I've occasionally been posting about evidence for the book of Revelation (here and here, for example). Another line of evidence for the book is fulfilled prophecy. I'm a futurist and premillennialist, so I think most of the prophecies in the book haven't been fulfilled yet. Somebody who holds a different view, like some form of preterism, could argue for the fulfillment of a larger portion of the book. But what I want to do here is discuss a line of evidence that Christians in general should agree about.
Some of the prophecies in Revelation are supposed to have been fulfilled near the time of the writing of the document even under the most futurist sort of perspective. I'm thinking of some predictions in chapters 2-3 about the churches to whom the book is addressed. And those churches would have been in a good position to know whether the predictions had been accurate. The stronger the evidence for the early acceptance of Revelation in those regions of the world, the more likely the accuracy of the predictions is.
See my post here that discusses the early reception of Revelation. Irenaeus refers to how "those men who saw John face to face" had commented on a textual issue in Revelation, which suggests that those eyewitnesses of John held the book in high regard and continued discussing it after its initial circulation (Against Heresies 5:30:1). The post linked above also discusses how some comments of Tertullian suggest that the seven churches addressed in Revelation 2-3 accepted the book. The evidence for Revelation's early acceptance, including among the seven churches addressed in the book, is early, comes from sources who were well positioned to judge the subject reliably, and is widespread.
That situation is best explained if the prophecies of Revelation 2-3 were accurate.
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