382 G. Biguzzi (4) The two different idolatries. — Rev 9,20-21 speaks of the idolatry of the (many) idols and demons, and Rev 13ff speaks of the particular idolatry of the Beast (with only one cultic image, the eijkwvn of the Beast; 13,14 and passim). The first idolatry is struck by the plagues of the trumpets and the second by the plagues of the bowls (39). While two such distinguishable idolatries would hardly correspond to any historic or even symbolic datum in the Jerusalem of the 1st century A.D., they are easily identified with the traditional idolatry of the Roman-Hellenistic pantheon, which was present in every town and village, and the emperor cult, whose native land and actual centre was exactly in Asia Minor. (5) The time of composition. — The major difficulty against the anti-Jewish interpretation comes from the dating of Rev. According to Corsini, Beagley (hesitatingly) and Lupieri, Rev was written after the destruction of Jerusalem (70 A.D.)(40) and, according to Josephine Massyngberde Ford, after 66 A.D. Yet, both during the revolt and after its destruction, Jerusalem was furiously fighting or enraged against Rome. Consequently it is inconceivable that its religious power was in “monstrous alliance” with the Roman political establishment. (6) «The Great City … where their Lord was crucified». — Even the major argument of the anti-Jewish interpretation is not invincible. In fact the Great City spoken of in Rev 11 is divided into two fronts. On one side there is the sanctuary, the worshipers in it, and the two Witnesses of the Crucified Lord, who all without any doubt are to be interpreted as the Christians (41). On the other, there are the “pagans”, (39) On the two idolatries of which Revelation speaks cf. G. BIGUZZI, I settenari nella struttura dell’Apocalisse. Analisi, storia della ricerca, interpretazione (Bologna 1996) 172-176; ID., “Ephesus, its Artemision, its Temple to the Flavian Emperors, and Idolatry in Revelation”, NovT 40 (1998) 276-290; ID., L’Apocalisse e i suoi enigmi, 63-78. (40) Cf. E. CORSINI, The Apocalypse. The Perennial Revelation of Jesus Christ (Dublin, Ireland 1983) 329: “If the destruction to which the passage alludes is to be understood in a literal and material sense, it can only refer to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans in 70 A. D. Only then, in fact, after the slaying of Jesus Christ, did Jerusalem become, in the eyes of John and the early Christians, the definitive ‘prostitute’, the opposite of the ‘holy city’ which it had once been”; BEAGLEY, The ‘Sitz im Leben’ of the Apocalypse, 112; LUPIERI, L’Apocalisse di Giovanni, LXVI-LXVII. (41) BEAGLEY, The ‘Sitz im Leben’ of the Apocalypse, 61, writes: “These [i.e. the naov", the altar and the adorers] are the Christians” (cf. the numerous authors quoted in footnote 135), but cf. already Cassiodorus: “… per quam [arundinem Johannes] visus est metiri loca quae Christianus populus obtinebat; alia vero relinquere quae infideles poterunt [sic] obtinere” (PL 70, 1411.A).