Revelation of John about Antichrist

Apocalypsis Ioannis de Antichristo

Standard abbreviation: Rev. John Ant.

Other titles: none

Clavis numbers: ECCA 656

Category: Apocalypses

Compiled by Charles D. Wright, University of Illinois

Citing this resource (using Chicago Manual of Style): Wright, Charles D. “Revelation of John about Antichrist.” e-Clavis: Christian Apocrypha. Accessed DAY MONTH YEAR. https://www.nasscal.com/e-clavis-christian-apocrypha/revelation-of-john-about-antichrist/.

Created April 2019. Current as of January 2024.

1. SUMMARY

Rev. John Ant. begins with John asking Christ to tell him about the end of the world. Christ replies (1) with a pastiche of biblical signs that will herald the reign of Antichrist. John then asks “in whose likeness” Antichrist will appear, “so that those who see him will not believe in him.” The remainder of the text consists of Christ’s answer to this question (Christ is not specified again as the speaker, but no other speaker is introduced). Christ first states (2) that the Antichrist will be born to a harlot from the tribe of Dan. In the Longer Version, this is followed by an elaborate and grotesque physiognomy of the Antichrist. The physiognomy is lacking in the Shorter Version, but does occur in the Old Irish versions and is probably original (and seems to be presupposed by John’s prompt about the Antichrist’s similitudo). Christ then alludes to the Antichrist’s upbringing in Chorazin and brief residence in Bethsaida. In the following sections (3–5) Christ describes the career of Antichrist. First (3) he describes the Antichrist’s persecutions of the elect, his branding of his followers, and his miracles (including the rare one of turning trees upside down and making their roots flower). Christ then (4) describes the tribulations of the time leading to the Antichrist’s birth, including an alleged scriptural prophecy that seems to echo Exod 12:30. The other signs include both biblical and non-biblical portents, mainly involving social evils (one of which, women displaying their menstrual cloths, appears to have developed from a textual corruption of 4 Ezra 5:8) but also natural and supernatural catastrophes (earthquakes, falling stars, and waters turning to blood). Christ then (5) passes abruptly to the appearance of Enoch and Elijah, who fight against Antichrist and are slain by him, but after three days they are resurrected and ascend into heaven. Then God dispatches the archangel Michael, who cuts the Antichrist in two with the sword of the Holy Spirit, after which the world is renewed for three years and six months “until the consummation of the world.” The Shorter Version (and three of the Irish vernacular versions) end here. The Longer Version (and one Irish vernacular version) continues with brief descriptions of (6) a silence in heaven and earth that lasts forty days and nights, and (7) the resurrection of the dead. Angels at the four corners of the world cry “Arise!” three times, and all those who have died from the time of Adam then rise, whether their bodies had been burned, eaten by animals, or drowned at sea.

Named historical figures and characters: Adam (patriarch), Antichrist, Dan (patriarch), devil, Enoch (patriarch), Elijah (prophet), Holy Spirit, Jesus Christ, John (son of Zebedee), Michael (angel).

Geographical locations: Bethsaida, Chorazin, Israel, Paradise.

2. RESOURCES

3. BIBLIOGRAPHY

3.1 Manuscripts and Editions

3.1.1 Latin

Longer Version:

L London, British Library, Add. 33969, fol. 89^v (early 14th cent.; Lincoln) ~ contains only 1:1-4, 2:1–7; 3:1, 3; 2:8

R London, British Library, Royal 17.B.xvii, fol. 97^r–98^v (late 14th cent.; Northern England)

A London, British Library, Add. 37787, fol. 23^r–24^v (late 14th or early 15th cent.; Bordesley, Worcestershire)

D Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, 23 N 15 (490), pp. 53–58 ~ fragmentary Latin quotations in Irish Text 2, written in 1740 with additions in 1810

Horstmann, Carl. Yorkshire Writers: Richard Rolle of Hampole and His Followers. 2 vols. London: S. Sonnenschein, 1895–1896 (editio princeps of the Longer Version based on R, vol. 2:63–64).

Shorter Version:

C Oxford, Bodleian Library, Laud Misc. 582 (13th cent.) ~ the autograph of the Chronica of Roger of Howden (Hoveden) which includes the text under the year 1190–1191 as the last of three “views” (opiniones) about Antichrist

Roger of Howden (Hoveden). Chronica Magistri Rogeri de Houedene. Edited by William Stubbs. Rolls Series 51. 4 vols. London: Longmans, Green, Reader & Dyer, 1868–1871 (editio princeps of the Shorter Version from C, vol. 3:85–86).

