John, divine locality and the Book of Revelation

Abstract

This thesis argues that John, the author of Revelation, depended upon two traditions or cultural models for the development of his theology: the corporeality of God and the heavenly temple. 'Cultural model' is a term used in cognitive anthropology to refer to conceptual constructs shared amongst persons in a given culture, which helps those persons sense-make and behave in their world. John used the cultural models of divine corporeality and the heavenly temple to construct a unique cosmology and theology in his apocalypse. Moreover, these cultural models and his resultant theological system helped John answer critical questions facing him at the end of the first century: Where is the Messiah, and why is he gone? For John, Jesus was absent in his world because he was completing necessary sacrificial and sacerdotal ministries at the heavenly temple so that the world could be purged of its impurities, allowing the Lord God to dwell physically with his people on earth.