 You're listening to the Naked Bible Podcast. To support this podcast, click the NakedBiblePodcast.com and click on the support link in the upper right-hand corner. If you're new to the podcast and Dr. Heizer's approach to the Bible, click on New Start Here at NakedBiblePodcast.com. Welcome to the Naked Bible Podcast, Episode 207, Revelation 4 and 5 with Dr. Alan Bandy on Delaymond Trey Strickland. He's a scholar, Dr. Michael Heizer. How you doing, sir? Very good. Very good. We're going to do some eschatology stuff today. Shocking. It's shocking. People may want to sit down. They're driving off the road right now, you know, like they just can't believe it. Well, Mike, it's only about the end of the world. It's kind of a big deal. It's kind of an important topic. A lot of people are interested, so it's only the end of the world, Mike. Okay. We've got to do something here sometime, so why not today? Mike, before we get started with the interview here, I just wanted to point out. That Dr. Bandy's Internet wasn't the greatest, so his sound quality suffered a little bit. So what might help our listeners get through the interview is to pretend that he's a robot. Sure. All right. Maybe that'll help him. He is not a robot, but hey, if it helps, go with it. Well, I'm really excited to have Dr. Alan Bandy with us. Alan's specialty is the book of Revelation. So I can no longer be accused of avoiding eschatology here on the podcast. I really wanted to have Alan on because it'll become evident as we go through, but just to tease before I ask him to introduce himself. What he does with Revelation 4 and 5 has a relationship to the Divine Council, which is again sort of the sweet spot for my own academic interest in a lot of the stuff that we end up talking about here on the podcast. So without further ado, Alan, could you introduce yourself to our podcast audience, just your background and where you went to school, your degrees, where you're teaching that sort of thing? Sure. So my name is Alan Bandy, and I was born and raised in the Washington, D.C. area in Maryland. I became a believer around the age of 17, delivered from kind of, I was a punk rocker, I had Mohawk and all that, and God kind of delivered me, called me into ministry. I went to a little Baptist Bible college in Kentucky called Clear Creek from my undergrad, and then from there went to another small seminary in Memphis, Tennessee called Mid-America, and then from there I did my PhD in New Testament at a Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary in North Carolina. And so I've been a pastor, and I've been on staff in church really since the early 90s, and currently teach at Oklahoma Baptist University, teach New Testament in Greek, and have continued to write on Revelation. I guess my interest there was peaked because of its, I think the challenge of it, you know? It's an unusual book, but I think it's a beautiful culmination of Scripture. And so, you know, I can spend the rest of my life studying it, and I don't think ever exhaust it or fully master it. So that's kind of where I am, and I have a wife and five kids here in Oklahoma with me, and we just live life and enjoy. That was great. Oh, that's great. Well, your dissertation, and you did it under Kirstenberger, right? That's correct, yes. Okay. Your dissertation was entitled The Prophetic Lawsuit in the Book of Revelation, colon, because you have to have a subtitle for dissertation. An analysis of the lawsuit motif in Revelation with reference to the use of the Old Testament. And that was in 2007. Now, you argue, and these are, I'm going to pull out some quotes here from little snippets of it. You argue that, quote, the Book of Revelation exhibits a lawsuit motif in which Christians and the world stand trial before God's court with Jesus as the presiding judge. You also argue that it's not just Revelation 4 and 5 that is affected by, again, what we're calling the covenant lawsuit motif. We're going to define that in a moment. Again, this God's throne room is God's courtroom as well. It's where his counsel is, and it's where decisions are made and decrees are handed out, so on and so forth. So this audience will be familiar with that, but in case we have someone new, that's kind of what we're angling for, the throne room of God as a lawsuit, as a scene of a trial, that kind of thing. You also argue that it's not just Revelation 4 and 5, but every section of the Book of Revelation is somehow impacted by this motif, this lawsuit or trial kind of setting. And for those of us, those in the audience, again, that are used to divine counsel I'm not going to read the whole quote, but I'll read just part of this so that you know that Alan is familiar with what we do. Again, my work is Old Testament where you basically run into the divine counsel in all sorts of places. He writes here on page 43 in his dissertation, he says, concerning the role of the counsel, he's quoting, I think you're quoting Davis's dissertation here, Davis observes, an examination of the activities of the members of the divine counsel reveals that they fulfill several different functions, including some specific roles. They surround the head of the council as attendants, I got First Kings 22, Daniel, Ezekiel 1, Daniel 7, they support the divine throne for the head of the council. They praise and adore the head of the council. They are warriors who fight battles for Yahweh. They participate in the council proceedings and give counsel, and they are to promote justice among the peoples, there's Psalm 82, and serve as guardians or watchers, Daniel 4. Now, anyone who's hearing that knows that, again, Alan is a scholar who takes this material seriously, we're not going to be running off into, these are just the Jewish elders that are somehow ruling from the skies, that sort of stuff. He pays serious attention to divine counsel, divine courtroom settings in the Old Testament for his own work in Revelation 4 and 5, and of that he says, two more short quotes, he says on page 45, the heavenly court scene of Revelation 4 and 5, depicting a divine counsel session provides the key element in the overall portrayal of divine judgment and covenant fulfillment, and then on the next page he adds, the council determines the worthiness of the Lamb to redeem his righteous followers who are in covenant relationship and corporate solidarity with him. With that as a backdrop, let's just start in Revelation 4 and 5 and start fundamentally with what is, can you explain to the audience, what is the prophetic lawsuit, the covenant lawsuit motif? Yeah, well it's interesting that the genesis of that concept for me started with a paper I wrote, a PhD seminar paper on a witness terminology in the book Revelation, and I came across a work by a scholar by the name of Allison Trites who argues that Mark Toreto and any, all the language of witness terminology always comes from the court of law court. And I noticed that within the book of Revelation, witness terminology occurs quite frequently, and yet it also seems to be, for example, with Antipas and Pergamum, he calls them my faithful witness who did not deny his name. So in the sense there's