Silencing the Witnesses

Moses and Elijah back from the dead?

The most popular interpretation of Revelation 11 today is literal – that Moses and Elijah are soon to reappear in the streets of Jerusalem as witnesses, to preach for three and a half years, then be killed by a metaphorical beast (a man called the Antichrist) before being resurrected again after three and a half days.

The most common academic view today, however, is that these are all metaphorical images, referring to the church being persecuted initially by the Romans, today by the whole world, but ultimately vindicated.

In this book, Graeme Carlé takes the metaphorical approach but from a Jewish perspective. The Early Church was, after all, led by Jewish disciples and/or Gentiles taught by Jewish disciples. He shows how the two witnesses would have been understood by John’s 1st Century audience to be the Law and the Prophets, making essential connections with Jesus’ parable of the rich man and Lazarus, and with Paul’s two Jerusalems in Galatians 4.

In doing so, Graeme surveys the effects of the Law over 4,000 years of Jewish history, how it still applies to every Jew not under the New Covenant, and how it is relevant for all of us today.