The Theme of the Book of Revelation (Revelation 1:7)

Below is the eighth 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:

"THE THEME OF THE APOCALYPSE [BOOK OF REVELATION]:

"We have already endeavoured to show that the Apocalypse [Revelation] is essentially one with the prophecy on the Mount of Olives [as recorded in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21] that is to say, the subject of both is the same great catastrophe, viz. [that is] the Parousia [Second Coming], and the events accompanying it [including the destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, which occurred in A.D. 70]. The Apocalypse announces its great theme in the opening sentence of the book, after the preface or prologue. That opening sentence is the seventh verse of the first chapter:--- ‘Behold, he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and [even] they also which pierced him; and all the tribes of the land ["tribes of the land" in Greek: hai phulai tes ges] shall wail because of him. Even so, Amen.’

"This is the thesis of the whole discourse; ...the key to the whole revelation.

"It will be seen that these words are the echo of our Lord’s prediction [made circa A.D. 30] in Matt. xxiv. [24:]30 [Matt. 24:30]:--- ‘Then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the land ["the land" in Greek: tes ges] mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.’ 

"There is no possibility of mistaking the reference in these words; there is no ambiguity or uncertainty as to whose coming or what coming is intended. The time and the manner of the coming are plainly indicated: it is near: ‘Behold, he is coming.’ It is in glory: ‘He is coming with clouds.’ The two predictions are in fact identical. The time of its fulfilment was now drawing nigh, for the standpoint of the Seer [John] was in ‘the [great judgment] day of the Lord' [Rev. 1:10]. That which our Saviour declared to be within the limits of the generation then existing [in the 1st century] was now, at the close of some thirty or forty years, on the very eve of accomplishment. The knell of doom was just about to sound: ‘Behold, he is coming.’ 

"Not less clearly indicated is the scene of the coming catastrophe. It is the land of [1st-century] Israel. This is plain from the express statement of both passages, in the Apocalypse and in the gospel: ‘All the tribes of the land’ [Greek: pasai hai phulai tes ges]. The loose way in which this phrase is sometimes taken as referring to all the nations of the globe cannot be sufficiently reprobated. The original source of the expression (Zech. xii. [12:]12) [Zech. 12:12] ‘the families of the land,’ shows that the land of Israel, and especially the city of Jerusalem are intended; and a similar limitation is required in the citations both in the gospel and in the Apocalypse. The allusion to the crucifixion strongly confirms this conclusion---‘they also who pierced him.’ The crucifiers of the Lord of glory are specially ‘particularised among the mass that see with dread the tokens of an approaching avenger.'" [Quote of Biblical scholar Moses Stuart]



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