Recent Reads

The Last Disciple, by Hank Hanegraaff and Sigmund Brouwer

Radio's Bible Answer Man responds to the "Left Behind" phenomenon by writing (or co-writing) a fictional treatment of the Book of Revelations which adheres to a more historically-oriented interpretation than LaHaye and Jenkins. The Beast of John's prophetic vision is identified as the depraved Emperor Nero, and the Tribulation as Rome's persecution of Christians under his deranged rule.

There's plenty of dissension among Biblical scholars about the proper interpretation of Revelations, but the version put forth by Hanegraaff strikes me as far more plausible than LaHaye's and Jenkins' projections of John's visions into the present day and the future. Hanegraaff acknowledges the difficulty of interpreting mystical visions both in an explanatory epilogue and through a character in the story, a former Jewish rabbi, who notes while analyzing John's cryptic writings that a skillful user of symbols can make them encompass multiple meanings, and use them to conceal as well as reveal meaning. Hanegraaff's epilogue states that his purpose is not to "call into question the orthodoxy of the Left Behind authors", but this doesn't keep him from quoting a passage from one of their books, in which LaHaye's and Jenkins' version of AntiChrist performs a miracle by raising himself from the dead, and arguing that this literal, rather than symbolic, interpretation of certain passages in Revelations violates several basic Christian principles:

In a Christian worldview, only God has the power to raise the dead. If AntiChrist could 'raise [himself] from the dead' and control 'the earth and sky', Christianity would lose the basis for believing that Christ's resurrection vindicates His claim to deity. Further, if Satan possesses the creative power of God, this would subvert the post-resurrection appearances of Christ in that Satan could have masqueraded as the resurrecting Christ. Moreover, the notion that Satan can perform acts that are indistinguishable from genuine miracles suggests a dualistic worldview in which God and Satan are equal powers competing for dominance...." (p. 394)

Unfortunately, the plot of the story in which these ideas are presented is both predictable and plodding, the prose is unspectacular, and few of the characters are more than stereotypes. Still, the book is a useful corrective for wild theorizing of the Left-Behind variety, and it's moderately entertaining as historical fiction set in the turbulent decline of the Roman Empire and the surreptitious growth of the early Christian church.