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The Book of Revelation
is one of the
most popular books in history. Its vivid
rendering of the last judgment as a battle
between the forces of God and
Satan has inspired writers as diverse as
John Milton, William Blake, and James
Baldwin. In her new book, Revelations:
Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book
of Revelation (Viking), religion professor
Elaine Pagels explains the historical
roots of this apocalyptic text and how
it became the last book in the New Testament.
The author of Revelation, Pagels
writes, “wants to speak to the urgent
question that people have asked
throughout human history ... How
long will evil prevail, and when will
justice be done?”
MORE FACULTY BOOKS
FACULTY BOOKSHELF: ELAINE PAGELS
The historical roots
of an apocalyptic text
Classics professor
ROBERT A. KASTER takes
readers along the
ancient highway the
Appian Way from the
center of Rome to the
heel of Italy. He tells
the story of the road and the people
who traveled it — from a footsore
Roman soldier to craftsmen and pious
pilgrims headed to Jerusalem — in The
Appian Way: Ghost Road, Queen of Roads
(University of Chicago Press). “No road
in Europe has been so heavily traveled,
by so many different people, with so
many different aims, over so many generations,”
he writes. ... In Krupp: A History
of the Legendary German Firm
(Princeton University Press), HAROLD
JAMES explores the
Krupp family and its
company, which made
steel and played a central
role in arming
Nazi Germany. A professor
of history, James
May 16, 2012 Princeton Alumni Weekly • paw.princeton.edu
Pagels is an expert in early
Christianity. She received wide
acclaim for her book The Gnostic
Gospels, which introduced
the Gospel of Thomas and other
early Christian texts to the general
reader. In her new book,
Pagels writes that many revelation
texts were composed in the
early years of Christianity. Yet
like the Gnostic Gospels —
ancient wisdom teachings that
were considered heterodox by
some early Christian leaders — they
were not included in the New Testament
canon, often for political reasons.
The author of the Book of Revelation
was John of Patmos, a prophet
who belonged to the second generation
analyzes the company’s transition from
a family business to one owned by a
nonprofit foundation. ... JANET Y. CHEN
examines the lives of the urban poor in
China during the early 20th century,
when poverty became part of the
national conversation,
in Guilty of Indigence:
The Urban Poor in
China, 1900–1953
(Princeton University
Press). She also
explores Chinese attitudes
toward urban poverty and the
development of policies intended to
alleviate it. Chen is an assistant professor
of history and East Asian studies. ...
In The Jewish Jesus: How Judaism and
Christianity Shaped
Each Other (Princeton
University Press), PETER
SCHÄFER looks at the
ways Christianity and
rabbinic Judaism influenced
each other in
Late Antiquity by examining the texts
of those traditions. Schäfer is a professor
of Jewish studies and religion and
of Jesus’ disciples. After Jewish rebels
were crushed by Roman forces in
Judea, John fled to the island of Patmos.
Inspired by visions and still reeling
from the Roman destruction of the
Jewish Temple, John began writing.
director of the Program in Judaic
Studies. ... Students and colleagues of
WEN C. FONG ’51 *58, professor emeritus of
art history and art
and archaeology, contributed
nearly 40
essays on Chinese,
Japanese, and Korean
art history to Bridges
to Heaven: Essays on
East Asian Art in Honor of Professor Wen
C. Fong (Department of Art and
Archaeology/Princeton University
Press). The two volumes address topics
ranging from early jades to photography,
and modern museum practice. The
editors are JEROME SILBERGELD *69, professor
of Chinese art history at Princeton
and director of Princeton’s Tang Center
for East Asian Art; DORA C.Y. CHING *11,
the Tang Center’s associate director;
JUDITH G. SMITH, an administrator in the
Asian art department at the Metropolitan
Museum of Art; and ALFREDA MURCK
*95, a guest research fellow at the Center
for Research on Ancient Chinese
Painting and Calligraphy at the Palace
Museum in Beijing.
JERRY PAGE