Gonzalo Rojas-Flores, «The Book of Revelation and the First Years of Nero’s Reign», Vol. 85 (2004) 375-392
In this article I try to demonstrate that the Book of
Revelation was written in the first years of Nero’s reign, because (a) there
is an important patristic tradition in favor of Nero and (b) the internal
evidence shows that the text was redacted after Nero’s ascension to the throne
in 54 and before the earthquake of Laodicea in 60.
386 Gonzalo Rojas-Flores
John himself wrote:
When he opened the sixth seal, I looked, and there came a great
earthquake. (Rev 6,12)
Then the angel took the censer and filled it with fire from the altar and
threw it on the earth; and there were peals of thunder, rumblings,
flashes of lightning, and an earthquake. (Rev 8,5)
Then they heard a loud voice from heaven saying to them, “Come up
here!†And they went up to heaven in a cloud while their enemies
watched them. At that moment there was a great earthquake, and a
tenth of the city fell; seven thousand people were killed in the
earthquake, and the rest were terrified and gave glory to the God of
heaven. (Rev 11,12-13)
Then God’s temple in heaven was opened, and the ark of his covenant
was seen within his temple; and there were flashes of lightning,
rumblings, peals of thunder, an earthquake, and heavy hail. (Rev 11,19)
The seventh angel poured his bowl into the air, and a loud voice came
out of the temple, from the throne, saying, “It is done!â€. And there
came flashes of lightning, rumblings, peals of thunder, and a violent
earthquake, such as had not occurred since people were upon the
earth, so violent was that earthquake. The great city was split into
three parts, and the cities of the nations fell. (Rev 16,17-19)
According to the three previous arguments, the epistle to the
Community of Laodicea was written before the years 62-70. The
epistle presents a marked messianic-escathological tendency. It has
many allusions to the city’s geography and economy. It was written by
someone interested in the earthquake as a literary resource linked to
God’s judgement. With those antecedents, the absence of any
reference to the earthquake of 60 shows that Revelation was written
before that time.
5. The symbolism of the Beasts
The “blasphemous names†of the Beast who rises out of the sea
(Rev 13,1) allude to the divine titles of Roman emperors. Influenced
by the eastern mores of the Tolemaic and Seleucid monarchies, they
were called “lord and god†(Augustus, Domitian, maybe Nero), or
simply “god†(Julius Caesar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius,
Nero, Vespasian, Domitian). Therefore, the argument which links Rev
4,11 to the imperial cult of Domitian is not conclusive (31).
According to John, one of the Beast’s heads seems to be mortally
wounded, but its deadly wound is healed and the Beast lives (Rev
(31) Cf. F.O. PARKER, “‘Our Lord and God’ in Rev 4,11: Evidence for the
Late Date of Revelation?â€, Bib 82 (2001) 209-217, 219-220, 224-226.