Apocalypse
concept of a prophetic revelation, sometimes about eschatology
Apocalyptic literature (from Ancient Greek ἀποκάλυψις (apokálupsis) 'revelation, disclosure') is a literary genre originating in Judaism in the centuries following the Babylonian exile (597–587 BCE) but persisting in Christianity and Islam. In apocalypse, a supernatural being reveals cosmic mysteries or the past to a human intermediary. The means of mediation include dreams, visions and heavenly journeys, and they typically feature symbolic imagery drawn from the Jewish Bible, cosmological and (pessimistic) historical surveys, the division of time into periods, esoteric numerology, and claims of ecstasy and inspiration. It is "an unveiling or unfolding of things not previously known and which could not be known apart from the unveiling". Almost all are written under pseudonyms, claiming as author a venerated hero from previous centuries, as with the Book of Daniel, composed during the 2nd century BCE but bearing the name of the legendary Daniel from the 6th century BCE.
Eschatology (from Greek eschatos, last) concerns expectations of the end of the present age. Thus, apocalyptic eschatology is the application of the apocalyptic world-view to the end of the world, when God will bring judgment to the world and save his followers. An apocalypse will often contain much eschatological material like the epiphany of Paul the Apostle, but need not: the baptism of Jesus in Matthew's gospel, for example, can be considered apocalyptic in that the heavens open for the presence of a divine mediator (the dove representing the spirit of God) and a voice communicates supernatural information, but there is no eschatological element. In popular use apocalypse often means such a catastrophic end-times event, but in scholarly use the term is restricted to the visionary or revelatory event.
Scholars have identified examples of the genre ranging from the mid-2nd century BCE to the 2nd century CE, and examples are to be found in Persian and Greco-Roman literature as well as Jewish and Christian texts. The sole clear case in the Jewish Bible (Old Testament) is chapters 7–12 of the Book of Daniel, but there are many examples from non-canonical Jewish works; the Book of Revelation is the only apocalypse in the New Testament, but passages reflecting the genre are to be found in the gospels and in nearly all the genuine Pauline epistles.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Apocalypse” as concept of a prophetic revelation, sometimes about eschatology. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as concept of a prophetic revelation, sometimes about eschatology. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q696203. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference.
The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Apocalypse” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.