Giancarlo Biguzzi, «The Chaos of Rev 22,6-21 and Prophecy in Asia», Vol. 83 (2002) 193-210

Interpreters of the Apocalypse agree that in Ap 22,6-21 disorder reigns and that, most of all, various voices in these verses interfere with one another, without care for rules which would produce a proper development. Therefore, chaos is undeniably in the text. But it is equally true that with some ease one can discern in the text an articulation in three strophes: the first and the third speak of the revelation received by John and of the transmission of that revelation to the churches by means of John’s book, while the second is concerned with the ethical life and its eschatological reward. All this reveals the anxiety of John about a relaxation of vigilance on the part of the churches of Asia, so that John consequently insists on the imminence of the eschatological Coming and labors to show the legitimacy of the demands of his book, especially before the eyes of his ‘brother-prophets’. It is the framework of their prophetic style, probably charismatic like that of the prophets of 1 Cor 14, which allows us to make sense of the interference and injection of various voices in these verses of the johannine Apocalypse; we find a similar style in certain other verses at the beginning and in the body of John’s book.

have sent my angel...’, 22,16). The ‘witness of Jesus’, however, is then deeply modified in 22,18, where it no longer concerns the life of the churches, but the heavy sanctions which shall fall upon those who tamper with John’s book. Furthermore, although the witness seems to be addressed generically ‘to everyone who hears the words...’ and not exactly to the prophets, in reality it is not so. In fact John writes ‘every one who hears’ because the sanctions are taken according to the reciprocity rule from his writing, that obviously is to be read and heard. The panti/ of panti_ a)kou/onti, however, makes it clear that the sanctions threaten every reader: those who have some responsibility within the churches included. In other words, by writing: ‘everyone who hears’, John could certainly refer to the congregation, as he does in 1,3, but the members of it could tamper with the words of John’s book only by applying them in a reduced or distorted way in their everyday life, and so the book and its words would remain untouched. The hearers threatened in vv. 18-19 are, then, the influential people who have some real possibility of altering John’s book, either by deleting or interpolating, or by minimising and perverting this or that teaching in the community sermon¹⁹. This was exactly what Jezebel was doing. As a prophetess, she exerted some kind of didactical authority in the Thyatira community, teaching the pornei/a and the lawfulness of eating ei)dwlo/quta (2,20) to Christ’s servants, against John’s teaching. Hers was a typical example of what John meant with his e)piti/qhmi, and with his a)faire/w (22,18-19).

        There are, also, in Rev interlocutors whom John deals with in a way different from how he knew and felt about them. He does not face their weaknesses directly, but tries to condition them in every way, with great rhetorical skill: he blandishes them, he incites them, he stirs them up, and tries to drag them from giving in, to vigilance. The ‘brother-prophets’ were probably among those he addressed with more