Is the book of Revelation literal or not?

@divegeester

Ok so I’m trying to pin down posters like KellyJay on the eternal suffering topic, but he for one is now sulking with me so I’m starting this thread so that anyone can tell me what they think.

Stop imagining other posters' emotional state.

Revelation contains literal matters, symbolic matters, allegorical matters,and things which are signs. Signs pointing to more profound realities that they signify.

If you want to imagine a "lake of fire" to be an icecream cone, you do so at your own risk.

Most of us read that, and though we are not sure all that a lake of fire entails, we're pretty sure it is something terrible and to be avoided by God's salvation.

It is hard to allegoricalize the DREAD out of it.

John was on the island of Patmos and was caught up in the spirit and saw visions of all sorts of stuff.

That's right. And if you want to think a lake of fire represents something benign which holds no dread, do so.

Don't blame some of us if we are pretty sure a "lake of fire" where Satan, the antichrist, and the false prophet go forever and ever is not anything any human being should want to partake in.

Which of it is literal and which of it is imagery/metaphor?

That may take some time and experience. Most people know that a pleasant sign represents something pleasant and an unpleasant sign stands for something unpleasant.

I say it is all metaphor.

For the sake of lessening the dread of eternal punishment you are willing to say the entire book of Revelation is all metaphor.

That I would say is overkill and desperation.
But you're free to try.

@sonship said
Stop imagining other posters' emotional state.

You use it as one of your go-to "debating" gimmicks more often than anyone else here does.

@mister-moggy

the book of the revelation, like the rapture, speaking in tongues, etc. is just a human invention.

Rapture means a kind of ecstatic happiness. If you have never had an ecstatic happiness in God, then just speak for yourself.

I believe that is some genuine speaking in tongues.
I said "some".

So I don't share your skepticism there.

Heavenly Father must be quite amused at the stories His children make up over time.

I don't think God is that petty or that fidgety.
You are projecting your questionable amusement and hoping God feels the same, I think.

Revelation is the conclusion and climax of the 66 books of the divine revelation. Without Revelation the Bible has no conclusion.

So I don't know what you're talking about. Revelation is so marvelously designed as to structure it is anything BUT "a madman's dream."

@mister-moggy

the bible was created about 300 years after the life of the christ.

The Hebrew canon was completed before the life of Jesus as a man upon the earth.

The earliest books of the New Testament, Paul's letters started to be written around 15 years after the death and resurrection of Christ. They were written before the writing of the four Gospels.

The major events of Christ's ministry can be gleaned from reading Paul's letters, which were written BEFORE Matthew, Mark, Luke and John.

The Gospels were written TOO SHORT of a time after the death and resurrection of Christ to be the result of legendary fabrication. Too many people were still alive to affirm or deny the things written in the four Gospels.

some books put in. some books left out.

That is correct with BOTH the old testament canon and the new testament canon. The people of God were led by the Spirit of God to discern among the plethora of sacred and religious writings which books bore the stamp of prophetic authenticity. Of course in the NT there were many, many other writings which are called either the Apocrypha or the PSerudpigrapha.

These many other writing sometimes have historical value and even spiritual value. But that alone did not cause them to be recognized as the inspired books as God's communication - Gog's word to human beings.

This work was done a long time ago. There is no need today to re-do this work of discriminating between useful but uninspired books and the inspired books.

the trinity created at the same time.

The New Testament says the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God. That is basically the revelation of the three-one God. And such a revelation did not come 300 years into the church age - THOUGH the word "trinity" was coined some three centuries perhaps after the close of the NT canon.

Actually, Genesis reveals the mysterious nature of God being triune when in the 26th verse of that book it says "God said, Let Us make man in Our image according to Our likeness. ... And God created man in HIS own image, in the image of God He created them ..." (v.27)

Already something mysterious about God being a mysterious "Us" is seen in the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament.

the "conclusion" of the bible is the gospels.

No. The conclusion of the Bible is the book of Revelation. Not only so but Jesus Himself indicated that there was more that the Holy Spirit had to reveal to the disciples.

"I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of reality, comes He will guide you into all the reality; for He will not speak from Himself, but what He hears He will speak; and He will declare to you the things that are coming." (John 16:13)

So the disciples expected that according to Christ's word, the Holy Spirit would come to declare the things that were to come to them.

The conclusion of the Bible is the book of Revelation.

@mister-moggy removed their quoted post

This would be absolutely incorrect. We have St. Ignatius of Antioch referring to the trinity in the very early 2nd century -- his references to the trinity predate some of the people's estimates as to when the Gospels were put down, which is rather remarkable.

Check out this blog post on Orthocatch:

https://orthocath.wordpress.com/2010/09/30/ignatius-of-antiochs-view-of-the-trinity/