War of Flesh and Spirit in Believers | Charles Spurgeon Sermons 2022 - 2023

I Send Destruction 4-5-23@ 5:14pm

Har Magedon: The End Of The Millennium

By Meredith G. Kline

[Meredith G. Kline is professor of Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary in California, Escondido, California, and emeritus professor of Old Testament at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, South Hamilton, Massachusetts.]

Some sixty years ago C. C. Torrey published a study of Har Magedon that has not received the attention it deserves.[1] His explanation of the Hebrew terms transliterated into Greek as har magedōn (Rev 16:16) is accepted in the present article and additional evidence for it adduced. Further, it will be shown how this interpretation leads to the recognition that Har Magedon is Mount Zaphon/Zion and that the Har Magedon battle is the Gog-Magog crisis of Ezekiel 38–39. This in turn proves to be of critical significance in the millennium debate. For it adds a final, decisive point to the traditional amillennial argument for the identification of the conflict marking the end of the millennium (Rev 20:7–10) with the climactic battle of the great day of the Lord to which the Apocalypse repeatedly returns, as in the Rev 16:12–16 account of the Har Magedon encounter itself and the Rev 19:11–21 prophecy of the war waged by the messianic judge.[2]

I. Har Magedon, The Mount Of Assembly

1. Derivation from har môʿēd. Har is the Hebrew word for mountain. The meaning of magedōn is disputed. The most common view, following the variant reading mageddōn in Rev 16:16, identifies it as Megiddo, site of notable battles in Israel’s history (Judges 5; 2 Chr 35:22–25) and thus an apt designation for the place where “the battle of the great day” occurs. In addition to the frequent objection that there is no mountain of Megiddo, the area being rather a vast plain, Torrey stressed the fact that the vicinity of Jerusalem is where Biblical prophecies uniformly locate the eschatological crisis in which the armies of the nations assemble against God and his people.[3] He cited passages like Zechariah 12 and 14, Joel 3(4), Isa 29:1–7 and, of particular relevance, Rev 14:14 ff. (esp. v. 20) and 20:7 ff. (esp. v. 9), which parallel 16:14–16 in the structure of the Apocalypse.[4]

Torrey’s own solution, developing an earlier conjecture by F. Hommel, was to trace har magedōn to the Hebrew har môʿēd (cf. Isa 14:13), “Mount of Assembly.” He noted the appropriate association of har môʿēd with Jerusalem and dealt with the question of transcriptional equivalence. The apparent differences between the Hebrew har môʿēd and the har magedōn rendering can be readily accounted for. Representation of the consonant ʿayin by Greek gamma is well attested. Also, in Hebrew -ôn is an afformative to nouns, including place names.[5]

2. Antipodal to the Abyss. Supportive of the derivation of har magedōn from har môʿēd is the fact that each of these expressions in its single Biblical appearance is paired with Hades as its polar opposite on the cosmic axis. In the Isa 14:13 context the contrast is drawn between the heights to which the king of Babylon aspires as the site of his throne and the depths to which he is actually to descend. He will not ascend to the har môʿēd, above the stars of God, to the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn, “heights of heaven,” as he boasts (vv. 13–14), but will be brought down to the yarkĕtê bôr, “depths of the Pit” (v. 15).[6] Correspondingly, in the book of Revelation har magedōn (16:16) is contrastively paired with Abaddōn (9:11), another Hebrew term, here the name of the angel of the Abyss, and in its OT appearances a synonym of Sheol (Job 26:6; 28:22; 31:12; Ps 88:12; Prov 15:11; 27:20). The Abaddon of Rev 9:11 is then the equivalent of the Sheol and Pit of Isa 14:15. And the har (mountain) element in har magedōn (Rev 16:16) of course contrasts with the Pit of Abaddon, as does the har in har môʿēd (Isa 14:13).

