Typological Preterist

It's his self-description. 

> All this is a way of saying that John is a typologist rather than an allegorist. It is an admittedly crude distinction, rightly disputed by many scholars. Whether or not the terms are felicitous, there is a genuine difference between a mode of reading that moves from text to an abstract, generalized concept (what I am calling allegory) as opposed to one that moves from text to real-life referent, while leaving open the prospect that mimics of the real-world referent will emerge, non-identically, in other times and places (typology). (Leithart, Vol 1: 12)

> These varied readings can seem so divergent that it is difficult to recognize that everyone is reading the same book. Yet the different approaches can be harmonized by the typological preterist reading adopted in this commentary; or, to use a more traditional designation, by application of the quadriga. The medieval quadriga posited that there are four senses in the biblical text: the literal sense, the allegorical or Christological sense, the tropological or moral sense, and the anagogical or eschatological sense (cf. Leithart 2010: 110–25). Applying this to Revelation: Literally, the book predicts a specific set of historical events that (mostly) take place soon after the book was written (preterist). Because God is consistent, these historical events are patterned by earlier events and pattern later historical sequences (idealist, historicist). Revelation depicts a double replay of exodus in first-century events, but later events might also qualify as exodus. As allegories and tropologies arise from the literal sense, so historicist and idealist readings arise from a preterist interpretation. Something like the trumpet sequence took place during the collapse of the Western Roman Empire, or in the later middle ages. John is not seeing or writing about those events directly, but they represent legitimate allegorical applications. John is not talking about us, but we may, will, and ought to seek analogies between what he is talking about and our own times. The better we learn the melody of the text, the more attuned we will be to contemporary (alternative rock?) renditions of that melody. (ibid, 14)

Thanks, Nick. I wasn't before, but now I'm really tempted to get this resource! I originally hesitated because I didn't really need a commentary that summarizes whatever everyone else has already said, but his perspective on this -- as well as the intertextual stuff, about which he also looks to be making refreshing insights -- makes me extremely interested.

Per TGC Review: "This theological-historical reading leads Leithart to conclude that Revelation primarily is about events that occur shortly after the letter was written. But his preterist impulse neither leads him to conclude that all events in the book are in the past (i.e., Rev 20:11–21:8 speaks of the far future) nor that Revelation does not speak directly to future generations. Instead, Leithart calls his approach a typological preterist approach and invokes God’s consistent working in history as revealing a system of patterns that we can expect God will replicate in the future (1:14). If God saved Israel in an Exodus, he will do the same in the future. And he did so through Christ, and he did so again through the martyrdom of the saints in Revelation according to Leithart."

https://ca.thegospelcoalition.org/reviews/review-of-revelation-itc-by-peter-j-leithart/