Q.
36
Was the book of Revelation written in code?
Or had the author gone crazy? Was he
hallucinating? Were the images portrayed to
be taken literally?
Becky Garrison
A.
I would try to explain all the various rapture-ready theories that
have popped up over the years, but some of them are so farfetched
I’d just laugh myself silly. I do, however, need to touch on what I
would call “Darby’s Dealie,” because this seems to be the theory that is getting
the most press attention.
For those who are not familiar with John Nelson Darby, this former
Anglican priest and founder of the Plymouth Brethren propagated a new the-
ology known as “dispensationalism,” which introduced a brand new idea into
evangelical theology: the rapture. Thanks to Darby, we have folks who have
taken a metaphorical tale literally and thus translated metaphors into a code
that they use as a lens to interpret geopolitical events such as the Holocaust,
the Cold War, and the September 11 terrorist attacks.
Skim the Bible and you won’t fi nd the word “rapture,” but you will fi nd
Darby’s footprints all over the best-selling Sco eld Reference Bible and the Left
Behind series. What’s truly troubling about Darby’s teaching on dispensation-
alism is that it eliminates from the picture any talk of biblical teachings such as
the Beatitudes. If you only focus on otherworldly things, then there is no point
in working toward peace, social justice, the end of poverty and the like, on the
basis that such projects are futile.Jarrod McKenna
A.
The book of Revelation is not to be read literally but practically.
John the Revelator is a guerrilla poet whose genre is Jewish apoca-
lyptic, a potent political tool of resistance for the oppressed that he
uses to seize our imagination in imitation of the Lamb whose nonviolence is
victorious. John tells us to quit collaborating with the empire’s gastric juices,
destroying and dehumanizing life, because we are in the belly of the Beast. But
by living God’s victorious Calvary-shaped love we should give the system a
stomach ache.
Despite the crazed rants of the radio preacher, trying to predict the end of
the world with Revelation is like trying to use Bob Marley’s lyrics as a street
map. Not only do you get lost; you forget to dance. The dance of discipleship