While the Left Behind Corpus may be commended for being an effective tool for evangelism, the question arises of whether or not its themes engender a theology of extermination, indeed a creeping crusade; “creeping” in the sense of it being a movement of stealth and not one of high visibility – “crusade” in the sense of a militaristic movement, similar to that of the medieval crusades. I span my research across three artefacts in the LB Corpus in terms of its embedded interpretation, discourse and ideology; in fact three separate entities for explanatory purposes, but in effect they form a single entity of interaction and cross-production. I am therefore extending many niches of research and critical discourse to what I envisage as the wider context of the LB Corpus: its potential for social construction, and its enigmatic connections with other apocalyptic-driven and crusade-like movements. Based as it is on “consistent literalism,” the LB Corpus can only be countered by an exegetical approach that situates the foundational text for the Left Behind phenomenon, Revelation 7, in its historical setting, while taking cognisance of the particularities of early Christianity, with its Jewish heritage lived out in a Graeco-Roman environment. In offering an alternative reading, I take some cues from Vernon Robbins‟ socio-rhetorical approach and draw from perspectives of theorists across several disciplinary fields in pointing out anomalies in a consistent literalism driven interpretation of Revelation 7. / New Testament / Thesis (D.Litt. et Phil. (Biblical Studies))

I sette libri del "De opificio mundi" dell'alessandrino Giovanni Filopono (metà VI p.Ch.) sono il primo commento speculativo alla pericope cosmopoietica del Genesi mediante la fruizione di categorie filosofiche aristoteliche. Presentandone la prima traduzione italiana, si illustra il conato di novità che il Filopono esercita nell'esegesi biblica giacché interpreta Genesi non già attraverso il paradigma demiurgico del "Timeo" platonico, come in àmbito giudaico (Aristobùlo e Filone Ebreo) e nella produzione esameronale patristica (Cappàdoci), bensì attingendo alle opere fisiche e logiche dello Stagirita. Invece della struttura mitico-allegorica sottesa alla lettura cristiana del "Timeo" si impone l'approccio analitico di Aristotele: Filopono rifiuta l'interpretazione allegoretica, impiegando l'argomentazione sillogistico-deduttiva dell'"Organon" aristotelico, ricorrendo a filosofemi cardinali in Aristotele e nella tradizione scientifica che dal medesimo fiorì in Alessandria. Così Filopono in-venta un nuovo modello esegetico: superando l'allegorismo tradizionale (arbitrario e infedele al messaggio rivelato) e il letteralismo della scuola antiochena di Teodoro di Mopsuestia, Teodoreto, Cosma (banalizzante e senza metodo critico) Filopono conia un letteralismo metodologicamente forte, ove il metodo proviene formalmente dalla logica aristotelica e contenutisticamente dalla fisica aristotelica. Già commentatore dello Stagirita, Filopono fa incontrare Rivelazione e filosofia aristotelica, lasciando nel "De opificio mundi" un singolarissimo prodromo della scolastica cristiana. / The present essay is meant to illustrate the philosophical and exegetic work intitled "De opificio mundi" (seven books) written by John Philoponus in Alexandria in the middle of the sixth century A.D. about the kosmopoiesis of the first chapter of Genesis. It is argued this treatise is the first evidence of Biblical exegesis led not according to Plato's "Timaeus" but according to Aristotelian corpus, specially "Physics" and "Organon". Philoponus rejects the allegorical method based upon demiurgic "Timaeus" since he thinks it is arbitrary and untrue compared with the Revelation literalism; therefore Philoponus passes the limit of Aristoboulos, of Philo's "De opificio mundi" and also the limit of Christian tradition of Hexaemerons (Fathers of the Church just like Cappadocians). Philoponus replaces allegorism with a new kind of Biblical literalism: not the trivializing one led by the school of Antioch (Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret of Cyrrhus, Cosmas Indicopleustes) but a scientific and methodic literalism relied on Aristotelian logic and on the (meta)physical concepts derived from Aristotle (kinesis, dynamis, hexis, hypokeimenon, etc.); so "De opificio mundi" has a syllogistic and deductive structure, not a mythic-allegorical one. Last philosopher in Late Antiquity, Philoponus is in-ventor of a striking Christian-Aristotelian scholasticism.