The authors studied in previous chapters give some intimation of the constant activity and complexity of political communication throughout the late and post-imperial world. The interchange of communication between different levels of authority, using well-maintained traditions, continued to serve a central role in public administration as it had under the earlier empire. But, as Procopius' vignette demonstrates, political communication also shaped crucial political developments in the fifth and sixth centuries.

The role of two nameless members of the lower Italian clergy in triggering the conflict of 540–4 between the late antique ‘super-powers’ of the eastern Roman empire and Sassanian Persia dramatically illustrates the potential of late antique patterns of communication.

Introduction

The aim of this study is to assess how far a reading of the Book of Revelation might be used to support or question recent theological understandings of the relationship between historical events and divine reality, with particular reference to the work of Pannenberg and Moltmann. Chapter 1 set the scene by giving an overview of the twentieth-century debate about the relationship between history and faith, within which the contributions of Moltmann, Pannenberg and others need to be seen. Chapters 3–5, will turn in detail to the text of the Book of Revelation, to explore the way in which the seer conceives of the relationship between God and human history. In chapter 6 I shall examine some of the conclusions reached by Pannenberg and Moltmann and reflect on these in the light of my reading of the text of Revelation. But before dealing in detail with either of the two poles of my subject – the text of Revelation on the one hand and contemporary systematic reflection on the other – it will be necessary to cover some foundational questions about how these two poles might relate to each other. That relationship has been the subject of prolonged and intensive scholarly discussion over the last two to three decades.

In this chapter I examine some of the different ways in which the relationship between biblical interpretation and systematic theology has been understood.

The spatial setting of the text

The importance of the temporal dimension of apocalyptic thought has long been recognized, given the central role which eschatology often plays in apocalypses. However, recent analyses of apocalypses have sought to underline the importance of the spatial dimension of the genre alongside the temporal dimension. This is reflected in the important definition of the genre of apocalypse, put forward in 1979 as a result of work in the SBL Apocalypse Group: ‘“Apocalypse” is a genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial insofar as it involves another, supernatural world.’ It is the idea that the Book of Revelation seeks to disclose a transcendent spatial reality which underlies my treatment of the spatial dimension of the text in this chapter.

In an influential reassessment of apocalyptic thought Rowland has laid particular emphasis on the importance of the spatial dimension of this literature, in the sense of the revelation of heavenly secrets. It is this feature of apocalyptic which is for Rowland its most distinctive characteristic – more distinctive even than the eschatological interest which is usually held to be central to the genre. Rowland's suggestion that eschatology should not be regarded as the central feature of the apocalyptic genre has been criticized.

This interdisciplinary study brings together a reading of the Book of Revelation with an assessment of the work of Wolfhart Pannenberg and Jürgen Moltmann on the theology of history. Although both theologians have been influenced by apocalyptic, there has been no detailed study of their work in the light of Revelation, the most important Christian apocalypse.

Chapter 1 sets Pannenberg and Moltmann in their context, showing the influences which have shaped their work. Chapter 2 examines some of the methodological issues which arise in relating scripture and systematic theology together.

Chapters 3–5 form a detailed study of Revelation, exploring the way in which the author uses the dimensions of space and time to make theological points about the relationship between God and history. This in turn encourages faithfulness to God in the present.

Chapter 6 is a detailed assessment of the theologies of history developed by Pannenberg and Moltmann, including their views on the nature of the historical process, and the use of apocalyptic ideas in eschatology. Their proposals are analysed alongside conclusions from the reading of Revelation in chapters 3–5.

The study therefore constructs a dialogue between biblical interpretation and systematic theology, giving due weight to both disciplines.

The aim of this study has been to examine the extent to which the reading of one New Testament text – the Book of Revelation – can be used to support or question the contemporary theologies of history proposed by Wolfhart Pannenberg and Jürgen Moltmann.

I began in chapter 1 by setting the contributions of Pannenberg and Moltmann in their context, comparing and contrasting their proposals with other influential ideas about the relationship between faith and history. In chapter 2 I proceeded to explore some of the methodological issues which arise from the consideration of the relationship between theology and scripture. I argued against attempts to see the relationship between exegesis and systematics as a ‘two-stage’ process, in which the results of biblical interpretation are first determined, then transmitted wholesale to an entirely separate discipline, which seeks to apply them to contemporary questions. Rather, I suggested that it was both legitimate and important for the two disciplines to interrelate. Similarly, I argued for the relationship between scripture and theological formulation to be seen as dialectical. Scripture is a starting point for the generation of conceptual frameworks in theology. These frameworks then need to be reassessed continually, to determine their adequacy as elaborations of scripture. At the same time, new light may be shed on scripture itself by reading it through the lenses provided by such conceptual frameworks.

