The Title used in the Authorized Version of our English Scriptures, and retained by the English Revisers, [pg 023] is “The Revelation of St. John the Divine,” a name given to the book by the early church, though many of the older manuscripts omit “the Divine”. Our American Revisers read, “The Revelation of John;” but the more correct title is the one that is commonly used, and that is printed in the upper margin of the text, simply “The Revelation,” i. e. the unveiling, or uncovering [viz. of the mystery of the divine purpose and method in human life and history]—the opening words of the book itself—or, if preferred, the original Greek name, “The Apocalypse”,9 which perhaps should have been retained without translation as in the Douay Version, but of which “The Revelation” is the exact equivalent. The phrase “of St. John”, or “of John”, may properly be omitted because of its ambiguity; for the book is declared in its opening sentence to be “the Revelation of Jesus Christ”, i. e. a revelation of or from Jesus Christ, and it is only in a secondary sense “the Revelation of John”, i. e. a revelation made to and recorded by John. The occasion for the use of this title, “The Revelation of St. John”, in the first centuries was in order to distinguish the canonical Apocalypse from many others then in circulation, but this necessity has long since ceased to exist. For us it stands alone, it is the Apocalypse, the Revelation.