The last book of the New Testament is the book of Revelation, also known as the Apocalypse. It has many different titles, including “The Apocalypse of John” and “The Revelation of St. John the Divine.” The name Revelation can be translated as “awakening or unveiling,” referring to revelation received from God by John who was exiled on Patmos (1:9). This final book opens with an introduction from Jesus Christ. In it, He reveals that all things are already present with the Father and His son before time began (1:18). full of specifics regarding First And Last Book Of New Testament
The word Bible comes from the Greek word ‘biblia’ which means books. The Bible is not a single book but 66 books written by 40 authors over the span of 1,000 years. There are two parts: Old Testament and New Testament. The Old Testament contains the stories of God’s covenant with Abraham that began with God’s promise to be their God and his chosen people. Their history later recorded in the Hebrew Scriptures up to Ezra who reestablished the nation in 539 BC consisting of information surrounding What Are the 46 Books of the Old Testament in Order
The Book of Revelation is the final book in the New Testament. It is also called the Apocalypse of John, The Revelation of Saint John the Divine or simply Revelation. Its central theme is a series of six seals, opened in sequence by an angel, unleashing successive woes on a wicked humanity during which the cosmos itself ends and God anew creates a new Heaven and Earth.
Last Book Of New Testament
The Book of Revelation, the final book of the New Testament, has some of the most dramatic and frightening language in the Bible.
In her new book Revelations: Visions, Prophecy and Politics in the Book of Revelation, Princeton University religious professor Elaine Pagels places the Book of Revelation in its historical context and explores where the book’s apocalyptic vision of the end of the world comes from.
“The Book of Revelation fascinates me because it’s very different than anything else you find in the New Testament,” Pagels tells Fresh Air’s Terry Gross. “There’s no moral sermons or ethical ideas or edifying things. It’s all visions. That’s why it appeals so much to artists and musicians and poets throughout the century.”
Pagels says the Book of Revelation’s author, who calls himself John, was likely a refugee whose home in Jerusalem had been leveled by the Romans in response to a Jewish rebellion against the Roman Empire.
“I don’t think we understand this book until we understand that it’s wartime literature,” she says. “It comes out of that war, and it comes out of people who have been destroyed by war.”
Other images in Revelation — which include bright red beasts with seven heads, and dragons, monsters and cosmic eruptions — were likely influenced by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, which buried and destroyed the city of Pompeii, she says.
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“Most people think John was writing at about the year 90 in the first century. That would be 60 years after the death of Jesus, and the eruption of Vesuvius happened in the year 79,” she says. “Much of what we find in the Book of Revelation couched in the fantastic imagery are descriptions of events that for John were very close — the war in Jerusalem, the eruption of Mount Vesuvius, the Roman Emperors who were ruling at the time. … It seems as though [John] reacted to that, saying, ‘Jesus is coming and he is going to destroy all of this.’ It was John’s conviction that the destruction of Jerusalem was the beginning of the end of time that Jesus had predicted.”
Many of the images in the book, she says, are thinly disguised metaphors for images associated with the ruling powers in Rome. The great scarlet beast with seven heads and seven crowns, for example, may represent the emperors from the dynasty of Julius Caesar, says Pagels. And the name of the beast — which is not named but is represented by the numbers 666 — may refer to Emperor Nero.
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“This is a reference to the technique of calculating numbers and letters,” she says, “so that you can take anyone’s name and have a numerical value of each letter, and you add them up or multiply them in complicated ways, and you find out what the name is. … John would have wanted his readers to understand that that number, which is couched in a mysterious code, would be understood to his readers as the name of one of those emperors who destroyed his people.”
Shortly after John wrote the Book of Revelation, Christians fearing persecution from the Romans seized on his message, seeing it as a way of deliverance from evil. For the past 2000 years, Christians have been reading Revelation as if it applies to conflicts and struggles in their own time, says Pagels.
“If you read it as John intended, you think, ‘God is on our side; we of course are on the side of good,’ ” she says. “Now we could be Lutherans fighting against the Catholic Church, we could be Catholics fighting against Lutherans. … What I found so remarkable is the way that people on both sides of a conflict could read that same book against each other.”
In the Civil War, she says, Northerners were reading John’s prophecies as God’s judgments for America’s sins of slavery.
” ‘The Battle Hymn of the Republic’ resounds with all of those imageries of the Book of Revelation,” she says. “People in the South, in the Confederacy, were also using the Book of Revelation, seeing the war as the battle of Armageddon at the end times, and using it against the North. And that’s the way it was read in World War II. That’s even the way it was read in the war in Iraq.”
