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The Book of Revelation or Book of the Apocalypse is the final book of the New Testament. Written in Koine Greek, its title is derived from the first word of the text: apokalypsis, meaning 'unveiling' or 'revelation'. The Book of Revelation is the only apocalyptic book in the New Testament canon. It occupies a central place in Christian eschatology.
Christian eschatology is a minor branch of study within Christian theology which deals with the doctrine of the "last things", especially the Second Coming of Christ, or Parousia. The word eschatology derives from two Greek roots meaning "last" (ἔσχατος) and "study" (-λογία) – involves the study of "end things", whether of the end of an individual life, of the end of the age, of the end of the world, or of the nature of the Kingdom of God. Broadly speaking, Christian eschatology focuses on the ultimate destiny of individual souls and of the entire created order, based primarily upon biblical texts within the Old and New Testaments. Christian eschatology looks to study and discuss matters such as death and the afterlife, Heaven and Hell, the Second Coming of Jesus, the resurrection of the dead, the rapture, the tribulation, millennialism, the end of the world, the Last Judgment, and the New Heaven and New Earth in the world to come.
Mormonism is the theology and religious tradition of the Latter Day Saint movement of Restorationist Christianity started by Joseph Smith in Western New York in the 1820s and 1830s. As a label, Mormonism has been applied to various aspects of the Latter Day Saint movement, although since 2018 there has been a push from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints to distance itself from this label. One historian, Sydney E. Ahlstrom, wrote in 1982 that, depending on the context, the term Mormonism could refer to "a sect, a mystery cult, a new religion, a church, a people, a nation, or an American subculture; indeed, at different times and places it is all of these."
In religion, a prophet or prophetess is an individual who is regarded as being in contact with a divine being and is said to speak on behalf of that being, serving as an intermediary with humanity by delivering messages or teachings from the supernatural source to other people. The message that the prophet conveys is called a prophecy.
In religion and theology, revelation is the disclosing of some form of truth or knowledge through communication with a deity (god) or other supernatural entity or entities.
People of the Book, or Ahl al-Kitāb, is a classification in Islam for the adherents of those religions that are regarded by Muslims as having received a divine revelation from Allah, generally in the form of a holy scripture. The classification chiefly refers to pre-Islamic Abrahamic religions. In the Quran, they are identified as the Jews, the Christians, the Sabians, and—according to some interpretations—the Zoroastrians. Beginning in the 8th century, this recognition was extended to other groups, such as the Samaritans, and, controversially, Hindus, Buddhists, Jains, and Sikhs, among others. In most applications, "People of the Book" is simply used by Muslims to refer to the followers of Judaism and Christianity, with which Islam shares many values, guidelines, and principles.
Ebionites as a term refers to a Jewish Christian sect that existed during the early centuries of the Common Era, whose name may have been taken from the first group of people mentioned in the Beatitudes of Jesus as blessed and meriting entry in the coming Kingdom of God on Earth.
The Sabians, sometimes also spelled Sabaeans or Sabeans, are a mysterious religious group mentioned three times in the Quran, where it is implied that they belonged to the 'People of the Book'. Their original identity, which seems to have been forgotten at an early date, has been called an "unsolved Quranic problem". Modern scholars have variously identified them as Mandaeans, Manichaeans, Sabaeans, Elchasaites, Archontics, ḥunafāʾ, or as adherents of the astral religion of Harran. Some scholars believe that it is impossible to establish their original identity with any degree of certainty.
Cerinthus was an early Gnostic, who was prominent as a heresiarch in the view of the early Church Fathers. Contrary to the Church Fathers, he used the Gospel of Cerinthus, and denied that the Supreme God made the physical world. In Cerinthus' interpretation, the Christ descended upon Jesus at baptism and guided him in ministry and the performing of miracles, but left him at the crucifixion. Similarly to the Ebionites, he maintained that Jesus was not born of a virgin, but was a mere man, the biological son of Mary and Joseph.
