spiritual judgement of bygone generations, a resurrection from
Hades to Heaven of the faithful of past ages, and an ingathering
of saints then on earth into the Father's House of many mansions
(Mt 24:31; Joh 14:3; 1Th 4:17; 2Th 2:1).

If this belief ever obtains general acceptance the
earlier date of the Apocalypse will also be regarded as fully
established. For it will then be seen that the book describes
beforehand events which took place in 70 A.D. and the years
immediately preceding, partly on earth and partly in the
spiritual world, and is mainly concerned with the downfall of the
earthly Jerusalem and the setting up of Christ's heavenly
Kingdom--the new Jerusalem. And its many mysterious symbols will
be seen to have been a cipher of which the first Christians held
the key, but which hid its meaning from their enemies.

Many scholars, however, regard the book as a document of
Nero's time carefully incorporated in one written about 90 A.D.:
"a Jewish Apocalypse in a Christian framework;" both perhaps
being by the same author.--EDITOR.