Quote:
Originally Posted by awareness
ICA I think it's funny that the Eastern Orthodox didn't accept the book of Revelation in the canon until the 5 century, and now they have complete hermeneutics developed upon it.
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Maybe, but there was no other church those days and, sadly, there were not so many great minds, like now (especially Lee, Nee, Jehovah Witnesses, Mormons, and other sects), who could understand and interpret it literally.
The Revelation of John was one of the most uncertain books. It took a few centuries for the ancient and generally influential Christian theologians to study it, come to common ground, and accept the Book of Revelation universally.
BTW, in Protestantism, Martin Luther made an attempt to remove the books of Hebrews, James, Jude and Revelation from the canon (partially because they were perceived to go against certain Protestant doctrines such as sola scriptura and sola fide), but this was not generally accepted among his followers.
"Revelation was the last of the traditional books to be accepted as part of the Christian biblical canon, up to 100 years later than the other books. According to Denzinger, Revelation was accepted at the Council of Carthage of 397 AD; according to McDonald & Sanders it was added at the later 419 council. Revelation's place in the canon was not guaranteed, however, with doubts raised as far back as the 2nd century about its character, symbolism, and apostolic authorship. These doubts have been regularly expressed through Church history.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Book_of_Revelation