PART I
DATING THE REVELATION

WHO WAS "THE TYRANT?"

Another early witness for the dating of the Revelation is Clement of Alexandria, who flourished about A.D. 192-220. He related a story which he had received respecting the apostle John. "For after the tyrant was dead, coming from the isle of Patmos to Ephesus, he (John) went to the regions of the Gentiles." 1

To establish when John left the isle of Patmos it is important to identify the tyrant. He was either Nero or he was Domitian. Clement's reference to Caesar as the tyrant indicates that one of the emperors was particularly known by this appellation. In reviewing the literature of that day, it is significant to note that Domitian is commonly referred to as the tyrant. The following account from the first century describes the reputation this cruel Caesar had earned for himself.

Apollonius of Tyana lived during the reign of Domitian and suffered persecution under that emperor. He was born at the beginning of the Christian era and died during the reign of Nerva (A.D. 96-98). Although not a follower of Christ (he was a neo-Pythagorean philosopher), he went about speaking against the excesses of the pagan system. He was arrested by Domitian but was later acquitted. In The Life of Apollonius of Tyana, by Philostratus (written in the second century), we read, "Domitian had already written to the governor of Asia directing the man of Tyana (Apollonius) to be arrested and brought to Rome ... Apollonius set sail for Achaea and having landed in Corinth ... met Demetrius ... the boldest of the philosophers, knowing that he had moved from Rome to get out of the way of the tyrant ...". 2

Then Demetrius speaks: "Domitian intends to implicate you (Apollonius) in the charges for which Nerva and his associates were banished."3 Apollonius ponders his situation: "It behooves a philosopher to die in the attempt to protect his parents and children ... and friends ... but to be put to death, not for true reasons ... and to furnish the tyrant with a pretext for being wise is much worse and more grievous than to be bowed and bent high in the sky on a wheel as they say Ixion was".4 Further on we find that "there came to Rome from Arcadia a youth remarkable for his beauty and found there many admirers, and above all Domitian". The young man spurned the advances of Domitian, and was thrown into prison and there had a conversation with Apollonius. "Moreover Apollonius mentions this youth in one of his letters ... and adds that he was not put to death by the tyrant."5

Pliny the Younger was contemporary with Domitian as a young lawyer in Rome. He later wrote that several of his friends were executed by that Caesar and that he himself had feared at times for his life. Recalling one of the emperor's inhumane deeds, he writes of Domitian as assuming "the character of high-priest, or rather indeed of a cruel tyrant." 6

Another writer who titles Domitian "the tyrant" is Lactantius, a Christian apologist of the third century known for a major work entitled The Christian Institutions. In his treatise, De mortibus persecutorum (Of the Death of the Persecutors), he writes of Domitian, "who, although his government was exceedingly odious, for a very long time oppressed his subjects, and reigned in security, until at length he stretched forth his impious hands against the Lord. Having been instigated by evil demons to persecute the righteous people, he was then delivered into the power of his enemies, and suffered due punishment. To be murdered in his own palace was not vengeance ample enough: the very memory of his name was erased. For although he had erected many admirable edifices, and rebuilt the Capitol, and left other distinguished marks of his magnificence, yet the senate did so persecute his name, as to leave no remains of his statues, or traces of the inscriptions put up in honour of him; and by most solemn and severe decrees it branded him, even after death, with perpetual infamy. Thus, the commands of the tyrant having been rescinded, the Church was not only restored to her former state, but she shone forth with additional splendour, and became more and more flourishing." 7

John was exiled to Patmos and it is to be noted that Domitian had a penchant for exiling his antagonists. A case in point: the emperor's niece Domatilla and her husband Flavius Clemens had been given honors by Domitian, but they converted either to Judaism or Christianity. This was considered by the emperor as "atheism" (i.e. not acknowledging the divinity of the emperor or of the Roman deities). Caesar then banished his niece and executed her husband. 8

It is evident from the testimony of these witnesses that Domitian was known to those who opposed his will as the tyrant, that the emperor's persecution extended particularly to Asia, and that banishment was a form of persecution associated with his name. The liberation at Domitian's death of those he exiled is substantiated by Dio Cassius,9 the Roman historian.

1 Clement of Alexandria (Translation by G. W. Butterworth), p. 357.

2 Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana, Vol. I, Book VII, Ch. 10.

3 Ibid.. Ch. 11.

4 Ibid.. Ch. 12.

5 Ibid.. Ch. 42.

6 Pliny, Letters. Book IV.xi.

7 Lactantius, De mortibus persecutorum, ch. III (pp. 166-167).

8 Domatilla and Clemens were charged with Jewish manners and sacrilege. These were expressions which were used of both converts to Judaism and Christianity.

Latourette, A History of the Expansion of Christianity. Vol. I, "The First Five Centuries", p. 140 (Dio Cassius, Domitian, xiv). Suetonius, xvii.1 (pp. 371-2).

9 Dio Cassius, Book Ixviii.1.