Revelations

Through the bestselling books of Elaine Pagels, thousands of readers have come to know and treasure the suppressed biblical texts known as the Gnostic Gospels. As one of the world’s foremost religion scholars, she has been a pioneer in interpreting these books and illuminating their place in the early history of Christianity. Here, however, she tackles a text that is firmly, dramatically within the New Testament canon: The Book of Revelation, the surreal apocalyptic vision of the end of the world. It is the Bible’s strangest and most controversial text, one that is devoid of stories or moral teaching, offering only visions—“dreams and nightmares,” in Pagels’ words. Where did it come from, and what has given it such enduring popularity?

In this startling and timely book, Pagels returns The Book of Revelation to its historical origin, written as its author, John of Patmos, took aim at the Roman Empire after what is now known as “the Jewish War,” in 66 CE. Militant Jews in Jerusalem, fired with religious fervor, had waged an all-out war against Rome’s occupation of Judea; their defeat resulted in the desecration of Jerusalem and its Great Temple. Pagels persuasively interprets Revelation as a scathing attack on the decadence of Rome. Soon after, however, a new sect known as “Christians” seized on John’s text as a weapon against heresy and infidels of all kinds—Jews, and even Christians who dissented from their increasingly rigid doctrines and hierarchies.

Pagels shows how the Book of Revelation has been used as a powerful religious weapon over the past two millennia. Martin Luther wanted to remove it from the canon, claiming “there is no Christ in it”—until he realized how he could use its powerful imagery against the Catholic Church. Catholic apologists turned it back against Luther and other “protesting” Christians. Christians in America have identified with its vision of cosmic war since the 1600s, when many immigrating to the New World believed they had arrived in the “new Jerusalem” promised in Revelation. Pagels also uses today’s religious landscape to reflect on the past. In a time when global religious violence surges, Revelations explores how often those in power throughout history have sought to force “God’s enemies” to submit or be killed.

Revelations offers not only an engrossing historical odyssey, but a powerful exploration of the roots of dissent, violence and division in the world’s religions, as well as its more humanistic possibilities. As Pagels shows, understanding how this book has fascinated readers for two thousand years tells us much about ourselves, and about how religion evokes such powerful responses—for better and for worse—to this day.