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Apocalypses

The word “apocalypse” is derived from the Greek apokalypsis, meaning simply “revelation.” As a genre, however, it describes a type of literature dating from around 200 BCE to 200 CE1 that depicts the reception of some divine disclosure to a person—typically a famous figure from the Hebrew Bible—alongside its interpretation by a heavenly figure such as an angel.2 The manner in which one receives such disclosures is typically by a vision or dream directly conveyed by a heavenly being, or the visionary is taken on an otherworldly journey, often with an angelic guide.

Though apocalypses exhibit some variety, there are some points of commonality: an appeal to heavenly revelation, the importance of angelic mediators, and an expectation of a judgment of individuals after death. Typically apocalypses exhort readers/hearers to perceive the present life “in light of impending judgment and to adopt one’s values and lifestyle accordingly.”3 Or, more poignantly, an apocalypse is “intended to interpret present, earthly circumstances in light of the supernatural world and of the future, and to influence the understanding and behavior of the audience by means of divine authority.”4 Apocalypses are saturated with symbolic language and images of a wide variety, using these images as communicative devices for their messages. They use symbols as metaphors for the purpose of referring to concrete objects or events as well as abstract ideas, often expressed in specific, nonliteral language, typically using imagery drawn from a set of recognizable symbols that were often understood to represent things beyond themselves.

Apocalypses are found in portions of the Hebrew Bible, such as the book of Daniel (chaps. 7–12; cf. Ezek. 40–48; Isa. 24–27, 34–35, 56–66; Zech. 9–14). Apocalypses within the Pseudepigrapha include 1 Enoch, which is composed of a set of distinct apocalypses, including the Book of Watchers (chaps. 1–36), the Similitudes of Enoch (chaps. 37–71), the Astronomical Book (chaps. 72–82), the Dream Visions (chaps. 83–84), the Animal Apocalypse (chaps. 85–90), and the Epistle of Enoch (chaps. 91–108). Also discussed in the coming chapters are 4 Ezra, 2 Baruch, Sibylline Oracles 3–5, 11, and the Apocalypse of Abraham.

 

1. J. Collins, Apocalyptic Imagination, 3–4.

2. John J. Collins has defined the term in his seminal work as follows: “‘Apocalypse’ is a genre of revelatory literature with a narrative framework, in which a revelation is mediated by an otherworldly being to a human recipient, disclosing a transcendent reality which is both temporal, insofar as it envisages eschatological salvation, and spatial, insofar as it involves another, supernatural world.” “Introduction,” 9.

3. J. Collins, “Apocalypse,” 344–45.

4. A. Collins, “Introduction,” 7.