Revelation (Continental Commentary | CC)

by Jürgen Roloff

Publisher:

Fortress Press

, 1993

Overview

Is Revelation, with its strangeness and idiosyncratic theology, a legitimate expression of the Gospel? To this question, raised by the book’s conflicting history of influence, Jürgen Roloff is able to answer yes. Viewing Revelation as a lively interaction between the author and concrete communities of faith, Roloff maintains that the book’s epistolary framework is the chief starting point for interpreting its prophetic message and bizarre apocalyptic images.

Contents

Top Highlights

“patient endurance’ designates the steadfast trial in the sufferings and conflicts that were imposed on believers” (Page 44)

“The Christians in Laodicea were living in the self-satisfied certainty that they had already received salvation as a sure possession. In this respect, they were forgetting that this gift of salvation required radical obedience, which shows itself within the church by a love that serves and outside the church by courageous public testimony.” (Page 64)

“Three features are taken from it: the knocking by the master, the opening of the door by the servants who have remained awake, and the reward of these servants with a meal prepared by the returning master.” (Page 65)

“In addition, however, very early it became one of the most important strongholds of the cult of the Caesars in the eastern part of the empire; in 29 b.c., Augustus had persuaded the Ephesians to dedicate a temple to Julius Caesar, The Christian community established by Paul became the mother church for the whole province through the mission reaching out into the hinterlands, and Paul’s legacy seems to have been kept very much alive for a long time there.” (Page 44)

“Also in favor of an origin of Revelation between a.d. 90 and 95 is the picture it sketches of the churches in the province of Asia.” (Pages 10–11)

Praise for the Print Edition

In this commentary, one catches the Revelator’s vision of eternity ablaze with promise and expectation of accountability in the bleakness of the present. May this book find many who are willing to dialogue with the Revelator.

—Frederick Danker, editor, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature

Product Details

• Title: Continental Commentary Series: Revelation
• Author: Jürgen Roloff
• Translators: John E. Alsup and James S. Currie
• Publisher: Fortress Press
• Publication Date: 1990
• Pages: 272

About Jürgen Roloff

Jürgen Roloff is Professor of New Testament at the University of Erlangen, Germany, and is the author of several important New Testament studies.