There is a well established tradition among liberal Bible scholars who are involved in what is called “source criticism” to state that the books in the Pentateuch arose as a combination of at least four separate original sources. But this approach is not as often followed when analyzing the books in the New Testament. Below is one exception to that general rule.
J. Massyngberde Ford, in her entry to the Anchor Bible series of new translations and commentary, posits three separate sources to the Book of Revelation:
1. “Chs. 4-11 originated with the revelations given to the Baptist before and during the time he recognized Jesus as 'He that cometh.'”
2. “Because chs. 12-22 actually contain the name of Jesus...they were probably written by a disciple [of John] who knew more than John [but still less than actual followers of Jesus].”
3. “The present writer believes that 22:16a, 20b, and 21 are later Christian interpolations akin to chs. 1-3.”
Thus, in her commentary, she rearranges the material in Revelation so as to put it into her proposed chronological order of composition with chapters 1-3 coming after chapter 22, followed by the three verses listed in #3 above as later additions. Her reasoning is based mainly on two foundations: (1) Revelation is a book of prophecy and John the Baptist was a prophet and (2) the vocabulary in those “later Christian interpolations” contrasts with the vocabulary found in the rest of Revelation. There are several problems with her thesis:
1. There is absolutely no early manuscript evidence to back up her proposal of three separate original sources.
2. Very early evidence from the writings of the Church Fathers states that either John the Apostle or “John the Elder” was the author of the book.
3. It is well known that the vocabulary utilized by a given author can be quite dependent on the particular subject of the writing. And since much of Revelation 1-3 consists of direct quotes from Christ rather than John, it is not surprising that the vocabulary might differ from the bulk of the book.
4. Ford's next piece of evidence is that the description of Jesus as “Lamb,” which is common in Revelation, only appears in the Gospels in contexts in which John the Baptist is concerned. This argument can be easily discounted. In the first place, there is only one such context for such a usage in the Gospels, which hardly constitutes a trend, and that is found in John 1:29,36. Secondly, and most importantly, the Greek word used in those two verses is amnos (also applied to Jesus by Luke in Acts 8:32 and Peter in I Peter 1:19), unlike the word for sheep used throughout Revelation, arnion.
5. In contrast to the four-source theory regarding the Pentateuch, which is still widely accepted among liberal circles, Ford (as far as I am aware) has attracted no scholarly followers to her unusual thesis since its publication back in 1975. That lack speaks volumes regarding the validity of her reasoning.
6. She treats Revelation 1-3 as the composition of a different author than Chapter 4. However, my analysis of these first four chapters demonstrates that they all belong together as a discrete section (see more details for this and other literary considerations in the post “Book of Revelation: Introduction to the Literary Structure”). It forms the common ABA structure found throughout the Bible:
A. Vision of Christ (Rev. 1)
B. Letters to the Churches (Rev. 2-3)
A. Vision of Heaven (Rev. 4)
And as usual in such a literary arrangement, there are strong affinities that ch. 4 has with the opening passages of the book, especially ch. 1. Both are filled with images taken from Ezekiel 1. Both are theophanies that take place in heaven, unlike the earthly setting of chs. 2-3. Between these two “A” scenes, all the major heavenly characters of the drama are introduced: the Son of Man, seven spirits and seven angels in ch. 1, and Almighty God, 24 elders and four creatures in ch. 4. Beale points out that practically the same grammatical irregularity appears in Rev. 1:10b-11 and 4:1. In addition, specific words and phrases common to chs. 1 and 4 are:
“what is to take place hereafter”
“like a sound of many waters” / “speaking like a trumpet”
“I was in the Spirit”
“what is to (must) take place after this”
“seven spirits before the throne”
“seven lamp stands” / “seven torches of fire”
“for ever and ever, I am alive for evermore” / “who lives for ever and ever”
“who was, and is, and is to come”
“glory and dominion” / “glory and honor and power”
“voice like a trumpet”
These data are almost impossible to reconcile with Ford's statement that chapters 1 and 4 were written by entirely different people.
7. If the present order of verses is maintained, then the first chapters are intended as the prologue to the book and chapter 22 as the epilogue. Thus, we would expect there to be strong verbal parallels between chapters 1-3 and 22, but only if they were written by the same person, which Ford denies. In such a comparison, we must in all fairness omit the three partial verses that she does feel were written by the author of Rev. 1-3. That still leaves the following numerous parallels:
revelations coming from God, Christ and angels (1:1; 22:6)
“Blessed is he who reads this prophecy” (1:3; 22:7b)
“prophecy” (1:3; 22:7,10,18,19 )
“the time is near” (1:3; 22:10)
“the things written” (1:3; 22:18-19)
“Behold, he is coming (1:7; 22:7a,12)
“I am the Alpha and Omega” (1:8; 22:13)
God's only speeches in the book (1:8; 22:1-5)
“I was in the Spirit, a loud voice said, “Write” (1:9-11) // “I, John heard...the angel...said, do not seal up the words.” (22:8-11)
“The first and the last” (1:17; 22:13)
“When I saw him (them), I fell at his (the) feet.” (1:17; 22:8)
“He put...on me” (1:17) // “God will put on him.” (22:18)
the importance of “deeds” (2:2,5; 22:12)
“grant to eat of the tree of life” (2:7) // “have the right to the tree of life” (22:14)
the only occurrences of phileo (“love”) in the book (2:19; 22:15)
similar descriptions of judgment in 2:23 and 22:12
“the morning star” only in 2:28 and 22:16
“people who have not soiled their garments” (3:4) // “those who wash their robes” (22:14)
both God and Christ are on the throne (3:21; 22:1)
8. The present text of the final section of the book can be readily analyzed as shown below:
A. “I am coming soon” – Blessing (22:6-7)
B. “I John...heard and saw...keep the words of this book...worship God” (22:8-9)
C. Contrast (22:10-11)
1. evildoers
2. the holy
D. “I am coming soon” (22:12)
D'. “I am the Alpha and Omega” (22:13)
C'. Contrast (22:14-15)
2. the holy
1. evildoers
B'. “I Jesus...him who hears...take of the water of life” (22:16-17)
A'. “I am coming soon” – Warning and Blessing (22:18-21)
However, this symmetrical arrangement readily falls apart once one omits those verses which Ford feels have been inserted by another author, i.e. 22:16-17a and 20-21.
9. The strong unity of the present text is confirmed by a myriad of individual words, phrases or similar events which appear throughout Revelation as exact multiples of the symbolic numbers 7 and 12. These statistics are disrupted greatly if one only counts the contribution of any one of the putative multiple authors proposed by Ford.
10. Finally, the extensive literary analysis of this book summarized in my post referenced above demonstrated that it could viewed alternatively as organized in three completely different ways: as alternating sections dealing with heaven and earth, a mirror-image (or chiastic) structure, or as seven successive sections meeting the definition of progressive recapitulation – a hallmark of apocalyptic literature in the Bible. To edit together such a complex structure from three diverse blocks of source material is almost impossible to imagine. But, of course it is much more believable if written by one single, inspired author under the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
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