a legal proceeding for the believers, so that there's a sense in which they're being on trial and they're being faithful to Christ, and as a result they're being killed. And so initially I just saw it in a few places, but then as I began to study it, I began to see the theme of justice is really what's driving it, that God's judgment is not arbitrary, nor is it just purely a motive, that there's a basis in righteous standards of justice by which he renders his wrath upon earth. And so within that I kind of coupled it with a work by Andrew Lincoln on the Gospel of John called Truth on Trial, in which there's a large overarching theme that it's kind of a cosmic courtroom setting. So in the first three chapters of the Churches, it's Jesus examining the churches, and then from 4 to 20, really 4 to 19 and 20, you have this trial of the nations in which I believe the judgments are incremental, designed to provoke repentance, but also to expose guilt. So that ultimately when Babylon the Great, when humanity is judged and judgment is rendered, the charges leveled against it is idolatry. So they worshiped the false gods, not to the one true Creator God, and they killed his people, the saints, for the blood of the saints was found in her, that is Babylon. And so the lawsuit motif, as I see it, drawing from Old Testament prophets using covenantal lawsuit, language and imagery, is really designed to show that the judgment that's taking place is actually in a fair and just trial. And so that when he pours out his final wrath, he's right and just to do so. And so that's kind of how it all fits together. And so I see it from beginning to end, even if not every verse and chapter has something directly related to it. It's really interesting, you know, when you get, you know, you have the Revelation 2 toward the end, Revelation 3 toward the end, this whole idea of believers being those who overcome being put over the nations. You know, in my book Unseen Realm, and of course I'm certainly not alone, I'm just drawn on what other people do. The whole notion that believers are the reconstituted counsel, so going by your framework, which you just articulated there, you essentially have, you know, the witnesses being examined who are believers of the church early on, then it shifts to the nations. And when you get to the end, you have the individual believers who are put over the nations. They're the ones who emerge from the trial, so to speak, vindicated. And that makes real sense with Paul, when Paul talks about 1 Corinthians 6-3, don't you know that you're going to judge angels? They have the right, you know, the authority to essentially render judgment negatively on the ones they displace, again, the fallen, you know, the rebellious sons of God and all that, and that's because they've been tried. They have been tried and found wanting, you know, that's really interesting. Yeah, and speaking in that theme of vindication, because I think that's what the whole, the resurrection, whatever the thousand-year reign is, I think it is vindication, so that if backgrounds play into this, I think that it's showing how Christians in the Roman Empire were not guaranteed a fair trial. There's a miscarriage of justice, if you will, in which judges are sentencing them to death. And so one of the passages I gravitate to is kind of central is Revelation 6-9-11 with the beheaded souls before the altar, and they cry out how long until you avenge us, until you vindicate us, oh Lord. So they're told wait a little bit longer until the rest of your brothers and sisters are brought in. And so that then the visionary, the two witnesses and all the other, what I call interludes, the 144,000 and so forth, are all depicting the church and faithful witness to the nations. But what Revelation has is a kind of a reversal theme, right? So those who are judged by earthly judges will become the judges of those who judge them, you know, kind of having that ultimate reversal of putting everything to rights that was gone wrong in the world. Yes. How do you see, I mean, take us through Revelation 4 and 5, because this is the passage everybody's going to think of. You've got the 24 elders, you know, and again, if this is judicial context reaching back into the Old Testament, you've got the not only the two or three witnesses idea, but just the elders generally, you know, that kind of function. So what are the points of connection or the not points of connection back into the Old Testament? How do you take this and walk us through that scene in Revelation 4 and 5? Great question. Revelation 4 and 5, I mean, I spent just a lot of time there and continue to go back, right? Because I find it so foundational. So people divide Revelation up differently, but I divided it into four visions marked by the phrase in the Spirit, which only, of course, occurs four times, John like basically chapter 1, 8 and 9 when he's on Patmos, then in chapter 4, verses 1 and 2, he's in the Spirit, but he's taken to the throne room, and chapter 4 through 6 is then all one kind of visionary unit, which goes up to, I mean, not 6, but 16. And then in chapter 17, he's in the Spirit. One of the elder shows him the Great Harlot Babylon. And then in chapter 19, one of the elder shows him the New Jerusalem coming down as a bride. So there's, I see four visionary units. And then the longest and most central is 4 through 16. So when I see chapters 4 and 5, I connect them all the way through to the end of chapter 16 so that the vantage point of John is all coming from that heavenly throne room scene. So the series of sevens and everything else stemming from that. So what we have then is a courtroom, a kind of a heavenly throne room vision that extends through all of those judgments. So the introduction of the one seated on the throne in chapter 4, followed by the slain yet standing lamb in chapter 5, who's worthy to take the scroll. All of those scenes are absolutely significant. One for establishing the worthiness of God as Judge, but more importantly of Christ. So you have this divine counsel scene, right, with the throne, the big throne and then other thrones reminiscent of Daniel 7. And so I believe all of this is, and then what is it is, First Kings 19, 22 or 2219. 