That har magedōn is to be perceived as paired with Abaddōn even though they do not appear in the same immediate context is indicated by certain factors besides their antipodal semantic relationship. One is that in the book of Revelation these two terms, and these alone, are described as Hebraisti, “in Hebrew.”[7] Another factor is their parallel placement in the literary structure of the Apocalypse: Within an overall chiastic arrangement they appear in the corresponding series of the trumpets and the bowls of wrath, in each case at the climax.

In short, then, we find that in Isaiah 14 and the book of Revelation there are matching antonymic pairings of har môʿēd and har magedōn with the pit of Hades. Within the framework of this parallelism the har môʿēd of Isa 14:13 is the equivalent of the har magedōn of Rev 16:16 and as such is to be understood as its proper derivation and explanation. Accordingly, har magedōn signifies “Mount of Assembly/Gathering” and is a designation for the supernal realm.

As an appendix to this point we would note that the term môʿēd, if seen as the Hebrew behind magedōn, provides a further point of linkage for the pairing of har magedōn and Abaddōn. For in Job 30:23 the Death/Sheol realm denoted by Abaddōn is called the bêt môʿēd, “house of gathering.” Though Job longs to come to God’s place of judgment, the heavenly council gathered on the har môʿēd, he is sure only of being brought down with all who live to their common appointed gathering, their house of gathering (bêt môʿēd) in Sheol. The association with môʿēd, “gathering,” thus shared by Abaddon and Har Magedon intensifies the irony of those Biblical passages where someone finds himself in Abaddon/Sheol who had laid claim to Har Magedon or gathered forces against it.[8]

3. Hebraisti. There is another overlooked clue to the meaning of har magedōn in Rev 16:16 itself. As noted in the discussion of the relationship between Har Magedōn and Abaddōn, each term is identified as Hebraisti (which can refer to Aramaic as well as Hebrew). Our clue has to do with a stylistic feature characterizing the appearance of such transliterated words in the Greek text of the NT: These words are regularly accompanied by an explanation of some sort, even by a translation sometimes. The Abaddōn counterpart to Har Magedōn in Rev 9:11 is a good example: “They had a king over them, the angel of the Abyss, whose name in Hebrew is Abaddon, and who has in Greek the name Apollyon (Destroyer).”

By way of further illustration it will sufice to mention those instances where the transliterated word is specifically identified as Hebraisti. These turn out to be all the more apropos in that this use of Hebraisti is an exclusively Johannine trait within the NT, with four instances in John’s gospel besides the two in Revelation.[9] In three of the cases in the gospel the word in question is the name of a place. In each case the context furnishes at least an identification of the place thus denoted, even if not a translation. In John 5:2 Bethesda (with variants Bethsaida, Bethzatha, Belzetha) is identified as a particular pool in Jerusalem having five porches or colonnades. Similarly, in John 19:13 the Aramaic Gabbatha (of uncertain meaning) is identified by the Greek term Lithostrōton (“stone pavement or mosaic”), the designation of Pilate’s judgment seat to which Gabbatha is appended. In the case of the reference to the site of the crucifixion in John 19:17 the Greek name Kraniou (“of the skull”) affords a translation of the Aramaic name Golgotha, which is added to it.[10] In John’s resurrection narrative the Aramaic rabbouni is at once explained by the Greek didaskale, “teacher” (John 20:16).

This consistent pattern creates a strong presumption that an accompanying explanation will be found in Rev 16:16 for Har Magedōn, the place name there with the Hebraisti label. Such an explanation can be shown to be present once it is recognized that Har Magedōn is based on har môʿēd. The semantic connection is between Magedōn and the main verb in the statement: “And he gathered (synēgagen) them into the place called in Hebrew Har Magedon.” The verb synagō interpretively echoes the noun magedōn—he gathered them to the Mount of Gathering. In effect it translates magedōn, establishing its derivation from môʿēd, “gathering.” Synagō is indeed the verb used in the LXX to render yāʿad (“appoint”; niphal “assemble by appointment”), the root of môʿēd (an appointed time or place of assembly).

