Enjoy more audio from the Holy Bible here: www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZB-0zOHuJ9M&list=PLYyesfVYHl50-odnmbVo9BHtKQViwJZB8&index=5 The Book of Revelation, often known simply as Revelation or The Apocalypse is the final book of the New Testament and occupies a central place in Christian eschatology. Written in Koine Greek, its title is derived from the first word of the text, apokalypsis, meaning "unveiling" or "revelation." The Book of Revelation is the only apocalyptic document in the New Testament canon, although there are short apocalyptic passages in various places in the Gospels and the Epistles. The author names himself in the text as "John", but his precise identity remains a point of academic debate. Evidence for identifying the author as John the Apostle comes from second-century writers such as Justin Martyr, Irenaeus, Melito the bishop of Sardis, and Clement of Alexandria and the Muratorian fragment. Other scholars oppose this view, proposing that nothing can be known about the author except that he was a Jewish Christian prophet. The bulk of traditional sources date the book to the reign of the emperor Domitian (81-96 CE), and the external and internal evidence tends to confirm this. The book spans three literary genres, the epistolary, the apocalyptic, and the prophetic. It begins with John, on the island of Patmos (an island in the Aegean) addressing a letter to the "seven churches of Asia" (meaning Asia Minor). He then describes a series of prophetic visions, including figures such as the Whore of Babylon and the Beast, culminating in the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. The obscure and extravagant imagery has led to a wide variety of interpretations: historicist interpretations see in Revelation a broad view of history; preterist interpretations treat Revelation as mostly referring to the events of the apostolic era (1st century), or, at the latest, the fall of the Roman Empire; futurists believe that Revelation describes future events; and idealist or symbolic interpretations consider that Revelation does not refer to actual people or events, but is an allegory of the spiritual path and the ongoing struggle between good and evil. The title is taken from the first word of the book in Koine Greek: ἀποκάλυψις apokalypsis, meaning "unveiling" or "revelation". The author names himself as "John", but it is extremely unlikely that the author of Revelation was also the author of the gospel of John. Some of the evidence for this was set out as early as the second half of the 3rd century by Dionysius, archbishop of Alexandria, who noted that the gospel and the epistles attributed to John, unlike Revelation, do not name their author, and that the Greek of the gospel is correct and elegant while that of Revelation is neither; later scholars noticed that the two books also have radical differences in theological perspective. Tradition links him to John the Apostle, but it is unlikely that the apostle could have lived into the most likely time for the book's composition, the reign of Domitian, and the author never states he knew Jesus. All that is known is that this John was a Jewish Christian prophet, probably belonging to a group of such prophets, and was accepted as such by the congregations to whom he addresses his letter. His precise identity remains unknown, and modern scholarship commonly refers to him as John of Patmos. Early Church tradition dates the book to end of the emperor Domitian (reigned 81-96 CE), and most modern scholars agree, although the author may have written a first version under Vespasian (69-79 CE) and updated it under Domitian. The beast with seven heads and the number 666 seem to allude directly to the emperor Nero, but this does not require that Revelation was written in the 60s, as there was a widespread belief in later decades that Nero would return

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