Adherents of Judaism do not believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah nor do they believe he was the Son of God. In the Jewish perspective, it is believed that the way Christians see Jesus goes against monotheism, a belief in the absolute unity and singularity of God, which is central to Judaism; Judaism sees the worship of a person as a form of idolatry, which is forbidden. Therefore, considering Jesus divine, as “God the Son”, is forbidden.
Mirza Ghulam Ahmad was an Indian religious leader and the founder of the Ahmadiyya movement in Islam. He claimed to have been divinely appointed as the promised Messiah and Mahdī—which is the metaphorical second-coming of Jesus (mathīl-iʿIsā), in fulfillment of the Islamic prophecies regarding the end times, as well as the Mujaddid of the 14th Islamic century.
In the Book of Ezekiel in the Hebrew Bible, New Jerusalem is Ezekiel's prophetic vision of a city centered on the rebuilt Holy Temple, to be established in Jerusalem, which would be the capital of the Messianic Kingdom, the meeting place of the twelve tribes of Israel, during the Messianic era. The prophecy is recorded by Ezekiel as having been received on Yom Kippur of the year 3372 of the Hebrew calendar.
Prima scriptura is the Christian doctrine that canonized scripture is "first" or "above all other" sources of divine revelation. Implicitly, this view suggests that, besides canonical scripture, there can be other guides for what a believer should believe and how they should live, such as the Holy Spirit, created order, traditions, charismatic gifts, mystical insight, angelic visitations, conscience, common sense, the views of experts, the spirit of the times or something else. Prima scriptura suggests that ways of knowing or understanding God and his will that do not originate from canonized scripture are perhaps helpful in interpreting that scripture, but testable by the canon and correctable by it, if they seem to contradict the scriptures. Prima scriptura is upheld by the Anglican and Methodist traditions of Christianity, which suggest that Scripture is the primary source for Christian doctrine, but that "tradition, experience, and reason" can nurture the Christian religion as long as they are in harmony with the Bible. Pentecostals generally uphold prima scriptura with an emphasis on the leading of the Holy Spirit rather than tradition.
The migration to Abyssinia, also known as the First Hijra, was an episode in the early history of Islam, where the first followers of the Islamic prophet Muhammad migrated from Arabia due to their persecution by the Quraysh, the ruling Arab tribal confederation of Mecca. They sought and were granted refuge in the Kingdom of Aksum, an ancient Christian state that was situated in modern-day northern Ethiopia and Eritrea, in 9 BH (613 CE) or 7 BH (615 CE). The kingdom's capital was Aksum, which is an ancient city in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia. The ruling Aksumite monarch who received them is known in Islamic sources as Najashi, the Negus of the kingdom; modern historians have alternatively identified him with the Aksumite king Armah and Ella Tsaham. Some of the Sahabah exiles returned to Mecca and made the migration to Medina with Muhammad, while the others remained in Aksum and arrived in Medina in 628.
The Elcesaites, Elkasaites, Elkesaites or Elchasaites were an ancient Jewish Christian sect in Lower Mesopotamia, then the province of Asoristan in the Sasanian Empire that was active between 100 and 400 CE. The members of this sect, which originated in the Transjordan, performed frequent baptisms for purification and had a Gnostic orientation.
The first to criticize the Islamic prophet Muhammad were his non-Muslim Arab contemporaries, who decried him for preaching monotheism, and the Jewish tribes of Arabia, for what they claimed were unwarranted appropriation of Biblical narratives and figures and vituperation of the Jewish faith. For these reasons, medieval Jewish writers commonly referred to him by the derogatory nickname ha-Meshuggah.
The historicity of Muhammad refers to the study of Muhammad as a historical figure and critical examination of sources upon which traditional accounts are based.
The Divine Incantations Scripture is the oldest known Chinese classic text that details an apocalypse.
Buddhologist Edward Conze (1966) has proposed that similarities existed between Buddhism and Gnosticism, a term deriving from the name Gnostics, which was given to a number of Christian sects. To the extent that Buddha taught the existence of evil inclinations that remain unconquered, or that require special spiritual knowledge to conquer, Buddhism has also qualified as Gnostic.
Continuous revelation or continuing revelation is a theological belief or position that God continues to reveal divine principles or commandments to humanity.