2219, yeah. 2219 with Micaiah the prophet who is the throne and the other thrones and God's saying basically how am I going to cause this to happen? And one says I'll do this and the other says I'll do that. I think that what you find in the prophets, both written prophets as well as verbal prophets or non-writ writing prophets, this common scene of evoking that when God's going to render judgment, he gathers his counsel together and that counsel then serves not so much as an advisory board, but those who are participants as representatives as heavenly beings of sorts who partake in the playing out of whatever follows. Yeah, and that's typically the way I talk about it too. God doesn't need a counsel, it's not like he needs help, but he likes to have his intelligent imagers participate with him in both carrying out decrees and also letting them participate in making some decisions that are in concert with that. I mean nobody's autonomous, it's not like in Daniel 4 where the watcher says to Nebuchadnezzar, this is by decree of the watchers. Well, let's follow the few verses later by saying this is by decree of the most high. Nobody's going rogue here and deciding well, we'll tell God later then he'll rubber stamp it for us. You don't have any sense of that. It's just a like participation that just seems to be a good word. You know, when God does something, it's in the passage, it was given to them to do this, it was given and you almost see not so much a removal of God, but it's like God decrees and then these beings or these other angels or these other messengers then carry out what he decrees. Now go get it done. Yeah, exactly. And so like, you know, of particular interest are the 24 thrones. So you find say in the Old Testament passages, Daniel, Kings, and you know, those are the two primary ones I would go to, but there's throne. So there's the throne of God and then there's other thrones. But in Revelation is the only place where you find a specified number, you know, 24. And then when when compared with other apocalypses, Jewish apocalypses in particular, you don't, you know, that the 24 elders is unique to the book of Revelation. It's not found anywhere else. So there's been a lot of like being spilled on who are these 24 elders? What are they? Because they're the only beings allowed to be seated on thrones in the presence of God, you know, and they're usually on their face. So they're not even seated half the time, but they're way they're dressed. They're wearing white. They have crowns on their heads. So this speaks of something that's exalted yet at the same time. Revelation is not shy about using angels when it's denoting an angel. So, you know, there's questions of whether or not, you know, different scholars will argue that their angels or their saints, the 12 patriarchs and the 12 apostles or their astral zodiac star gods, there's a number of theories out there. But I tend to lean toward a view that doesn't necessarily try to put a name on them. So in other words, I think they're angelic, heavenly beings of some sort. But the term elder connects it then to those who are leaders in Israel, you know, the elders at the gate, the 70 elders, and, you know, there's arguments of whether or not they composed a lesser Sanhedrin of 24, or they correspond to the 24 courses of priests and first chronicles, second chronicles. Did you come across any, how do I want to put this? Was there any helpful trajectory extending from Isaiah 24, you know, specifically in verse 23, when you have, you know, Yahweh, you know, the Lord of hosts reigns on Mount Zion in Jerusalem. His glory will be, quote, before his elders. And you've got sun and moon terminology there. You know, it's not the same thing that you get in Psalm 89, you know, Ramulan would argue that we've got a, that the witness in the clouds there is a member of the council and so on and so forth. But I'm just wondering, did you find any kind of helpful use of that maybe in Second Temple stuff? That's something I'm going to have to go back and revisit because I don't recall, you know, immediately whether or not, you know, I made that connection with Isaiah, that would be incredibly helpful, especially with the sun and the moon imagery, that's brought in. Yeah, because you don't, it doesn't sound like any kind of quotation or, and I don't even know if it's an illusion. Yeah, that's exactly right. Most of the scholarship will focus on things that they can determine as a clear illusion or some sort of possible illusion, based on like, similarities. You know, but what's interesting about that is the, within apocalyptic writings. So I kind of took the track from Dead Sea Scrolls and others that saw them as some sort of kind of Sanhedrin, which was really kind of the modern equivalent of the, the elders of Israel, the 70. So you had your lesser Sanhedrin, which is kind of like a legal body, but within the Jewish apocalyptic literature, and even within rabbinic writings, there's this dualism. So one, I think it's in, in the Talmud, it said that nobody serves on the Sanhedrin below, unless he serves on the Sanhedrin above. And so the language of below and above is used a lot so that what is happening, say, in the temple and in the priesthood and leadership is then mirrored. And it's a mirror of what's happening in heaven. That there's kind of this, this parallel there, so that as it is below, so it is above. So that what you have of these 24 elders, whatever they are, I believe that they represent the saints. They're kind of like a representative body, like a Sanhedrin with legal commentations. It's, it's really, I mean, you, you mentioned the, the as in heaven so below. I mean, obviously in Revelation 4, you've got, again, you've, you've got the, the constellation imagery drawn from Ezekiel 1, which takes you into the Markova, you know, arena, which, which can get real crazy pretty quickly. And then you, but, but that, that's, that's significant because at Qumran, you know, they, you have the whole priesthood separates, you know, from the Jerusalem priesthood because, well, you know, we want to use the mathematical calendar, not that crazy calendar. You have to adjust every now and then, and then they're off, you know, doing their thing in the wilderness, you know, to their priests without a temple, but they're going through all the motions, but that those are priests. And my point is that all of that mimicking tends to get tied to priest language as opposed to elder language. And so you have to wonder is, is Revelation merging that? Because, you know, Revelation emerges a lot of stuff. It is, yeah. Is this a merger or should we, should we not assume it's merging? Should we make, you know, should we like just talk about elders and not talk about the priestly stuff? It, you know, it's, that's, that's difficult. Well, you definitely get that merging, mixing, slicing and dicing and reconstructing in Revelation where, I mean, there's never really an exact parallel. I mean, even the visions from Zachariah of the olive tree and the lampstand is changed. So it's not exactly one to one correspondence. So it is possible because you do have priestly imagery ascribed to the elders in Revelation because they're functioning in a mediator, a mediatory fashion. They're also guiding John through the vision. They're interceding. So there's a lot of interesting things that are leading in the worship and heaven. They wear the white garments, yeah. They wear the white garments. They're also connected with the saints though. So for example, in Revelation 17, or 18, when the, you know, 17, I'm sorry, 19, when the saints are given white garments, you know, which is their right to see. And believers are pictured wearing white and having crowns. And so the language of the elders seems to also reflect the language of God's people into their redeemed glorified state, which would suggest that, and this is why I call them representatives. So then the four living creatures, who I think are also council representatives, I think they represent the created order. So you have four, which is often