Elaine Pagels has been called one of the world’s most important writers and thinkers on religion and history. She won the National Book Award for her book The Gnostic Gospels. She is also the author of Beyond Belief: The Secret Gospel of Thomas.
Jerry Bauer/Courtesy of the author
Interview Highlights
On other books of revelation, now known as the Gnostic Gospels
“One of the surprises that I found when I started to work on the Book of Revelation is that there is not only one. That is, most people think there is one Book of Revelation because there’s only one in the canon, but I discovered that this was one of an outpouring that Jews were writing; Greeks who followed the Greek gods were writing many books of revelation. The Book of Ezra, for example, is another revelation written by a Jewish prophet — not a follower of Jesus — but very similar to John’s in many ways and very grieved about the Roman Empire and concerned about the question of God’s justice.”
On why the Book of Revelation has been so controversial
“One reason why the book is so contested is that people who saw its prophecies against the Roman Empire suggesting that the empire was going to be destroyed by God realized that those prophecies had failed. What happened instead is that the Roman emperors become actually Christians, and the Roman Empire became a Christian empire — that is, completely contrary to what the prophecy said. So some people would have said, ‘The prophecy failed, so let’s leave that in the dust the way we leave other prophecies that fail.’ Other people said, ‘Wait a minute, that is not what it really means.’ If you interpret these images differently, and they open themselves to a very wide range of reading, then you could say, ‘Well, the prophecies are being fulfilled in a totally different way.’ “
On the Book of Revelation’s authorship
“John apparently was not only a Jewish prophet, but he was a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, who of course had been crucified about 60 years earlier. But they say that Jesus had prophesied that the end of the world was coming, and it seemed as though Jesus’ prophecy had simply failed. What John saw 60 years after the death of Jesus was that the Roman Empire was going stronger than ever, and I think he responded to the enormous power of Rome, which you can see in the buildings and the monuments and the architecture and the armies, which he would have seen stationed throughout those provinces. …
“It’s the response of one of the followers of Jesus, who was last seen on Earth crucified and in a horrible way tortured by the Romans. … And his follower John sees that Jesus is enthroned in heaven and returning as the ruler of the world. It’s almost like a perfect retaliation for what he sees as the execution of Jesus.”
On the images in the Book of Revelation
“One of them is an image of an enormous, bright-red beast with seven heads with crowns on its head — a violent, threatening, raging monster. Another is a giant whore called the Whore of Babylon who sits on the back of one of these dragons with seven heads, and she’s drinking from a golden cup the blood of innocent people who have been killed. Then there’s another image of Jesus coming forth from the sky and starting the battle of Armageddon, which ends in heaps and heaps of corpses at the end of the book.”
On what the Book of Revelation says about the new world
“It’s striking that the author sees nothing of the present world surviving except the people who are dead come back to life in this new world. But the new world as he sees it will be on Earth, will be a new Jerusalem full of the glory of God.”
On the followers of Jesus
“The earliest followers of Jesus were all Jewish, and they don’t seem to have imagined that they would ever diverge from their adherence to their tradition. It was just that they had found the Messiah of Israel. It’s the Apostle Paul who decided that Jesus had offered a message for non-Jews and opened it up for the salvation of the entire world. As John sees it, yes, gentiles will eventually be included in the blessings brought by Jesus, just as the Hebrew Bible says all the gentile nations will be blessed through Abraham, but for John the focus is on Israel and the Jewish people.”
On various interpretations of the Book of Revelation
“Many Christians assume John is a Christian, he’s a follower of Jesus, it’s a Christian book, and when the catastrophic events of the end times happen, everyone will have to be converted to Christianity. What I discovered, and it was surprising working on this, was in a sense you could say Christianity hadn’t been invented yet. That is, the idea of a new movement that was quite separate from Judaism and its obvious successor the way Christians see it today.”
First And Last Book Of New Testament
The first and last book of the New Testament is Revelation.
The first book of the New Testament is Matthew.
The last book of the New Testament is Revelation.
The only book in the Bible that was not written by an apostle was by Paul (1 Peter).
The first book of the New Testament is the Gospel of Matthew. The last book, or concluding book, is the Book of Revelation.
The New Testament books are organized in a certain order:
The four Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke and John)
Acts of the Apostles
Epistles (letters) to various churches (Romans through Jude)
Prophecy/Apocalypse (Revelation)
The first and last books of the New Testament are the book of Matthew and the book of Revelation. Both books contain valuable information about Jesus Christ and the Bible.
Matthew is one of the four gospels in the New Testament, along with Mark, Luke and John. It is also known as The Gospel According to Matthew. The gospel recounts Jesus’ life from his birth until his death on a cross. The book was written around A.D. 80 by an unknown author who used material from oral tradition as well as other sources like Old Testament prophecies and writings of early church leaders such as Peter. The author wrote in Greek so that it could be read by both Jews and Gentiles in Rome and throughout the Roman Empire (1).
