Structure and Plan of the Book of Revelation

Below is the sixth of multiple excerpts of commentary on the Book of Revelation from The Parousia, the late 19th-century masterpiece on the Second Coming by James Stuart Russell:

"STRUCTURE AND PLAN OF THE APOCALYPSE [BOOK OF REVELATION]:

"As commonly interpreted [it would seem that] nothing can be more loose and unconnected than the arrangement of the Apocalypse [Revelation]. ...In reality there is no literary composition more regular in its structure, more methodical in its arrangement, more artistic in its design. No Greek tragedy is composed with greater art or more strict attention to dramatic laws. ...[T]he whole arrangement [consisting of a sevenfold division] stands as follows:---

"Prologue, chap. i, 1-8 [Rev. 1:1-8]
"1. Vision of the Seven Churches...chap. i. ii. iii. [Rev. 1,2,3]
"2. Vision of the Seven Seals...chap. iv. v. vi. vii. [Rev. 4,5,6,7]
"3. Vision of the Seven Trumpets...chap. viii. ix. x. xi. [Rev. 8, 9,10,11]
"4. Vision of the Sun-clad Woman...chap. xii. xiii. xiv. [Rev. 12,13,14]
"5. Vision of the Seven Vials...chap. xv. xvi. [Rev. 15,16]
"6. Vision of the Great Harlot...chap. xvii. xviii. xix. xx. [Rev. 17,18,19,20]
"7. Vision of the Bride...chap. xxi. xxii. 1-5 [Rev. 21,22:1-5]
"Epilogue, chap. xxii. 8-21 [Rev. 22:8-21]

"Such is the natural self-arrangement of the book, so far as its great leading divisions are concerned; there are also several subordinate divisions, or episodes as they may be called, which fall under one or other of the great divisions.  We shall find that in the different visions there is a common structural resemblance, and that, more particularly, each division concludes with a finale, or catastrophe, representing an act of judgment or a scene of victory and triumph.

"But the most remarkable feature in the Apocalypse, so far as its structure is concerned, remains to be noticed. It is that the several visions may be described as only varied representations of the same facts or events.... [I]t will be found that they are all different aspects of the same great event. If we may venture to use such an illustration we should say that the visions are not telescopic, looking at the distant; but kaleidoscopic,---every turn of the instrument producing a new combination of images, exquisitely beautiful and gorgeous, while the elements which compose the picture remain substantially the same. As Pharaoh’s dream was one, though seen under two different forms [Genesis 41:32], so the visions of the Apocalypse are one, though presented in seven different aspects. The reason of the repetition is probably in both cases the same. ‘For that the dream was doubled unto Pharaoh twice, it is because the thing is established by God, and God will shortly bring it to pass’(Gen. xli. [41:]32). In like manner the events foreshadowed in the Apocalypse are declared by their sevenfold repetition to be sure and near."

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