used for the earth, north, south, east and west. But then you have, you know, the ox and the eagle and the man and the lion, which really kind of represent classes of created animals, right? Flying animals like the eagles, domesticated animals like the ox, wild animals like the lion. And then obviously humans as the, you know, kind of crowning achievement of being made the name of God. So what I would argue is that the four living creatures, whatever they are, are representatives of the created order. So I kind of take a read on the four living creatures and the 24 elders as both, as the divine council representing before the throne, all of creation and God's people specifically through the 24 hours. How do you think, tell us what you do with that as you move into the, you've got the repetitive cycles. Well, maybe I shouldn't, I shouldn't predispose the discussion by using recapitulation language. You've got the sequence of sevens. Okay, let's put it that way. We'll predispose the other way. You got this seven stuff going on in the revelation six through 16, you know, the bowls and the trumpets and whatnot. So how does, how does revelation four and five, you know, viewed as this trial scene or this court scene, how does it affect how we look at those things? Right. So I mean, I think, I think chapter five becomes significant because whatever that seven seal scroll is, and it's interesting, based out of a cache of scrolls found in a trash pile in Egypt, they found a scroll with seven seals on it. And, and, and as they broke the seals and unrolled it, they unrolled it seven times it was blank. And on the seventh roll, there was script. And it ended up being a legal document. It ended up being a, I think a last will and testament of sorts. It was interesting. It is interesting. So there's a lot of speculation. What is this seven seal scroll? Well, you know, I mean, my short answer is it's the scroll of God's judgment. Some see this as kind of the Jesus taking the inheritance, the rights as king. It's an enthronement scene, whatever it is, it's an enthronement scene in which the lamb is stepping forth and then given the right. And I think it does parallel Daniel's vision at night, where the, the Son of Man approaches the ancient days and is given dominion over the nations. So I think he's stepping up as judge. And then with the, the seals, you know, you have the seals being broken in kind of a consecutive manner, but it's broken down into a pattern, four and three. So there's the four horsemen, and then there's three additional seals. And the last one culminates with these shakings of heavens, these signs and wonders, if you will, the rocks and, you know, please follow on us, the wrath of the lamb has come. It's kind of a proleptic of the final judgment. But you would expect that with the breaking of the seals of the scroll, you would expect the contents of the scroll to be revealed. But instead of the contents of the scroll being revealed, you have seven angels with seven trumpets making announcements, sounding for their trumpets. So that I think that the trumpets kind of recapitulate because you're dealing with the same breakdown of four and three, four things affecting creation. So the four horsemen kind of ravaging the earth. And then in the trumpets, you have the wildlife, I mean, the plants and the seas being damaged, but to a greater extent. And then the seven trumpets sounds. And once again, you would expect something, there's culmination, there's celebration, there's worship in heaven. The nations of this world have become the nations of our Lord and He will reign forever and ever. So this kind of expectation of the final judgment being realized. But then you get the bowls. So what you get in between, the bowls of chapter 16 that are filled with the wine of God's wrath, which is the actual judgment being poured out, you have this interlude of 10 and 11 of the angel, this giant angel that has the same kind of description as Christ, we get the same from Christ. And then his hand is a little tiny scroll. And it's tiny because his hand is so big, right? He's he's straddling earth and sea. And John eats the scroll. And he's told, you must prophesy again, against many nations and kings and peoples and so forth. And so then that scroll that John eats is the same scroll that the lamb had broken the seals on. So do you mean some of those things really sound, you know, I hate to put it this way, but they sound fairly obviously like like they call for recapitulation. I mean, you use the word recapitulation, but I mean, it just seems that, like you said, you know, this, this series of things happens to set up this expectation, and it just sort of repeats again, then it happens, you know, so what, how, you know, I don't, I don't spend a whole lot of time in revelation. But this has me wondering, how do people not just see that? I mean, if they want to see the the sevens as a linear chronology, how do you, how do you get around that? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I struggle. I have, and, and, and of all people, I think Robert Thomas's commentary, he argues for kind of a telescopic recapitulation. And I think that that's probably closest to the way I see it unfolding. So I do see the repetition, both in terms of the focus, as well as even the wording, yet you have an intensification. But I also think there's something different taking place. So I argue that they're not so much a straight, like, you know, just the same thing, different perspective. I think there's a little bit of a progression there. So it's more like, instead of just circling overhead, it's kind of moving a little bit forward. And so I would argue that each of the last elements contains the final. So for example, the seventh seal introduces the seven trumpets. The seventh trumpet introduces the seven bowls. And that with the seven bowls, the wrath of God is complete. So I don't see it in a straight, kind of a linear chronological reading. I do see recapitulation, but I see progression in that as well. So it seems to be moving forward. But yet the final element, the blowing of the trumpet, kind of launches the wrath of God being realized. So, you know, people try to put this on a timeline, right? They try to bring in a half years. It's like this, you know, I don't, try to see it in a timeline. I don't think that the amount of years is even a focus. I noticed in your dissertation, you didn't have Clarence Larkin-esque. Maybe you took those out when they bound it. I have presented a lot of papers at different academic conferences where I kind of take much more of kind of a strong critique of those readings. Because I don't see revelation from beginning to end, even in a straight, kind of chronological fashion. I see it more like a tapestry. And you see the big picture, but then all the parts are interrelated. You can be looking at one thing and the linear approach makes sense there. And then you look at something else. Oh, I can see repetition here. You know, I don't know why it has to be one or the other. Well, part of it is they're trying to, you know, people try to fit it into a nice scene where they have it