Authorship of Revelation

For scholars, there are three possibilities when it comes to authorship of Revelation:

1.      John, the apostle, wrote it

2.      John, the elder, wrote it (and this is a different person)

3.      Attributing it to John was pseudonymous, which today we would see as unethical or lying but this was actually fairly common in the day and not necessarily seen as unethical. For example, the books of Enoch, Esdras, Baruch, and others that most scholars consider to be pseudonymous. Daniel is one book that many scholars consider to be pseudonymous. John Oakes is one author and apologist I know who presents the case that Daniel is not pseudonymous in his book Daniel: Prophet to the Nations. But he is an exception in the world of biblical scholars in this opinion.

So just in case you’re thinking so far: That’s just all those liberal scholars out there that don’t believe in the authority of scripture. This is sometimes true. Sometimes scholars have an anti-supernatural bias. But oftentimes they do not and are simply looking at the linguistic evidence. We don’t have the space here to look at this in the case of Daniel, but we will for Revelation. In my opinion, John did write Revelation, but I respect the opinion of those who disagree and they have good reasons to do so. I think it’s important to know the reasons a scholar might come to these conclusions so you don’t simply think it’s because they just have a liberal bias, and that would be the only reason.

Let’s first look at some reasons Revelation might be correctly attributed to the apostle John and then I will get into some reasons it might not. To make this assessment about the authorship of Revelation, we will start with the assumption that the gospel of John and the letters of John are written by the Apostle John, even though technically the gospel of John is anonymous. However, many scholars assume the gospel of John was written by John, that is my position, and we are focusing on Revelation today. I don’t want to go down too many rabbit holes.

The first reason for this position is all the symbolism that is in common with the gospel of John, and also much of the same language. Below are some examples:

Symbolism in Common with the Gospel of John

Light and darkness (Isaiah 60:3, 19; Zechariah 14:7)

Living Water (from Ezekiel’s vision of the stream coming from the restored temple)

Jesus as the lamb

The “exemplary” interpretation of the cross: we are to follow his example as martyrs (John 13:15, cf. Rev. 12:11The importance of testimony

Christus Victor: Christ’s victory over the rulers of the world

There are phrases in common, such as “heard and seen”, “preparing a place,” “doing truth/falsehood”, and “having a share”

              However, the books also use different language and some different ideas, and it’s reasonable to assume that, if it is pseudonymous, the author would attempt to emulate the language of John the apostle. Below are some examples of the differences.

Differences with the Gospel of John

-There seems to be a more “realized” eschatology in John, whereas in Revelation it is seen as future, unrealized. The gospel often talks about eternal life as a present reality whereas Revelation as a future one.

-The word lamb is commonly the word amnos in John whereas in Revelation it is usually arnion.

-There is a dependence on different Old Testament passages. When using the symbolism of “light”, the gospel of John uses Genesis 1, Psalm 27:1, and Isaiah 42:6 and 49:6. Revelation, when referencing light references Isaiah 60:3, 19; and Zechariah 14:7.

-There “are numerous words and constructions…which occur in the gospel but are absent in Revelation…the entire register of the Greek used in Revelation is different…Whether we think the two texts were written by the same person will depend on the extent to which we expect an author to use a common style in different documents, written at different times, in different genres for different purposes.” (Ian Paul, Revelation: An Introduction and Commentary, pg. 9) This is an issue for some of the Pauline epistles, but some scholars think Paul had different amanuensis, someone who dictated the document in their hand and manner of speaking/editing. This would account for many differences in tone without having to conclude that a letter was not Pauline. Perhaps something similar is going on between the gospel of John and Revelation. After all, today when someone writes a book they get an editor, and sometimes editors might make drastic changes for the sake of the audience. I will not have an editor for this document other than myself, and readers will probably notice the effect on its quality! All this to say, there are reasons to reject the belief that differences in tone and writing style must mean different writers. However, there is a problem with this theory and it’s that Revelation does have an amanuensis in it, and it is John, writing on behalf of Jesus himself!

For position number two, that John the elder is different than John the Apostle, the main reason for this is that the John of Revelation never identifies himself as John the apostle and Eusebius of 260-340 A.D. proposes the theory that another, John the Elder, wrote it. However, I don’t find it convincing since Eusebius seems to propose this for his own ideological reasons and misunderstandings. He seems interested in Revelation not being considered canonical (For more details, see pg. 8 of Ian Paul’s commentary). But moreover, Eusebius is farther removed from John than the Church Fathers who attribute Revelation to John.

In my opinion, there is not enough reason to suppose that John the apostle did not write Revelation. Eusebius is farther removed from when it is written, while Justin Martyr and Irenaeus attribute Revelation to John the apostle, who were closer to the time it was written.