An instructive parallel is found in Numbers 10, where an interpretive wordplay affords an explanation of ʾōhel môʿēd, “tent of meeting/gathering,” which symbolically points to the same heavenly reality that the har môʿēd represents.[11] Directions are given to Moses that at the sounding of a certain trumpet signal “the whole assembly (ʿēdâ, from the root yāʿad) shall gather (yāʿad) unto you at the entrance to the Tent of Meeting (ʾōhel môʿēd)” (v. 3). The verb of gathering that brings out the significance of ʾōhel môʿēd is rendered in the LXX of Num 10:3 by the same synagō that explains har magedōn in Rev 16:16.[12] Num 10:3 thus corroborates our view of how synagō functions in Rev 16:16.

We conclude that the evidence of the Hebraisti clue in Rev 16:16 clinches the case for the har môʿēd derivation of har magedōn.

II. Har Magedon, Mount Zaphon/Zion

Appositional to har môʿēd in Isa 14:13 is the phrase yarkĕtê ṣāpôn (Zaphon). Accordingly, what is disclosed about ṣāpôn, and particularly yarkĕtê ṣāpôn, in this and other contexts will contribute to our picture of the har môʿēd and thus of Har Magedon. The data that emerge through the Zaphon connection will also be found to confirm further the derivation of har magedōn from har môʿēd.

1. Zaphon, realm of deity. In texts from Ugarit on the north Syrian coast, Zaphon is the name of a mountain about thirty miles north of Ugarit that was regarded as the residence of Baal.[13] As a localized representation of the cosmic abode of the gods, Mount Zaphon shared its designation with the celestial realm. In the OT, ṣāpôn means “north.”[14] But it may also denote Zaphon, the terrestrial mountain;[15] or Zaphon, the mythological realm of the gods; or, as a demythologized figure, the heaven of the Lord God; or the holy mountain of God, Zion, as the visible earthly projection of God’s heaven.

The phrase yarkĕtê ṣāpôn appears in Ps 48:2(3); Isa 14:13; Ezek 38:6, 15; 39:2. Its meaning is clearly seen in Isaiah 14, where it stands in apposition with phrases (including har môʿēd) that refer to the heavens to which the king of Babylon aspires and in opposition to the yarkĕtê bôr into which the king will actually be cast. Some commentators, especially those who see a reference not to Zaphon the mountain of Baal but to a mountain of El farther north, would translate “the distant north.” It is evident, however, from the contrastive pairing with yarkĕtê bôr, the Pit of Sheol, that yarkĕtê ṣāpôn concerns a vertical, not horizontal, dimension. It refers not to a quarter of the earth but to a level of the cosmos, denoting the supernal realm, the celestial zenith, while its antipodal opposite, yarkĕtê bôr, denotes the infernal region, the netherworld nadir. In these phrases yarkĕtê, which in the singular means “side” and in the dual “recesses, extreme parts,” signifies the remotest reaches, the utmost height or depth.[16]

There are other passages where ṣāpôn has been understood as referring to the celestial realm. One is Ps 89:12(13). Above, it was cited as a possible instance of ṣāpôn as Mount Zaphon. Favoring that is the conjoined mention of mounts Tabor, Hermon and Amanus (taking ymn as an alternative for ʾmn), the mountain of El. Another view is that ṣāpôn here signifies “clouds,” an appropriate pairing being produced by emending yāmîn to yammîm, “seas.” Problematic for the rendering “the north and south” is the absence of a concept parallel to this in the context. What does parallel God’s creating of ṣāpôn and the south (v. 12[13]) is God’s founding of the heaven and earth (v. 11[12]). This favors understanding ṣāpôn as the heavens, with its lower cosmic counterpart designated “south” as a play on the meaning of ṣāpôn as “north.” Note also this psalm’s emphasis on God’s heavenly throne site (vv. 5–8, 13–14[6-9, 14–15]).