all mapped out and figure out exactly what's going to happen at what point. And I don't think revelation really allows for that. I even think the enumeration of the sevens is the seven kind of corresponding to the seven days of creation and perfection are also, you know, designed to kind of show that there's a process that's taking place. And then I argue that there are investigative judgments, because they all culminate in chapter six with the breaking of the seventh seal. There's no repentance. There's the wrath of the usage on the throne and the lamb has come who can stand and they're hiding and calling for the rocks to crush them, rather than turning to them, right? They're trying to escape it. Then with the sevens trumpet, you find a similar thing. They did not repent from their evil works. And then when it comes to the bowls, the same thing. They curse God, they nod their tongues and curse God, and they refuse to repent and let go of their practices. So in a way, these judgments, I think they're designed to, in an incremental fashion, unleash the judgment of God to provoke repentance. And their lack of repentance is the final evidence that when he judges them, they deserve it, because he's going to do the term. I was just going to ask you how the witness and the lawsuit motif works in that, but you kind of just answered that. Yeah. That that becomes sort of the testimony brought against them. But I think for the sake of the audience, this is going to be new thinking, because while on the one hand, somebody can be listening to this and, oh yeah, I've read Revelation a few times and I can pick up what he's saying and I remember the terms and whatnot, but to actually frame this as, again, intentionally, laying out evidence, okay, let's use it, let's say it that way, laying out evidence while the court watches and the judge watches, just that whole approach. It's really useful to kind of frame what it is that's going on. And if you think of it as a court scene, not every court case operates the same way. I mean, not all of it is a straight linear chronology in terms of the presentation of evidence. Sometimes you need to do that. Other times it's, well, we have this point of data and to make the case even harder, here's this again and let's up the ante here. You give evidence, evidential points of the same kind to drive home the same point and just make the case like airtight. You can have that going on too. And you've seen this in the Old Testament, God's bringing judgments against and you'd also see the same pattern. If you read like Isaiah, this really struck me when I worked through it in Jeremiah even, you have oracles against Israel or Judah for their sin. They turn after other gods. They've done wicked and God's like repent, otherwise I'm going to judge you and those are often framed within a law court kind of the covenant lawsuit. But then after you find these passages where he's like speaking against his people, he then turns and says, now Babylon, I'm going to judge because of what they've done to you in Egypt. I'm going to do this to them. And he kind of goes in a catalog of the nations of Israel and basically saying, because they hurt my people and their idols and they work with their idols, I'm going to judge them. And then in Isaiah in particular, you have the oracles against Israel and Judah, the oracles against the nations. And then you have that last section of like Isaiah 55 through 66 of here's the new heaven. So I argue that there's a pattern oracles against God's people covenant lawsuit oracles against the nations, which are also framed in kind of legal justice language. And then oracles of salvation, what God's deliverance and vindication will look like for his people. I'm glad you mentioned that because I was going to pull out the word covenant from covenant lawsuit and ask you, well, what covenant are we talking about here? Because you've got Christians, you've got the nations. So I'm glad you just went through that quickly because there is a bit of a differentiation here. When it comes to the God's people element, let's just put it that way. Can you give us a quick way to think about the covenantal aspect there? In other words, you have the New Testament, you've got the New Covenant in Jesus' blood, which if you go back to Jeremiah 31, you get the covenant language. Is that what we're talking about? Is this loyalty to Jesus? That's what I'm hearing makes me think. What is it something else? Yeah, I've really struggled with this. And I've had other friends and scholars working on this as well, and we've discussed it. And there's not a universal agreement. I mean, there are some people see this in reference to Israel. And Israel, exclusively, has got covenant people, kind of the Sinatic Covenant. And even in the Plagues, Greg Beale does a good job with this in his commentary, where he talks about life with the seals and the things that are happening, invasion of the land and plague and things, going to covenant curses of Leviticus. I believe it's Leviticus 26. Okay, if you don't repent, I'm going to send wild beasts to attack you and the sword to coming get you, and your women are not going to bear children and all these other things, and you see the same type of language of covenant kind of consequences for being unfaithful. But I would argue that because he's clearly writing those who are believers in Jesus, the churches, I kind of, it's a little bit novel, it hasn't picked up. So I don't know if I'm just being idiosyncratic here, but I call them new covenant communities. In other words, that in Christ, the new covenant, they are now the people who belong to Jesus marked out by the Spirit, faith in Christ, his death and resurrection. So it's a different focus. It's not dealing with straight off things, dealing with Israel's covenant, but what it means to be the people of God in a pagan society? You might get actually some help there by the 666 because that's quote, bearing the name. They bear the mark. And you take that language and that goes right back into the Ten Commandments, taking its Nassau, bearing the name of the Lord in vain. You have the people of God there, but then you have the same Paul, make the comment about those who name the name of Christ apart from iniquity. It's representation, it's imagery. So we as believers are supposed to bear the name of Christ, which means we're supposed to image Christ, and Christ was the perfect imager of God. So it takes you right back to the covenant God anyway, the God of the Old Testament. So there's no need to split that hair. Is it Israel or is it Christ? No, it's the people who have chosen to align themselves with the true God who is incarnate in Christ. What's the six one-half dozen of another? In fact, you have two groups of marked people. So you have those that take the mark of the beast and they're clearly the objects of wrath. They're clearly the ones that are like opposed to, they're unfaithful and opposed to God. But then you also have, like Jesus promises to the church at Philadelphia, the ones who are faithful, who go to commerce. He will make them pillars in the New Jerusalem with the name of God written