The Oxford Handbook of the Book of Revelation by Craig Koester;

Author:Craig Koester; [Koester, Craig]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780190655457
Publisher: Oxford University Press USA
Published: 2020-09-05T00:00:00+00:00

Creation and New Creation in the Book of Revelation

Our focus now moves from background context to examining the foregrounded text. Beginning with a survey summarizing the diverse ways John labels the created order, we then consider how creation and new creation are portrayed across the entirety of the work.

The Language of Creation

Before we embark on an examination of creation and new creation in Revelation, it is worth pausing to note the language that John uses to describe the created order. These include ktisis (“creation”; 3:14), ta panta (“all things”; 4:11; 22:1); kosmos (11:15; 13:8; 17:8), and oikoumenē (3:10; 12:9; 16:14). In addition to this, we have numerous instances where individual elements of creation are referred to, both natural (stars, grass, clouds, stones, mountains, rivers, and the sea; cf. McDonough 2000, 228) and supernatural (angels and demons; cf. Koester 2014, 119–20). Yet the predominant terminology employed throughout the text is the language of “heaven” and “earth.” On some occasions, this terminology simply echoes the conventional merism first encountered in Genesis, in which heaven is the visible sky above and earth represents the land below (see Rev 14:7; 21:1). But John’s usage of “heaven” and “earth” often encodes a theological meaning pertaining to the duality of the present created order. Hence, heaven frequently denotes the spiritual realm to which John ascends, the transcendent place from which a true perspective can be seen and a world where the divine will is honored (Bauckham 1993b, 31; McDonough 2008, 181–82). At the opposite pole of the duality, the earth is rarely construed as a neutral place; rather, it is the arena in which the suffering faithful must contend with an array of forces that actively resist the sovereignty of God (Bauckham 1993b, 40, 46; McDonough 2008, 183; Murphy 1999, 185). Yet for all that Revelation testifies to a present opposition between the two realms, the ultimate hope of this text is for this dualism to collapse by means of an eschatological merger of heaven and earth (Schellenberg 2006, 471).

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