Job 26:7 is one of two passages in Job that contain a similar use of ṣāpôn.[17] Here again the perspective is cosmic with references to the upper and lower extremes of creation in illustration of the universal scope of God’s providential control. Sheol and Abaddon appear in v. 6 representing the lower region, and v. 7 then adds: “He spreads out ṣāpôn over emptiness; he suspends the earth on nothing.” Clearly, a vertical rather than horizontal dimension is in view. The ṣāpôn is the sky above the earth.[18] But beyond that, as the preceding mention of Sheol/Abaddon suggests, the visible heavens point to the invisible heaven of God’s abode.

The Zaphon with which har môʿēd (and thus har magedōn) is equated in Isaiah 14 is the celestial realm of deity. It should also be noted that through the tying in of the heaven-defying king with the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn in this passage, the antichrist associations of Har Magedon in the Rev 16:16 episode begin to come into focus here.

2. Zaphon/Zion. In Psalm 48 the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn connection yields the identification of Har Magedon with Zion, the earthly counterpart of the heavenly dwelling of Israel’s God-King. The opening verses of this psalm introduce its celebration of the supremacy of Yahweh, the Suzerain, and his mountain-city: “Great is Yahweh, and greatly to be praised, in the city of our God (v. 1[2]a, b, c); the mountain of his sanctuary, paragon of peaks, joy of all the earth (vv. 1[2]d, 2[3]a, b); Mount Zion, the heights of Zaphon,[19] city of the Great King (v. 2[3]c, d, e).”[20] Linking the city and mountain of God, this passage declares Zion/Jerusalem to be the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn. This establishes that har môʿēd (appositional to yarkĕtê ṣāpôn in Isa 14:13) is Mount Zion, and thereby that har magedōn is related to the city of Jerusalem (and not to be explained by Megiddo).

This identification of har môʿēd is also attested by passages (like Ps 74:4; Lam 2:6) that speak of Zion as the place of God’s môʿēd and the assembled congregation (ʿēdâ) of his people, and most graphically by the locating of the ʾōhel môʿēd, “tent of meeting,” and its temple continuation on Zion.[21] In the ʾōhel môʿēd God met (yāʿad) and spoke with his people (Exod 25:22; 29:42–43; Num 17:4[19]), his presence being mediated through the Glory theophany enthroned amid the cherubim. The tent was thus an earthly replica of the divine council in heaven, where the Most High sits as King surrounded by his assembled hosts.[22]

The relevance of Psalm 48 for Har Magedon extends beyond its identi-fication of yarkĕtê ṣāpôn, the har môʿēd equivalent, with Zion/Jerusalem. This psalm also relates how the rebellious kings gather (yāʿad) there against Yahweh (v. 4[5]), who shatters their advancing forces and secures the eschatological peace of his city (vv. 5 ff.[6 ff.]). All the key elements of the Har Magedon event of Rev 16:16 are united here in connection with the har môʿēd (Zaphon) site, a signal corroboration of the explanation of har magedōn as har môʿēd.[23]

Har môʿēd/magedōn is then the place of God’s royal presence, whether heavenly archetype or earthly ectype, where he engages in judicial surveillance of the world (Lookout Mountain); where he gathers the gods (cf. Ps 82:1) for deliberation (Council Mountain); where he musters his armies for battle (Marshal Mountain); where he assembles the company of his holy ones, spirits of just men made perfect with myriads of angels (Ecclesia Mountain).[24] Echoing Psalm 48, Heb 12:18–29 displays these varied facets of Har Magedon, Mount of Gathering, and identifies it as Zion, heavenly Jerusalem, city of the living God, the Great King.

The story of the earthly Har Magedon goes back to the beginnings of human history when this mountain of God rose up as a cosmic axis in Eden. There the battle of Har Magedon was joined as Satan challenged the God of the mountain and overcame the first Adam, the appointed guardian of the garden-sanctuary.[25] In redemptive history Zion was a typological renewal of Har Magedon, the setting at the dawning of the new covenant age for another momentous encounter in the continuing warfare, this time resulting in a decisive victory of Jesus, the second Adam, over the evil one. The typological Zion/Jerusalem provides the symbolic scenery for prophecies of the climactic conflict in the war of the ages. Through his antichrist beast and his allied kings gathered to Gathering Mountain, Satan will make his last attempt to usurp Har Magedon. But the Lamb, the Lord of the mountain, and his assembled armies will triumph in this final battle of Har Magedon, the battle of the great day of God Almighty (Rev 16:14–16; 19:11–21; 20:7–10).

