ABSTRACT
The only offering envisaged in the heavenly Temple in the book of Revelation is that of incense. In her essay, Dominika Kurek-Chomycz argues that the author of the Apocalypse utilises a selection of meanings ascribed to incense in his own sacred writings, while also presupposing the audience’s familiarity with the widespread use of incense in the cities of Asia, to construct an elaborate warning against practices considered by him idolatrous, and to contrast them with appropriate cultic attitude and behaviour. In the Jewish scriptures, incense is a particularly holy but also precarious type of offering, related to its role in manifesting and executing the divine will and the divine judgement. In the Apocalypse, the qualities and functions associated with incense are transferred to incense vessels, the golden bowls and the golden censer in particular, rendering them important actors in the spectacle envisaged by John. Their role is in this consistent with the significance of other material objects in the Apocalypse, to some of which the author ascribes animate features. The fuzzy boundaries between material items and other actors are also part of Revelation’s “unstable epistemology” and have a potential to disrupt both the book’s and its interpreters’ hegemonic claims.
