Arthur Krystal, “What We Learn about Our World by Imagining Its End” (1.27.25), newyorker.com.
In time, the Book of Revelation became the cornerstone of apocalyptic thinking. [Frank] Kermode’s “The Sense of an Ending”—perhaps the most incisive commentary on Revelation’s appeal—found that it “showed, and continues to show, a vitality and resource that suggest its consonance with our more naïve requirements of fiction.” In other words, it’s a hell of a story. Not the one about Jesus’ life and death, but the one about his Second Coming, featuring the world’s best foils: the red dragon, i.e., Satan, and the beast from the sea, whom theologians later interpreted as the Antichrist. Good and evil clash at Armageddon, ushering in a Messianic age lasting a thousand years, at which point Satan reappears, this time with Gog and Magog in tow, leading to a thrilling and satisfying dénouement: “Now I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse. And He who sat on him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness He judges and makes war. His eyes were like a flame of fire, and on His head were many crowns. He had a name written that no one knew except Himself.”
The Amateur Exegete 