The word evokes preordained events, feelings of anguish, mysterious visions, perplexing symbols. But Apocalypse means, first and foremost, Revelation. Of what? A string of catastrophes foretelling the end of the world? The advent of a new reality full of joy and without death? The triumph of Jesus Christ over history? Dealing with the Apocalypse means having to do with a literary genre and a religious school of thought, but especially the final book of the New Testament, also known as the Revelation to John. This volume with its references to history, literature, and art offers the reader a journey through the visionary and symbolic world of revelation with which the Scriptures end.

Piero Stefani, a scholar of the Bible and Hebraism, teaches at the Institute of Ecumenical Studies in Venice.