This post is directed to several widely held views about the book of Revelation that I think are probably wrong:  Did the author make it so highly symbolic because he didn’t want the authorities to realize what he was saying for fear of reprisal?  Does the book claim that non-believers will be consciously tormented forever in the Lake of Fire?  Does it indicate that anyone who denies or alters a single one of its prophecies be damned forever (22:18-19)?

I deal with these issues in my book The Bible: A Historical and Literary Introduction (Oxford University Press).  Here’s what I say there:

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The Book of Revelation as Underground Literature?

Some readers of the book of Revelation have taken its mysterious symbols to suggest that it was “underground” literature. The symbolic language of the book, according to this interpretation, was used to keep the governing authorities from realizing that they themselves were under attack.

There may be an element of truth in this view, but one might wonder whether a Roman administrator was likely to sit down over the weekend to read a good Christian book. It seems more plausible that the principal function of the symbolism, whether in Revelation or in other apocalypses, lay elsewhere, namely, in the character of the material itself. Indeed, the heavenly secrets are by their very nature not straightforward or banal or subject to empirical demonstration; their mystery and splendor virtually require them to be conveyed in unearthly and bizarre symbols of the higher realities of heaven.

 

The Destruction of Sinners in the Lake of Fire

Christians have traditionally believed that at the Last Judgment, some people will be granted an eternal heavenly existence, but others will be condemned to eternal torment. The book of Revelation and its “Lake of Fire” is often said to teach this view.

Is that actually the case? It is true that Revelation names the lake of fire as an ultimate destiny for sinners. But if the vast majority of the book is symbolic, why should we assume the lake of fire is meant literally? In fact, Revelation’s account of the last judgment may suggest the author did not believe that sinners are to be tormented forever but that they will be annihilated out of existence.

The judgment of the dead comes in Revelation 20:11–15, where a “great white throne” is set up and all the dead “great and small” are brought to give account of their lives. Those whose names are not written in the “book of life” (i.e., those not destined for a reward) are condemned and “thrown into the lake of fire.” Then Death and Hades themselves are thrown into the lake. The author tells us, “This is the second death, the lake of fire” (20:14).

It obviously makes no sense to imagine that living beings known as “Death” or “Hades” are literally thrown into a lake boiling with fire to be punished forever. This is describing the ultimate destruction of all that is opposed to God, the author of life. Death is his enemy, and it, along with the entire realm of the dead, will be destroyed, permanently. The lake is called “the second death” because it is the final annihilation of all the dead, including all dead humans. But if the destination of death and Hades is symbolic, why not the destination of sinners? If the point is that there will no longer be any death, then isn’t the point also that there will no longer be any sinful people? That they, like death, will simply be annihilated, no more to exist?

I think that’s exactly what the author is saying.  Like the rest of the New Testament, Revelation indicates that a sinner’s “eternal punishment” is being annihilated.  It’s a punishment because it’s the death sentence; it’s eternal because it will never be reversed (unlike the deaths of the saints).  The only figures who are said to be “tormented” forever in the Lake of Fire are the Devil, the “Beast” (the anti-Christ figure), and the “false prophet,” God’s ultimate enemies and (the Devil at least) not mere mortals.

 

An Ancient Copyright Curse

In the ancient world, there was no such thing as copyright law; and, as we have seen repeatedly, scribes often changed the texts they were copying to make them say what they wanted them to mean (see also chapter 2 of this book). How were authors supposed to protect their writing from being changed? The author of the book of Revelation tried one way, by uttering a dire curse on anyone who dared to modify his text: “I testify to everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: If anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book; and if any one removes any of the words of the book of this prophecy, God will remove his share from the tree of life and from the holy city, as described in this book” (Rev 22:18–19).

This is not a threat that the reader has to accept or believe everything written in this book of prophecy, as it is sometimes interpreted; it is in fact a typical threat to the copyists of the book that they are not to add or remove any of its words. Similar curses can be found scattered throughout the range of early Christian writings. Unfortunately, they appear to have had little effect: scribes still changed the texts they copied, the threat of eternal torment notwithstanding! Even the book of Revelation has numerous differences among every surviving manuscript, so much so that there are places where it is very difficult, if not impossible, to determine what the author originally wrote.