on the forehead. There you go. And then you also have the 144,000. However, one wants to interpret that, but it says a seal of God is on their forehead. So you seem to have these two groups of like kind of tattooed people, if you will, those who belong to Yahweh or Christ and those who belong to the beast and those who belong to the lamb and those who belong to the beast. And the beast is really just a grotesque parody of the lamb. So yeah, I think that's intentional, right, to show that. So I think the messages of the seven churches and are essentially lawsuit oracles. It's got people, hey, you're doing this great. Keep it up. Be faithful, overcome, and use your reward. But he also finds problems. Hey, you tolerate these people who do this. You left your first love. Repent. Otherwise, I'm going to come and deal with you, right? I'm going to remove your lampstand. I'm going to strike that prophetess dead. I'm going to do this. I'm going to, you're going to be found wanting when I show up. I'm standing outside the door knocking and you're not letting me enter your fellowship. So you have all kinds of, I think that's kind of the covenant lawsuit that you find in Hosea and Micah and other places in Old Testament where God's bringing charges against his people. It's just balanced, positive and negative there. Tell us a little bit about the trial, the sentencing, and the judgment of Babylon. You've got Revelation 17 on into chapter 21. How does this work with Babylon? Right. So Babylon's an interesting image, right? So kind of pulling out the narrative of Israel's history. Babylon being that empire that held God's people in exile. They were removed from the temple. They were oppressed. They were in exile. And you see the same imagery. John's in exile writing to his belief as brothers and sisters in Christ who are living under the oppression of the Roman Empire in very real ways. They're living in strangers and aliens in their hometowns as if they're in exile. But Babylon is personified as a prostitute who needs the entire nations and all the kings of the earth astray with her fornications. And the only weapon that's listed, well, it tells us, I think it's in chapter 18, that her cup is the blood of the saints in which she has made the nations drunk. And so it's a parody. It's a way of saying, this is, I would argue, Roman Empire, but more broadly, all the kings of civilization opposed to God. So I think maybe in John's day it would have been Rome, but the thing is that he's pulling in some Daniel's vision of the four of those kingdoms. You know, I'm talking about the statue. Yeah, Daniel. The different kingdom. He uses the language to describe the beast the very same way, drawing from Daniel's vision of the statue, except it's not one kingdom. It's all mixed together. You know, you can't identify it with Greece or with the historical Babylon or Rome. It's almost like that's intentional as a way of saying it's a combination of all of these kingdoms that have oppressed God's people. So I think she represents the power of the kingdom of this world in opposition, in league with the beast in the dragon. She sits atop the beast. She's riding it. And so she's leading the nations of stray, seducing them with wealth and riches and intoxicating them with her ways, which ultimately results in the slaughter of God's people. And if you go back to chapter nine, you have these souls that have been beheaded because they were faithful to the Lamb, and they cry out, how long, oh, Lord, holy and true, and could you avenge our blood? And I call them the star witnesses. They're the ones, the plaintiffs in the lawsuit case. They're the ones saying to a holy, just God, when is there going to be justice for what's happened to us? And his answer is, yeah, wait, there's going to be more. But when the full number comes in, then I will bring it. And so what you have is, for example, when the bulls are poured out, the third angel pours out his bowl on the freshwater, and they turn to blood. And an angel says, you are holy and just in this, because you have given them blood to drink because they had the blood of the saints and prophets were found in her. I'm not mixing some things there. But then a bulls from the altar comes and says, yes, holy and true. And it comes from under the altar in heaven. So the witnesses are going, yes, you're giving them blood to drink because our blood was shed. And then when Babylon is judged, it says, give her back a double portion of cup of what she has poured out, because she has killed my people. So the number one reason why God brings such a severe judgment is because the blood of his people has been spilled out. Now, just all of the people that have been slain from Abel all the way to whoever will be in the future, martyred for Christ, I don't know. But I think that God deals with the blood of his people and his image bearers with seriousness. And because they've shed that blood, he brings his judgment. And so the judgment of Babylon is seen, I think, as an expanded commentary on the wrath of God poured out in the bull judgments. Yeah, it wouldn't make a whole lot of sense going back to some earlier points about, okay, we're dealing here with the people of God as broadly speaking, not just Old Testament Israel, not just Gentiles. It's the people of God. So if that's going to be evident earlier in the book when it, and I think it certainly is, then when you get to this point, why would you isolate the language of judgment directed at the one targeting the people of God? Why would you isolate that to, that's only Rome, because we're talking about Christians now, or that's only Old Testament Babylon, because that's Old Testament stuff. I tend to agree with you that maybe for a slightly different reason, I mean, it's hard as an Old Testament person to see the term Babylon and not think of just general chaos. And the beast comes from the sea, just a traditional chaos imagery that transcends both testaments. I mean, this is very familiar stuff. At the end, there is no more sea, there's no more chaos. So you can't geographically funnel that. Everything that opposes God and his people is going to fall under that label of chaos. So I tend to look at it the way you're describing that it's comprehensive. It's not these isolated parts. The language is universalized. It's the whole earth. All of it is happening, not in one geographic location. It's not just one city that these things happen, one in Israel or Egypt. It has this universal language of everybody around the globe, even though it's set quite the same language. So yeah, I think that we're dealing with a final cumulative judgment in which God's delay of this is obviously going to be severe and final, but I think it's ultimately the saints crying out, how long? We've been faithful to you. We were righteous and we were killed. This is injustice. And so that question, how long, oh Lord, is really what they're asking and it's what's driving, I think, the message of Revelation. Kind of in a pastoral sense, Revelation is written to believers in Asia Minor who, whether or not there was a hard persecution against them and acted kind of empire-wide