Introduction

In the next three chapters, I turn to the Book of Revelation. My particular concern will be to analyse the way in which the dimensions of space and time are used in the text to develop the theological argument. I shall consider this in detail in Chapters 4 and 5, but first I examine in this chapter three important ways in which interpreters have approached Revelation. In section 3.2 I consider different ways in which the text has been treated as a resource for reflection on the development of human history. The seer is profoundly concerned with human history. However, his concern for history stems not from an attempt to provide a speculative chronology of the future or to discern abstract principles at work in the course of history. Rather, he provides a spatial and temporal framework within which to address the present situation of his readers. In section 3.3 I consider various interpretations of the rhetorical situation and impact of the text. My conclusion is that the seer aims to evoke a practical response from his readers to the threats which he perceives from the enemies of Christ. He achieves this by revealing hidden dimensions of reality, both spatial and temporal, to demonstrate the true nature of the readers' situation, and therefore to exhort and encourage them. In section 3.4 I turn to the recent debates about the genre of the text.

Introduction

In 1972 an influential book by Klaus Koch, the German Old Testament scholar, appeared in English as The Rediscovery of Apocalyptic. Koch charted the way in which theologians from different disciplines – both biblical studies and systematics – had begun to rediscover apocalyptic texts as a resource for contemporary theological reflection. He paid particular attention to two German systematicians, Wolfhart Pannenberg and Jürgen Moltmann, both of whom had worked extensively on the relationship between theology and history, using apocalyptic texts as exegetical support. The work of Pannenberg and Moltmann has often been characterized as a reaction against a dehistoricizing tendency evident in the dialectical theology of a previous generation of theologians, represented most clearly by Rudolf Bultmann. In fact, the original German title of Koch's book, Ratlos vor der Apokalyptik (which may be loosely translated as ‘At a Loss over Apocalyptic’), indicates something of the awkwardness and embarrassment apocalyptic had caused this earlier generation. In the face of the Bultmannian stress on the overwhelming importance of the present moment, and its dismissal of historical fact as a basis for faith, both Pannenberg and Moltmann have reaffirmed the centrality of history in theological understanding, and have used interpretations of apocalyptic in so doing.

Although the work of Pannenberg and Moltmann has important common features (for example, their interest in apocalyptic, their reaction against dialectical theology, and the strong orientation of their theology to the future), there are also important differences of emphasis.

Introduction

In this chapter I attempt to illustrate that the text offers a view of reality which is irreducibly temporal, without giving a chronological account of history. My aim is to show how John seeks to set the present experience of his readers within ultimate temporal horizons in order to provide a deeper understanding of reality, while at the same time focusing on the present situation of the communities to which he writes.

In chapter 4 I used a heavily modified version of a method adopted by Elizabeth Struthers Malbon in her analysis of the Gospel of Mark. By categorizing the spatial references in the text into groupings relating to ancient conceptions of the arrangement of the cosmos, I sought to map out the development of the spatial dimension of the text. I discussed at length how the text uses spatial categories to establish in 2:1–4:11 a dissonance between the way things appear to be on earth and the way things really are in the cosmos created by God. In 5:1ff., with the appearance of the Lamb, a long process begins in which this dissonance is intensified and finally resolved, in 21:1ff., in the vision of the New Jerusalem, where spatial distinctions between heaven and earth are removed, transforming the cosmos. I also commented that the New Jerusalem operates not only as a point of resolution but also as a starting point, from which the readers of the text must work as they face once again the present reality portrayed in the earlier visions.

Introduction

The starting point for this study lies in twentieth-century debates about the relationship between history and faith. These debates are one of the most enduring features of the modern theological scene. As far as New Testament studies are concerned, the debates have most often arisen in the context of the application of the historical-critical method to scripture. The two most obvious examples of this have been the various ‘quests’ for the historical Jesus, and the continuing discussions about the extent to which the resurrection of Jesus is accessible to the historical-critical method.

However, this study is concerned with a rather different question, which relates not so much to the exercise of the historical-critical method, but rather to some of the underlying assumptions made about the nature and significance of history as such. This more fundamental question is about the relationship between divine reality and the world of historical events. Of course, this question cannot be isolated from issues relating to the application of historical criticism to the biblical record. Three of the main protagonists to whom I refer in this opening chapter – Troeltsch, Bultmann and Pannenberg – have engaged in great depth with both sets of questions, and a major point of Pannenberg's programme is precisely the illegitimacy of dividing the two sets of questions from each other. Nonetheless, the focus in this study will be especially on the debate about the significance of history per se.