Revelation is also known as The Apocalypse or The Apocalypse of John because it reveals things that have not yet happened but will happen in the future (2). The book was written around A.D. 96 by John, who was exiled on Patmos island due to his faith in Christ (3). He wrote this book while he was there because he wanted people to know what would happen when Jesus returned to Earth for judgment day (4).
The Bible is divided into two parts: the Old Testament, which covers the history of God’s people and their relationship with him, and the New Testament, which tells of Christ’s coming to earth, his life and death, his resurrection and ascension.
The New Testament consists of 27 books. The first four books are called the Gospels (meaning “good news”), because they tell about Jesus’ birth, life, death and resurrection. The next six books are called the “Epistles” or “Letters,” because they contain messages from Paul and other early Christians to other Christians about how to live for God. The last book is Revelation, which contains visions of heaven as well as letters from John to seven churches in Asia Minor (today’s Turkey).
The Book of Revelation is the last book of the Bible. It is also called the Apocalypse of John and “the Revelation to John.”
The name Revelation comes from a Greek word for “disclosure” or “unveiling.” The meaning of this title is that God was revealing his plans for the future, both good and bad.
The book of Revelation was written by St. John around A.D. 95. He had been exiled on an island called Patmos, where he wrote down what he had seen in a vision
John wrote his book as a letter to seven churches in Asia Minor (modern Turkey), but it has become known as a prophetic book because it speaks about many things that will happen in the future. In fact, many Christians believe that it describes events leading up to Christ’s second coming when Jesus will return to earth once more and set up his kingdom on earth
As a religious canon or collection of scriptures for the Christian faithful, the books of the bible are important. Whether for study or interest, find a full list of Bible books in order, and a brief overview of their history, right here on Infoplease.
What Are the Books of the Bible, or Ta Biblia?
The Bible is long and complicated, so it can be a bit hard to keep it all straight. The scriptures contain hundreds of stories over generations. Christian Bibles, which borrow heavily from the Hebrew Tanakh, are broken down into different books; we’ve presented the full list of books in order for your reference.
As we discuss below, different traditions count different books and order them differently. We’ve decided to present them here in the order used in most mainline Protestant Bibles, as those are the most common variety in the United States where we’re based.
See also The King James Bible, Old Testament Names, and Kings of Judah & Israel
Looking to broaden your religion reading? Check out our list of the best books on Buddhism.
What Are the 46 Books of the Old Testament in Order
Genesis
Exodus
Leviticus
Numbers
Deuteronomy
Joshua
Judges
Ruth
1 Samuel
2 Samuel
1 Kings
2 Kings
1 Chronicles
2 Chronicles
Ezra
Nehemiah
Esther
Job
Psalms
Proverbs
Ecclesiastes
Song of Solomon (or Song of Songs)
Isaiah
Jeremiah
Lamentations
Ezekiel
Daniel
Hosea
Joel
Amos
Obadiah
Jonah
Micah
Nahum
Habakkuk
Zephaniah
Haggai
Zechariah
Malachi
What Are the Books of the New Testament in Order?
Matthew
Mark
Luke
John
Acts of the Apostles
Romans
1 Corinthians
2 Corinthians
Galatians
Ephesians
Philippians
Colossians
1 Thessalonians
2 Thessalonians
1 Timothy
2 Timothy
Titus
Philemon
Hebrews
James
1 Peter
2 Peter
1 John
2 John
3 John
Jude
Revelation
The Apocryphal and Deuterocanonical Books
The Apocrypha/Deuterocanonical
Tobit
Judith
Additions to the Book of Esther
Wisdom of Solomon
Ecclesiasticus
Baruch
The Letter of Jeremiah
The Prayer of Azariah and the Song of the Three Jews
Susanna
Bel and the Dragon
1 Maccabees
2 Maccabees
1 Esdras
Prayer of Manasseh
Psalm 151
3 Maccabees
2 Esdras
4 Maccabees
The Hebrew Scriptures & the Old Testament
The first books in the Christian bible are the holy books of the Jewish faith, collected in the Tanakh. “Tanakh” is an acronym of the three major division of the Hebrew holy book–the Torah (“teachings,” also known to Christians by the Greek name “the Pentateuch” or “five books”), Nevi’im (“prophets”), and Ketuvim (“writings”). In Christian traditions these books are called “the Old Testament.” The Jewish faith also adheres to the teachings in the Talmud, rabbinical commentaries on the Tanakh; unlike the Tanakh, Christian scripture does not recognize the Talmud.
