Millenium Controversy of Gog, and Magog (Ch 20)
Pre- A- or Post-Millenial Gog and Magog (Ch 20)
Satan Bound in Chains for One Thousand Years (Apoc 20:1–3):
1 And I saw an angel coming down from heaven, having the key of the abyss, and a great chain in his hand.
2 And he laid hold on the dragon the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years.
3 And he cast him into the abyss, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should no more seduce the nations, till the thousand years be finished. And after that, he must be loosed a little time.
The chapter begins with an angel that binds Satan for one thousand years. After this, Satan is released for a short time to persecute Christians and wage the war of Gog and Magog. The confusing part of the vision is that the final war (after the thousand years) includes the Antichrist and the False Prophet. Also, during the short time after the thousand years, the icon of the beast and the mark of the beast are enforced. When is this thousand-year period in Apocalypse 20, and how does it fit with the previous timeline given in Apocalypse 13 with the sea beast and land beast?
Evangelical Protestant Christians often debate the millennium and the coming of Christ with three various interpretations, which they call premillennialism, postmillennialism, and amillennialism.
· Premillennialism teaches the Second Coming of Christ will come before (pre-) the thousand years of binding of Satan. Satan will be bound for a thousand years, and then Christ will return a second time.
· Postmillennialism teaches that the Second Coming of Christ will come after (post-) the thousand years of binding Satan. These one thousand years will be a golden age of Christianity on earth, but Christ will remain ruling from heaven (not on earth as premillennialists suppose). After this will come the Antichrist and the coming of Christ.
· Amillennialism teaches that the thousand years is not (a-) a literal but symbolic “long time,” after which Christ will return.
Postmillennialists and amillennialists agree about Christ returning once in the future after the millennium—the difference is that postmillennialists see a future golden age of Christianity lasting about one thousand years, after which Christ comes to judge the living and dead. Amillennialism simply states that from AD 33 until the arrival of the Antichrist (a long time, but not necessarily a thousand years), Satan is bound. In the end, Satan will be released to assist the Antichrist and bring about the Great Tribulation.
The difficulty with premillennialism is that it teaches two final comings of Christ: first His earthly return before the thousand years, and then another earthly coming after the thousand years. In the early church, a form of premillennial theology was simply called chiliasm, from the Greek word chilias meaning “thousand.” Some Church Fathers subscribed to it, but Saint Justin Martyr explained that the position was contested at his time: “I and many others are of this opinion, and believe that such will take place, as you assuredly are aware; but, on the other hand, I signified to you that many who belong to the pure and pious faith, and are true Christians, think otherwise.”[1] Beginning in the AD 300’s, chiliasm (premillennialism) had been universally rejected by the Church.[2] Christians in the East and West taught amillennialism—the thousand years was just the long time between the resurrection of Christ (the binding of Satan) and the future coming of the Antichrist.
The early church historian Eusebius of Caesarea (d. AD 339) explained that premillennial chiliasm posited a second coming of Christ before a millennium and then a third coming after a literal one-thousand-year millennium, a notion that originated from the heretic Kerinthus. Not only did Kerinthus deny the incarnation of Christ, but he also promoted the idea of a one-thousand-year millennium. This would place the origin of chiliasm, or premillennialism, with the heretic Kerinthus, who ironically, corrupted the Apocalypse of Saint John for his own purposes.
Although many early Christians did adopt the premillennialist interpretation, the Catholic Church definitively settled on the amillennial position. Both the Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox Church teach amillennialism and only amillennialism. The premillennialist reading oddly holds that the Antichrist and False Prophet appear both before the thousand years (chapters 13–19) and after the thousand years (chapter 20). How do these two appear in chapter 13 and then live another thousand years and show up again in chapter 20? They don’t. The chapters of the book of the Apocalypse are not presented in chronological order. It telescopes its message and embeds its visions within visions. The error of the premillennial chiliasts is that they wrongly read chapters 13 through 19 as chronologically preceding chapter 20 in a historical progression, when in fact they describe the same event in different ways. The binding of Satan happened when Christ died on the cross and rose from the dead. This began a long, indefinite period, which John in the Apocalypse calls a thousand years. At the end of this period, Satan is released. He appoints his Antichrist and False Prophet. He makes war on the saints.
Just as Jesus said He would “bind the strong man” (Mk 3:27), so here He “laid hold on the dragon the old serpent, which is the devil and Satan” (Apoc 20:2). Although Genesis never explicitly states that the serpent in the garden was Satan, God reveals here that the snake is the dragon and Satan.
Jesus Christ binds Satan for a thousand years, which is not truly one thousand years but merely a symbolic long time of perfection: 10 × 10 × 10. Satan is jailed in the abyss with a seal over him, that he might not seduce the nations during this length of time of apostolic preaching and missionary success. This is why the twelve apostles and seventy-two elders of Christ are so amazed that they have power over the demons. Their binding has begun already in the life of Christ. After this long period of time, he will be “loosed a little time,” and this is the three-and-a-half-year period with the Antichrist as king of the world.
The story of Gog and Magog is yet another symbolic retelling of the same event. Gog and Magog are the same as the Antichrist and his ten kings. They fight Jesus Christ not by ascending into heaven, but by killing the Christians on earth who carry Christ within their hearts.
God Destroys the Antichrist and the False Prophet (Apoc 20:8–10):
8 And they came upon the breadth of the earth, and encompassed the camp of the saints, and the beloved city.
9 And there came down fire from God out of heaven, and devoured them; and the devil, who seduced them, was cast into the pool of fire and brimstone, where both the beast
10 And the false prophet shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.
The Antichrist, the kings, and their armies surround the “camp of the saints, and the beloved city” (v. 8). We know already that the beloved city is not the earthly Jerusalem but the heavenly Jerusalem that is above. The Greek word for “camp” here refers to a military camp or outpost. This identifies the earthly church “camp of the saints” as the militant church, which is distinct from the triumphant church in heaven as the beloved city.
Fire comes down from God and devours the enemies of God. Fire falling from heaven invokes the Holy Spirit descending on the Church on Pentecost in Acts 2. Now there is another descent of holy fire, not upon the Church (who already has the Holy Spirit), but upon the enemies of the Church, who are destroyed. The devil is thrown into the pool of fire.
The Great White Throne and Book of Life (Apoc 20:11–15):
11 And I saw a great white throne, and one sitting upon it, from whose face the earth and heaven fled away, and there was no place found for them.
12 And I saw the dead, great and small, standing in the presence of the throne, and the books were opened; and another book was opened, which is the book of life; and the dead were judged by those things which were written in the books, according to their works.
13 And the sea gave up the dead that were in it, and death and hell gave up their dead that were in them; and they were judged everyone according to their works.
14 And hell and death were cast into the pool of fire. This is the second death.
15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life, was cast into the pool of fire.
[1] Justin Martyr, Dialogue with Trypho, cap. 69–88. Some of the early Christian writers that hint at chiliasm are Irenaeus, Tertullian, Commodian, Lactantius, Methodius, and Apollinaris of Laodicea.
[2] The sub-apostolic Epistle of Barnabas is amillennial. The early Egyptian and North African were openly amillennial: Clement of Alexandria (d. c. 215), Origen (d. c. 254), and Cyprian of Carthage (d. c. 258). Augustine and Jerome were also amillennial, and their arguments and reputation solidified the suppression of chiliasm once and for all.