Parables of war: Reading John's Jewish Apocalypse‪.‬

Parables of War: Reading John's Jewish Apocalypse, by John W. Marshall. Studies in Christianity and Judaism 10. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2001. Pp. vii + 258. $29.95 (paper). In the introduction to this provocative but flawed work, "a Jew named John" gazes from the island of Patmos at the events across the Roman Empire during the turbulent year 69 C.E. Like Saruman with his palantir in Orthanc, he sees all! In the east the siege of Jerusalem and, farther east, the ghost of Nero leading the armies of Parthia against Rome; in the west, assassination and civil war in Italy; armies marching across Asia toward Rome; and the Jewish communities in the Seven Cities harassed by their neighbors and giving way to the temptations of the Greeks. With this sort of clarity, one wonders why John did not become the emperor himself. Instead, apparently, he wrote the Apocalypse.