III. Har Magedon And Magog

Following the trail of har magedōn back to har môʿēd has led us to examine a set of OT passages containing the phrase yarkĕtê ṣāpôn. From the first two (Isaiah 14; Psalm 48) it has appeared that har môʿēd/magedōn is identifiable with Mount Zaphon/Zion. Ezekiel 38–39 is a third such passage, and here we discover a fundamental correspondence between the Zaphon/Magedon and Gog-Magog concepts. That means that the Har Magedon crisis of Rev 16:14–16 (and the series of parallel passages in Revelation) is to be identified with the millennium-ending Gog-Magog event of 20:7–10. For the Revelation 20 passage is replete with allusions to Ezekiel 38–39, includ-ing, along with the explicit mention of Gog and Magog, the distinctive central theme of Ezekiel 38–39, the universal gathering of the world forces to destroy God’s people and their catastrophic overthrow by the descent of fiery judgment from heaven.[26] Accordingly it is generally acknowledged that Ezekiel’s prophecy and the vision of the loosing of Satan after the thousand years in Revelation 20 describe the same eschatological event.

A main consideration in establishing the identity of the Revelation 16 Har Magedon crisis and the Ezekiel 38–39 Gog crisis (and thus the Revelation 20 Gog crisis) is the antichrist element common to both.[27] The antichrist identity of the dragon-like beast in the Har Magedon episode would be acknowledged by most, irrespective of their millennial preferences. For the continuity of this beast of Revelation 16 with the fourth beast of Daniel 7 (in the final phase of its little-horn expression) is obvious, and in Daniel an alternative representation of this bestial eschatological foe is the self-deifying king of Dan 11:36, the figure interpreted by Paul as the antichrist (2 Thess 2:4). It remains now to show that the antichrist element is also conspicuously present in Ezekiel 38–39 among the other major features of this Gog-Magog prophecy that appear again in the Apocalyptic accounts of Har Magedon.[28] Gog’s antichrist characteristics may best be elicited through an examination of his provenance and his destination.

1. Provenance of Gog. A description of Gog’s place of origin is included in the opening account of his hostile advance with his military forces against the community of God’s people (Ezek 38:1–13). A condensed recapitulation of this portrayal of Gog appears as an introduction (38:14–16) to the next section, which presents God’s judgment on Gog (38:17–23), and once again by way of introduction (39:1–2) to the final section, which contains a double elaboration of the divine judgment (39:3–8; 39:9–29).[29]

Whatever details are omitted from the two abbreviated recapitulations of the opening section, one feature included each time is Gog’s provenance, the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn (Ezek 38:6, 15; 39:2). It is from the heights of Zaphon that God brings Gog with all his armies to overthrow them on the mountains of Israel. Gog is characterized by the antichrist syndrome: He is a pretender to the throne of heaven. The correspondence of his experience to the king of Babylon typology in Isaiah 14 is seen in the ironic motif of the polar contrast between his pretensions and his actual fate. Challenging Yahweh’s sovereignty on Zion, Gog would take possession of the mountain heights of Israel. But he ends up with his vast military array in the depths of a valley. He lunged for a heavenly throne but plunged into a netherworld grave. Not the lofty polis (city) of the divine Suzerain but a necropolis was his destiny.

