search engine finds 214,562 web sites that discuss the "Mark of the Beast," the topic in the second half of Revelation 13 which is our lesson for next week.

Even if we concede that these two lists may overlap somewhat, an amazing number of web sites offer discussions of the portion of Scripture assigned for our study today. Sometimes we wonder if anyone cares about the topics of our Sabbath School Lessons. It is no exaggeration to say that millions of people all over the world are interested in the portion of Scripture we have been asked to study this morning!

Unfortunately, because they often neglect the three most important considerations when studying Scripture, many of the Internet discussions of Revelation 13 are not as helpful as they might be. These three factors are context, context and context!

When real estate agents tell us that the three most important matters when assessing property are location, location and location, we understand them to be saying the same thing three times. But when we say that the three most important considerations when studying Scripture are context, context and context, we mean three related but different things.

The first of these is the text’s historical context. This is the setting in time and place that helps us understand what the passage says. The second is its literary context. This is the complete document of which the text is a part. This also helps us understand the passage. The third is the text's theological and ethical context. This is the discussion about what God is like, and about what we should be like, in which the text is embedded. It helps us to understand the passage too. Regrettably, many discussions of Revelation 13 on the Internet neglect its historical, literary, theological and ethical contexts.

Because for hundreds of years people have differed as to which of the several possible historical contexts is most decisive in helping us understand the book of Revelation, this matter is more complex than it might first appear. Putting on the shelf for now questions about the book's literary, theological and ethical contexts, and focusing momentarily only on its historical ones, we quickly become aware of a plurality of convictions as to which alternative is most pertinent.

Preterists hold that the time and place of John the Revelator, the author of Scripture’s last book, is the most important historical context. Many hold that this was probably during the rule of the Roman Emperor Domitian, about 95 A. D. Some date it about thirty years earlier, during the reign of Nero. Either way, preterists hold that these settings in our distant past deserve the most attention.

Futurists make the opposite case. They claim that we understand Revelation most effectively when we keep in mind that even in our own time many, if not most, of the events of which it speaks have not yet taken place. Instead of finding these events in our past, we should anticipate them in our future, they claim. Although there are several versions of this view, they agree that the last book of Scripture is about the final chapter in the story of human life, as we know it. We should therefore look forward, not backward.

Over the years, those of us who are Seventh-day Adventist Christians, including Ellen G. White, have often been historicists. Adopting an approach somewhere between those of preterism, on the one hand, and futurism, on the other, historicists believe that the context that provides the most pertinent setting for the study of Revelation is the entire sweep of human history, from before its beginning until after its end. Few historicists hold that the events of which Revelation speaks are either wholly in our past or entirely in our future. A number fall at various places in between.

As the term is often used in this context, idealists typically eschew the attempt to locate in the actual story of humanity specific events that correspond to those described in the last book of Scripture. Emphasizing the evident symbolic and political nature of much of the discourse in Revelation, these students of Scripture view its vivid accounts as graphic portrayals of the battle between good and evil, between justice and injustice. 

When they focus upon this struggle within each person’s life, these interpreters often move in psychological directions. When they concentrate upon the forms this conflict takes when it erupts between human beings instead of within any one of them, they often take more sociological turns. Idealists hold that the most important thing is to understand the scenes and symbols of Revelation as disclosures of the pervasiveness and significance of the struggle between good and evil and, often, as unveilings of the ultimate triumph of God’s justice.

Partly because each one makes a valuable but incomplete contribution, none of these four ways of approaching Revelation has completely won the day even though all four have been available for centuries. Preterism rightly contends that the last book of Scripture meant something to those who first read it, and that what it meant to them should inform what it means for us. Futurism correctly holds that at least some parts of Revelation depict in vivid terms the end of the current chapter in humanity’s story, something that is still in our future. Historicism rightly identifies seeds planted in early Christianity that grew and produced diverse and sometimes regrettable harvests throughout the centuries. Idealism takes seriously the symbolic nature of Revelation’s discourse in ways that are often psychologically and sociologically helpful. 

Thus, all four approaches offer something of value, but no one of them does complete justice to the full richness of Revelation, particularly if we utilize the approach in an extreme, one-sided or wooden fashion.

