Overview

People love to tell stories. In the ancient world most people interacted with these stories primarily through the spoken word as opposed to the printed text. The book of Revelation is one such story. Not only is the narrative Revelation intended to be read aloud (Rev 1:3), but the written text itself betrays a number of features characteristic of oral storytelling. The aim of this monograph is to analyze John's Apocalypse with the listening audience in mind, in order to validate that indeed the text was composed as a text for performance. An eclectic methodology combining tools from oral-biblical criticism, discourse analysis, and biblical performance criticism is utilized to explore three representative sections of Revelation, working from sounds and syllables to the oral patterns that structure the book itself. This book contributes to scholarship, proposing that Revelation must be re-heard, just as it was by the original recipients. Since syllables, sounds, cola, and periods are often ignored in current scholarship, this monograph aims to help scholars re-hear these neglected features. The many endless proposals regarding the macrostructure of Revelation frequently overlook the way in which material was arranged for oral performance, and this book serves as a corrective.

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9798385261789

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Reviews

""I highly recommend Performing the Apocalypse. Autry makes a unique contribution to scholarly study by demonstrating how the auditory, linguistic, and grammatical features emerge throughout Revelation, drawing the audience into the dramatic character of the Apocalypse. His clear prose, apt summary and conclusion sections, and tables and charts make the dissertation accessible to scholars, students, and pastors."" --Todd R. Chipman, Dean of Graduate Studies, Spurgeon College ""This work constitutes an innovative, carefully argued, and much-needed contribution to the study of Revelation and to the broader field of biblical studies. It promises to be a valuable scholarly resource as well as a methodological model for biblical interpreters."" --John Lee, Professor of New Testament, Midwestern Baptist Theological Seminary ""Thanks to this careful study, readers and commentators of the book of Revelation can no longer overlook its origins as a work composed for performance. Using an eclectic toolbox of methods, Autry has paved the way for others to apply those tools and discover the oral foundation of biblical books that were composed to be heard out loud, not silently read."" --Jeanette Mathews, author of Performing Habakkuk ""There is a growing awareness that the earliest audiences of the Bible experienced it as communication events, not simply words on a page. The tone, volume, pacing, and fluency of a speaker made a difference in how people understood what was read aloud. In the trajectory of this insight, Garland Autry brings together research from sound mapping, discourse analysis, and oral-tradition studies to explore the book of Revelation as an oral-aural event. Students of Revelation will gain from thinking more deeply with Autry about how the text suggests it may have been performed."" --Peter S. Perry, Affiliate Assistant Professor in New Testament, Fuller Seminary, Arizona

Author Information

Garland Autry is a pastor and Bible teacher at Fellowship Fayetteville.

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