The Narrow Path Ministries

Apparently Dean Furlong presumed that Revelation was written by the apostle John. This is questionable.
Though the writer identifies himself as "John" five times in the book, it was not the custom of the apostle John to identify himself in his writings.

The apostle John did not claim to be the author of either of the books that were written by him, neither in the gospel of John, nor in first John. Though in the gospel of John, he refers to himself 19 times, he didn't claim to be the writer of that gospel.
The name "John" doesn't occur in first John at all.

I've never heard anyone argue that because he is named in one book he couldn't have authored the others.

Apollos wrote:I've never heard anyone argue that because he is named in one book he couldn't have authored the others.

I never have either.

My point was that whereas in the two books known to have been authored by John the apostle, he didn't identify himself as the author, It wasn't the apostle's custom to do so.

On the other hand, the writer of Revelation gives his name as "John" 5 times. I don't claim that his name was not "John", only that he was not the apostle John.

The letter likely would be written to mid-first-century Christians so they could endure various trouble they would have to endure. The letter appears to be about vindication, especially in light of persecutions. It does seem likely that the letter was written to specific living people rather than to an anonymous future generation. If later generations had to understand it, then we are really in trouble because there is no settled view. The other problem is that it would be odd (especially with the interpretations that some people give) to have one's justification determined by understanding a book as symbolic as Revelation, since we are not Gnostics.

It would seem that the mid first century Christians would have the background study of the Old Testament prophecies to make sense of the letter. But even with all that background, the letter was probably still difficult. I suppose another option is that the Christians were talking quite a bit about the symbology to understand the prophecies.

(Sorry. Had meant to say the letter was written to specific living people in the first-century.)