and debated, but they were still marginalized. They still didn't have rights. They still would have suffered economically and if they were, you know, if people were looking against them, they would have likely been killed and we have evidence that some of this was happening in that time period. So John's writing to these believers essentially saying, faithful to Christ, don't compromise. Don't collude with the beast by participating in the horribly things of whether it's guilt or they have patron DETs that they would worship for practicing their trays of, you know, whatever they were accomplishing. He said basically saying, let's be faithful to Christ because no matter what they do to you, be faithful because he will one day judge them for what they're doing to you. So be faithful to the point of death and he will make it right in the end. So it really is a message kind of prompting the people to not just be faithful to Christ, but to be prepared to die, to be put to death, to face all kinds of hostility. But in that, God is not totally passive and unmoved. He will redeem them. He will vindicate them and not just vindicate them, but put them on thrones with Christ to rule the nations. And of course, the final image of the new Jerusalem and the city and all things made new is all part of that. They get to experience life in the age to come where there's no more curse. There's no more death. They don't even need a temple because God's dwelling with them. There's don't need the light of the sun or the moon because his face lights up the creation. So there's, there really is just some beautiful imagery, not just nuptial imagery of a broad city, which contrasts the harlot city. But then you also have garden of eating imagery in chapter 22 of the rivers with the water of life and the tree of life producing fruit for the healing of the nations. So it ends with just this glorious scene of final reward. Here is the vindication. This is why you can be faithful now because this is the final, this is the end of your story. I want to, yeah, it is. I want to hit, I mean, you know, for, for, again, for this audience, we have, you know, I made the joke about not spending a whole lot of time in the revelation, but the last couple of chapters, I mean, it's, you know, from an Old Testament, Semitic's perspective, it's the cosmic garden. It's the cosmic mountains. It's what Eden should have been. You know, it's, you know, there's a reason everything comes full circle, you know, that's got, God gets what he wants in the end. And those who endure are the benefactors, you know, they are, they are participating benefactors, you know, and again, brought into the family, you know, as Eden, you know, was the picture of the blended family, the divine and human family, humans made fit to occupy sacred space, all that stuff. It just, it just converges, you know, at the end there. I have one, one more question for you though. How has all the time you've spent doing this, in other words, and for those, again, who are listening, what, understand, you know, how I'm framing this question, but when you spend a lot of time in the book of revelation, not just looking at the trees and, and not noticing the forest, I mean, what, what Alan is doing here is thinking about the forest, he's thinking about how, how the whole book is framed and how the, how the content is framed, in this case by, you know, the, the lawsuit motif, the trial motif, you know, whatever label you want to stick on it. So how has thinking about the framework and then how the framework affects, you know, the content, when you drill down and start looking at the trees and the forest, how has that influenced your eschatology, you know, just your perspective? Has it, has it led you to adopt one view or reject another or are you just, I mean, I view myself as sort of eschatological system agnostic, you know, I don't really like systems. I think the systems all look beautiful until you look at where they're not beautiful when you start noticing the problems. But, you know, how, how has it, how has it, you know, influenced the way you think just theologically, eschatologically? Well, it has, I mean, had a tremendous impact on me. And I think I've run the gamut of just about every view one could have. I had the Larkin charts, and I had, you know, all of those things. And you've, you've missed your opportunity now. You just think about this title, you know, the greatest book on dispensational truth, you know, like version two are updated. Yeah, yeah, you know, it's what you could do with that. There is, you know, I think there's, there's a couple of ways it's impacted me. I mean, Jimmy cared his little commentary in Revelation, he uses the phrase when it comes to looking at the Old Testament in certain passages, he says, be careful not to unweave the rainbow. It's put together the way it is, because it's, it's intended to communicate as a whole. So I kind of, I mean, if anything, I've become less certain of interpretations, where I try to find the finer details of like, how all these things are going to play out. So I have a couple of things that I often say. One, you know, when it comes to the prophecies of Jesus coming the first time, you know, his birth and Bethlehem and his life and death and resurrection, the Old Testament clearly pointed to all of that as Jesus himself would indicate, but they missed it. And it's not until after he comes and dies and rises again that they look back and go, Oh, look, it's clear as day. That's exactly how it's supposed to happen. And I kind of argue the same thing. We see bits and pieces of the way it's going to unfold, but we don't have a clear picture. And some people think they did. I would say it's intentionally fragmented for different reasons, you know, for a variety of reasons. But yeah, I would, I would, that's my answer. It's going to work the same the second time. I don't know what to call that. When we come back, we're all going to go, Oh, yeah, that makes perfect sense. That's the way it was going to, you know, it's hindsight, you know, it's 25, 2020 is kind of the way I view it. But the other side of that is this, eschatology is not a detached fortune cookie of this crystal ball of how things are all going to unfold in the future. Eschatology is not about the future. It's about the now in light of the future. And with the prophets, the prophets gave messages of even future hope and judgment as a means to prompt action in the present. So Revelation is the only book of the Bible that promises a blessing for reading it. But it says repeatedly, especially in the beginning chapter, first chapter and last chapter, blessed is the one who will base the words of this prophecy. So I was once speaking to a group of pastors, and I said, if revelation is nothing but a blueprint of the future events, like, you know, kind of see an end for the future. I said, if that's all it is, how do you obey that? Yeah. And they were kind of stumped. You know, what do you mean? Well, you obey it by witnessing for Jesus. But that's not what it's saying. There's messages of repent, of be faithful, of yield up your life, of, you know, a number