The key idea here is that the book of Revelation doesn’t simply transcribe what John saw. We asked two world-class experts on the book of Revelation the same question: What does “saw” mean when we read that John saw something? Both of them immediately told us that “saw” refers to more than a visionary experience. It can mean he saw something with his “mind’s eye,” as in a dream, and then his “seeing” involved mentally pondering what was seen and interpreting it with the aid of the Bible’s own language.