We therefore do well to make judicious use of all four ways of studying Revelation and identifying its most pertinent historical contexts.  One way to do so is to imagine a square with preterism, futurism, historicism and idealism as its four mutually correcting and mutually reinforcing corners.

Preterism’s emphasis upon what has already taken place needs to be balanced by futurism’s interest in what has not. Historicism’s penchant for finding fulfillments or applications in the concrete particularities of human history needs to be balanced by idealism’s tendency to speak more abstractly and generally about the profound and universal struggle between good and evil, justice and injustice. 

In other discussions, some speak of maintaining a "reflective equilibrium" among important but differing considerations. We need to do something similar when thinking about the historical contexts of Revelation.

Many discussions of Revelation 13 on the Internet are also not as helpful as they might be because they neglect another important guideline. This is the reminder that in our study of Scripture we should reason from that which is clear to that which is not. Too often we reason in the opposite direction, from that which is not clear to that which is. Worse yet, we sometimes spend so much time pondering some things in Scripture that aren’t now clear to us that we neglect others that are abundantly so.

Because the previous chapter names him "the devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world," there can be no doubt about the identity of the dragon who takes "his stand on the sand of the sea shore" in verse 1 of Revelation 13. That much is clear!  It is also evident from the rest of the chapter that this dragon is an effective delegator. In the first half of the chapter, the dragon gives "his power and his throne and his authority" to a dreadful sea-monster. In the second half of the same chapter, an equally awful land-monster, who seemed innocent enough at first, "exercises all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and it makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose mortal wound had been healed." 

So the dragon delegates his powers to the sea-monster and the sea-monster delegates them to the land monster! As these symbols suggest, the demonic is more than able and willing to work through others, to create chaos and destruction through individuals and institutions that are cruel and oppressive.  This too is clear!

Although they often receive very little attention in discussions of Revelation 13, its 9^th and 10^th verses are abundantly clear also. "Let anyone who has an ear listen," declares verse 9. In other words, be alert! Be aware! 

Be alert first of all to what the next verses are about to say. But also be alert more generally; be aware of what is happening around and within us. Whether reading the text or the twists and turns of life, try not be taken by surprise!  This is especially vital when we see the gathering clouds of religious and political tyranny.

Also be realistic! The first portion of verse 10 declares, "If you are to be taken captive, into captivity you go." Some translations word the second portion of verse 10, "If you kill with the sword, with the sword you must be killed," in which case it is a reminder not to promote worthy causes in violent ways. Other translations say, "If you are to be killed by the sword, by the sword you must be killed," or something similar, a rendition that makes the second set of lines parallel in meaning to the first. If we understand the second portion of verse 10 this way, it also invites us to be realistic about life’s fortunes and misfortunes. Taken the other way, only the first portion of verse 10 makes this important point.

This is not an endorsement of fatalism or resignation, but an honest recognition that, sometimes through little or no fault of our own, the contingencies of life do flow against us. When this is so, as it was increasingly the case for Christians in the area we now call Turkey during the time of John the Revelator, instead of throwing a tantrum, as did King Hezekiah in ancient Israel, we do well to accept what we know we cannot prevent with as much quiet dignity as we can muster.

Not long ago I listened in admiring silence as a Christian friend of mine explained that the statistical likelihood that he will survive a disease for which he is being treated is about fifty percent, or a little more or less. He offered no outbursts of anger, grief or special pleading, just a realistic account of his diagnosis and prognosis, and what he and his physicians are doing in co-operation with God’s positive influence to improve his odds. He is an unusually steady man, and has been so for decades; nevertheless, I think that all of us can cultivate at least some of his courageous realism.

Finally, be strong and true! "Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints," declares the last portion of verse 10. Stamina, perseverance, strength under pressure, the ability to be strong when much might make us weak; this is what it means to have endurance. To have faith in this context means to be loyal, to be steadfast, to be so well anchored that even when the winds and waves of life assail, we are not unmoored from integrity and constancy, especially in our Christian commitments.

There are many things in Revelation 13 that we can continue discussing. However, it clearly teaches that the demonic is a factor with which we must reckon and that this dragon is an adroit delegator. It also teaches that, no matter what happens, we do well to be alert, realistic, strong and true, particularly in our loyalty to the One in whom "we live and move and have our being." This is good advice for all of us in every historical context!