of things it's telling them to do, repent of sin and let go of these things and avoid idolatry. And so I think that when I read Revelation, I used to see it as what's going to happen in the future. And now I see it as, how do I need to live now? How do I need to hear this message from my life now? So yes, there's a future expectation. There's a future hope. He will come back, literally and physically, I believe. And he will establish a new heaven, a new earth, and make it all right. But the focus is not on the details of timelines. The focus is on, because of that, this is how you then should act. This is how you live, so that, that you can be a participant in the final vindication. So for me, I see much more and also the emphasis on worship. There are seven distinct scenes of worship. Chapters four and five are the first. And so you have these scenes of worship, and I think that's something that's intended for the church. What they're doing in heaven currently is what we should be doing here now. So you see a lot more, not just in terms of unpacking future events, but this is what this means for me now. I can have confidence and encouragement now. I can, I can worship God now. I can endure against all opposition. Christianity is outlawed. If a gun is stuck to my head, if I'm in prison, because I can know that he will make it right. So for me, yes, I do have concrete ideas about how I think things will come out in the future. But I don't think that's the focus. I think it's a message to the church for every generation in whatever situations they find themselves in. So, you know, it's a bit agnostic in that sense. And I frustrate people because they can't nail me down. I'm not sure what I am. You should just enjoy that. So I'm definitely not dispensationalist. I'm probably the furthest thing from that. I get accused of being an all-millennialist, and I'm okay with that, but that's not exactly where I am either. So, you know, I take the title historical pre-mill just because it's ambiguous enough that it kind of captures ideas. But, you know, I think we have a tendency to try to package everything nice and neat so we can figure it all out and make a chart of it. And scripture doesn't always do that for us. And I'm okay living with the tension of trusting God that he will work it out in his way. I think that's a good way to end, you know, because, like you said, you know, at the end of the day, if you have this, you know, blessed is the one who obeys, you know, the words of this book, I mean, that should tell you that the purpose of the book is not so that you can divine everything, you know, in the book. The purpose of this is not so that you solve a puzzle. It's not about solving the puzzle. It's about, you know, like you said, you know, the here and now. So that's a good place to end, because I think that's a really good thought that is text-driven, you know, from the book itself. And I'm hoping, you know, for listeners that can really orient them when they think about this before. So when you approach the book, don't look at it as, you know, the goal here is to solve a puzzle. You know, the goal here is to live a certain way. And in light of the circumstances that I think it's fair to say, I mean, we don't have it as bad, but that doesn't mean we may not, you know, whatever the circumstances are, you know, put yourself right in there. So yeah, thanks for, thanks for spending the time with us and sharing your research and again, helping us think big picture, you know, when it comes to Revelation and also, you know, here at the end, just a really good note on the whole purpose of the thing. I think that's really useful. Well, thank you. I've enjoyed it. This has been invigorating. I forgot how much I love talking about Revelation. But yeah, it's been a blessing. You know, I find this book, people are scared, they're either scared of it or they're overconfident about it. And you know, I think some good humility for those that are overconfident, but for those who are afraid of it, they should really read it much the same way they read other letters of the New Testament for the encouragement and instruction they give and their faith. And yeah, it's been a joy. I appreciate the opportunity to talk about these things and your interest in the Divine Council. And it's always nice to know that there's other people that see them. We're out here lurking, you know. Yeah, I shouldn't put it too much that way because, you know, people want content. And fortunately, you know, Unseen Realm has, people are finding it as a good, this is how I put it in the intro. I mean, if you read the book and you really grasp the content, this isn't like the end point. This is the beginning point because the goal is to sort of give you the lay of the land where I want you to then go back and read Scripture and not be able to unsee things. You know, just sort of it's an orienting thing. And that's the thing that this audience really gravitates toward it, you know, learning things that will orient them when they drop in, you know, at any given book and they start, you know, reading or studying, that they'll be able to see the threads. You know, I've seen that thread before. You know, let's go chase that down and then tie it up somewhere and that sort of thing. So to try to just think on those terms. So I really like a big picture kind of thinking and anything that tethers the Testaments together to me is worth spending time on. Yeah, absolutely. Well, thanks again. Please, you know, consider your, you have my permission to continue to frustrate people. It's a badge of honor. Yeah, I do enjoy, I do enjoy kind of frustrating people that way. And they're constantly trying to figure out what it is that I believe in. And I mean, I'm clear with what I believe, but they can't label it. But I enjoy that. It's good for them. It really is. That's right. Well, thank you, my friend. I really do appreciate it. It's been a, it's been a joy and an honor to be a part of this conversation. All right. Thanks a lot. All right. Thank you. Well, Mike, we made it. We survived. I did. I did. We live again to put it off another year. Well, hopefully I can get you to talk about it a little bit more than once a year. But what was, what was Dr. Bandy's book or thesis again? The thesis title was the prophetic lawsuit in the book of Revelation, colon, an analysis of the lawsuit motif in Revelation with reference to the use of the Old Testament. Now, that has been published. I don't think the the dissertation itself is freely available online, but you could always, you know, try it. Some are, you know, occasionally you'll find one. It was published basically under the same title on Amazon, but it's, it's an academic publisher. So it's pricey unless you can find a used copy. You can find a used copy for about 50% off. Okay, Mike. Well, that wraps it up for this episode. I thoroughly enjoyed the book of Revelation. I know a lot of our listeners do too. So we appreciate you and Dr. Alan Bandy for coming on the show and talking about Revelation 4 and 5. And with that, I just want to thank everybody else for listening to the Naked Bible Podcast. God bless.