Of the questions that are still _sub judice_ one of the most difficult
is that of the relation of the Gospel to the Apocalypse. The Apocalypse
is a book on which criticism is very far from having said its last word.
I should like to express myself about it with great reserve. But I do
not think that in any case an argument can be drawn from it against the
Gospel. I will quote two very unprejudiced opinions. Harnack writes as
follows:—
‘I confess my adhesion to the critical heresy which carries back the
Apocalypse and the Gospel to a single author, always presupposing
that the Apocalypse is the Christian working-up of a Jewish
apocalypse (I should be prepared to say of several Jewish
apocalypses—to me this seems beyond our power to unravel). I mark
off the Christian portions very much as Vischer has done, and see in
them the same spirit and the same hand which has presented us with
the Gospel[81].‘
We remember that in Harnack’s view the author is not the Apostle but the
Presbyter.
And then Bousset, who has written the commentary on the Apocalypse in
Meyer’s series, though he does not go quite so far as Harnack, places
the two works in close relation to each other. After a careful
examination of the language of the Apocalypse he sums up thus:—
‘It is certainly right when this Johannean colouring of the language
is set down to the account of the last redactor of the Apocalypse
(Harnack, Spitta). But here too it may be seen that this redactor
has transformed the material before him more thoroughly than is
commonly supposed. The linguistic parallels adduced seem to justify
the supposition that the Apocalypse also proceeds from circles which
stood under the influence of John of Asia Minor[82].’
There are many to whom these opinions will seem paradoxical, but there
is much to be said for them. I quote them, however, only to show that
the two problems must be worked out independently, and that they need
not necessarily clash with one another.