Different Christian traditions acknowledge different books of the Bible as canonical. The Tanakh includes only 24 books, while mainline Protestant bibles inclue 39*, Catholics include 46, and Eastern Orthodox groups include 49. The books included in some bibles and not others are called Apocrypha or Deuterocanonical; this means either that they are not canon, or that they are less canonical than primary canon.
*Protestant bibles do not include more material than Hebrew bibles, but they divide the book of the 12 minor prophets into 12 different books, as well as dividing the book of Ezra-Nehemiah into the books of Ezra and Nehemiah, and the book of Chronicles into 1 Chronicles and 2 Chronicles. All Christian bibles, however, are ordered differently than the Tanakh.
The Five Books of Moses/the Pentateuch
The only set of books included in all forms of the Tanakh and the Old Testament, in the same order, is the Torah or Pentateuch. These five books, the five books of Moses, are the first and arguably most important books in the scripture.
An Overview of the Old Testament & the New Testament
The Old Testament begins with the book of Genesis, which tells the story of how the world was created, and how God anointed his chosen people and taught them how to live. This includes famous stories like those of Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and Noah’s Ark.
After Genesis, the different books of the Old Testament relate the trials of the Israelites as they endure centuries of enslavement or captivity under different empires. There is a general pattern where God sends a prophet to teach the Israelites how to live and to lead them from hardship, but over time they lose faith and find themselves suffering new hardships. The most famous example is Moses leading his people out of slavery in Egypt–the people are impious and must wander the desert for forty years before their descendants can enter the promised land.
Some of the other important episodes from the Old Testament include the rise of King David, the building of the Temple in Jerusalem, and the Babylonian Captivity. The Old Testament also includes various sayings and songs about morality, god, and other esoteric subjects.
The New Testament is concerned with the life and teachings of Jesus Christ, which are the basis for Christianity. His life story is told in the four Gospels (which comes from the Old English for “good news”). Almost all of the other books are letters written by Saint Paul or other Christian teachers, discussing their beliefs or giving advice.
The last book of the New Testament is the Book of Revelation, written by John the Apostle, which recounts an apocalyptic vision of the End of Days. The most important event discussed in Revelation is the Second Coming of Christ, although most of the events in Revelation are controversial in their meaning.
Notes on Biblical Terms
There are a few cases of terms that crop up a lot in the books of the bible, but that get confused in everyday language. We just want to focus in on two; the different terms for “God’s chosen people” in the Bible, and how God is identified and named.
The terms “Hebrew,” “Jew,” and “Israelite” are often used interchangeably, but they do mean slightly different things, as addressed in this informative post from Chabad.
The first person identified as a Hebrew is Abraham, and so in a sense the Hebrews are descendants of Abraham. More specifically, the etymology of Hebrew implies an individual who is across or has crossed something, and so it is often used to describe the people of Abraham when not in Israel/Canaan, and when resisting cultural pressures and temptations from outside groups. Joseph is called a Hebrew when in Egypt. Lastly, Hebrew is often used to refer to the Hebrew-speaking Jews of Roman Judaea.
Israelite more specifically refers to descendants of Jacob or Israel, the ancestor of the twelve tribes of Israel who later would be split between the kingdoms of Israel and Judah. It is important to note that Israelite is different from the current national demonym Israeli, indicating a person from the country of Israel.
Jew, lastly, refers to the people of Judah, and then after the Babylonian exile to Israelites more broadly due to cultural and religious importance of Judah. In general, Jew or Jewish person is used to refer to a person who practices Judaism or is part of the Jewish community. Due to its invective use by anti-semites, the word “Jew” by itself can sometimes sound harsh or rude, but there are many cases in which it’s perfectly neutral and appropriate.
The Name of God
In the Tanakh, God is identified with the seven different names. Per tradition, these are to be treated with extreme reverence; you shouldn’t erase or damage them when written down. For that matter, despite our academic use of them here, you’re not supposed to write them down too often either.
The most significant name for God in the Tanakh is the Tetragrammaton, or the four letters. The four letters are transliterated as YHWH. In Latin, since the letter J originally was pronounced like a Y or I, and the letter V sounded like a W, this was written JHVH (from which we get “Jehovah,” as in the Witnesses). Since you’re not supposed to write the name down too often, it’s common to change a letter (in English this is often written as G-d) or to space the letters, like Y-H-W-H.
Especially in Judaism, but in many Christian traditions as well, you are not supposed to pronounce the Tetragrammaton. When referring to the name itself, one would typically same HaShem (“The Name” in Hebrew). When reading the four letters, it is pronounced Adonai (or “The Lord”). If the word “Lord” is already next to the four letters, you would say Elohim. This is how we arrive at the common English phrase “the Lord God.”