Wright, Charles D. “A Revelation of John about Antichrist.” Pages 439–531 in Apocrypha Hiberniae. Vol. 2: Apocalyptica II. Edited by Martin McNamara. CCSA 21. Turnhout: Brepols, 2019 (facing text and English translation, pp. 471–79).

3.1.2 Irish

Ir1 Irish Text 1

Ir2 Irish Text 2

Ir3 Irish Text 3

GA Geinimhuin Anntichrist in the Irish Life of John

Breatnach, Caoimhín. “Three Irish texts of a Revelation of John about Antichrist.” Pages 531–85 in Apocrypha Hiberniae. Vol. 2: Apocalyptica II. Edited by Martin McNamara. CCSA 21. Turnhout: Brepols, 2019 (edition and translation of Ir1–3).

Breatnach, Caoimhín apud Martin McNamara. “The Irish Legends of Antichrist: Introduction.” Pages 423–37 in Apocrypha Hiberniae. Vol. 2: Apocalyptica II. Edited by Martin McNamara. CCSA 21. Turnhout: Brepols, 2019 (text and translation of GA, pp. 427–30).

3.2 Modern Translations

3.2.1 English

Wright, Charles D. “The (Latin) Revelation of John about Antichrist.” Pages 483–91 in vol. 1 of New Testament Apocrypha: More Noncanonical Scriptures. Edited by Tony Burke and Brent Landau. Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 2016.

3.3 General Works

Bischoff, Bernhard. “Vom Ende der Welt und vom Antichrist (I); Fragment einer Jenseitsvision (II) (Zehntes Jahrhundert).” Pages 80–84 in Anecdota novissima: Texte des vierten bis sechzehnten Jahrhunderts. Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1984.

Bousset, Wilhelm. The Antichrist Legend: A Chapter in Christian and Jewish Folklore. Translated by A. H. Keane. London: Hutchinson & Co., 1896.

Emmerson, Richard K. Antichrist in the Middle Ages: A Study of Medieval Apocalypticism, Art, and Literature. Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1981.

Delgado, Mariano, and Volker Leppin, eds. Der Antichrist. Historische und systematische Zugänge. Studie zur christlichen Religions- und Kulturgeschichte 14. Stuttgart: Academic Press Fribourg / W. Kolhammer Verlag, 2011.

James, M. R. “Man of Sin and Antichrist.” Page 228 in vol. 3 of A Dictionary of the Bible. Edited by James Hastings. 5 vols. New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1898–1904.

Jenks, Gregory C. The Origins and Early Development of the Antichrist Myth. BZNW 59. Berlin: de Gruyter, 1991.

Kaestli, Jean-Daniel. “La figure de l’Antichrist dans ‘l’Apocalypse de saint Jean le Théologien (Première apocalypse apocryphe de Jean).’” Pages 277–90 in Les forces du Bien et du Mal dans les premiers siècles de l’Église. Actes du Colloque de Tours, septembre 2008. Edited by Yves-Marie Blanchard, Bernard Pouderon, and Madeleine Scopello, Théologie historique 118. Paris: Beauchesne, 2010.

Kaestli, Jean-Daniel. “Un nuovo apocrifo da aggiungere al dossier dell’Anticristo: la Revelatio Iohannis recentemente scoperta in un manoscritto latino di Praga.” Pages 47–69 in L’ultimo nemico di Dio: Il ruolo dell’Anticristo nel cristianesimo antico e tardoantico. Edited by Alberto D’Anna and Emanuela Valeriani. Bologna: Edizioni Dehoniane, 2013.

McGinn, Bernard. “Portraying Antichrist in the Middle Ages.” Pages 1–48 in The Use and Abuse of Eschatology in the Middle Ages. Edited by Werner Verbeke, D. Verhelst, and A. Welkenhuysen. Leuven: Leuven University Press, 1988.

McNamara, Martin, “The Irish Legend of Antichrist.” Pages 201–20 in Jerusalem, Alexandria, Rome: Studies in Ancient Cultural Interaction in Honour of A. Hilhorst. Edited by F. García Martinez and Gerard P. Luttikhuizen. Leiden: Brill, 2003.

Norelli, Enrico. “Appendice: [fol. 26v] Apocalisse del beato Giovanni apostolo ed evangelista. Traduzione e commento.” Pages 71–83 in L’ultimo nemico di Dio: Il ruolo dell’Anticristo nel cristianesimo antico e tardoantico. Edited by Alberto D’Anna and Emanuela Valeriani. Bologna: Edizioni Dehoniane, 2013.