The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text (New International Greek Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, Mich.).)

Rating:
Summary: One of the definitive commentaries on Revelation
Review: This book is a scholar's dream on Revelation. Beale is to be commended for offering both the current scholarly range of interpretation on Revelation and for lucidly giving his own point of view -- many commentaries today only offer one or the other. The reader will come away with an appreciation of the major interpretive views of Reveltion as well as an excellently argued defense of Beale's idealist viewpoint. Those who do not share the Idealist bias should still be able to benefit from the wide range of differing viewpoints that Beale mentions, although any serious study of Revelation in the future will have to account for Beale's scholarship. Beale uses the Old Testament as his primary (although not only) key for interpreting the myriad puzzling passages in Revelation, and what results is a convincing analysis of a very confusing book. The only problem I could find with this commentary was its length: it is so exhaustive that its length is somewhat prohibitive against frequent usage (researching any passage is a major undertaking). However, this is a small criticism, as a shorter treatment of the subject matter would have prevented Beale from analyzing the text with such impressive depth. If you can afford the expensive cover price you will get all of your money's worth, and more, with this brilliant work.