The ironic reversal is underscored by puns. Instead of the glory of ṣiyyôn (Zion), Gog’s hallmark will be ṣiyyûn (Ezek 39:15), the marker that flagged for burial the corpses of his forces. The valley where his armies were buried is called the valley of the ʿôbĕrîm (Ezek 39:11), “those passing through or across,” a term used for the dead, those who cross over from this world to the next.[30] In that sense will they turn out to be ʿôbĕrîm who set out to be ʿôbĕrîm in the sense of invaders traversing the land of Israel as conquerors.[31] Another name given to the burial valley is gêʾ hămôn gôg (Ezek 39:11),[32] “valley of the multitude of Gog.” It recalls God’s wordplay interpretation of the new name, Abraham, he gave to Abram as a gift of grace: ʾab hămôn gôyîm (Gen 17:4–5), “father of a multitude of nations.” In quest of such name-fame Gog mustered his multitudes, but his hămôn-name proclaimed his shame. Whereas ʾab hămôn gôyîm prophesied of Abraham’s innumerable descendants out of all nations, elect in Jesus Christ and co-heirs with him of the kingdom of eternal life, the similar sounding gêʾ hămôn gôg signified the mountains of skeletons of Gog’s hordes, cleared from God’s kingdom land and cast into gêʾ hinnōm, the Gehenna valley of the dead, where the fire is never quenched.

The antichrist character of both the king of Babylon in Isaiah 14 and Gog in Ezekiel 38–39 is brought out by their connection with the yarkĕtê ṣāpôn. Gog, however, is not just an OT prefiguration but the antichrist of the final crisis. In Rev 20:7–10 the Gog-Magog assault on Zion marks the end of the millennium. Within Ezekiel 38–39 indications also abound of the eschatological finality of the Gog crisis. As in Revelation 20, it comes after a long age of secure preservation for God’s people (Ezek 38:8)—in NT terms, after the age in which the Church, though sorely persecuted, is preserved by the Lord to complete the great commission task (cf. e.g. Rev 11:7). And as the judgment on Gog in Revelation 20 merges with the resurrection of the dead for final judgment (20:11–15), so God’s judicial deliverance of his people from Gog in Ezekiel 38–39 institutes for them the eternal state of unending, never-again-disturbed felicity (39:21–29).

“Your [Gog’s] place” (mĕqômĕkā) stands in Ezek 38:15 (within the first recapitulation section) as a substitute for the previous “land of Magog” (Ezek 38:2; cf. 39:6). Indeed, the term is probably an etymological play on Magog. Māqôm would interpret the ma- in Magog (explained either by the Akkadian māt, “land of,” or as the Hebrew noun prefix signifying “place”).[33] The second syllable would then be taken as the name Gog, a name borne by an earlier Anatolian king (Gugu or Gyges) and here created out of Magog to serve as a symbolic pseudonym for the future antichrist foe. Even if “your [Gog’s] place” is not intended as an etymological explanation of Magog, it certainly functions in this context as an equivalent of Magog. And since “your place” is identified as yarkĕtê ṣāpôn in Ezek 38:15,[34] its equivalent, Magog, is likewise identified as yarkĕtê ṣāpon—and thus as har môʿēd/magedōn.

In fact māqôm could by itself, like yarkĕtê ṣāpôn, carry the idea of divine dwelling site. In Deuteronomy māqôm is used repeatedly for the place God would choose for his throne and residence—namely, Jerusalem (e.g. Deut 12:5, 14; 14:22–23; 15:20). In 2 Chr 36:15 it is used by itself as the designation of God’s temple. It is equated with the mountain of Yahweh (Ps 24:3) and refers to God’s royal abode in heaven (Isa 26:21; Mic 1:3). In the light of this usage, “your [Gog’s] place” in Ezek 38:15 would by itself seem to signify the position of supreme divine authority that Gog claimed. Along with yarkĕtê ṣāpôn it would be an expression of Gog’s antichrist pretensions. The theme that thus emerges in Ezekiel 38–39 is that of Gog’s coming from his place to challenge God at his place.

The Ezekiel 38–39 account of Gog’s Zaphon provenance harks back to the Noahic chapter in the story of the mountain of God. The list of nations gathered by Gog begins and ends with northern nations near Gog’s land of Magog (Ezek 38:2–6). Also, in the basic passage identifying Gog (38:2–3) and in the second recapitulation of it (39:1) Gog is titled Prince-Head of (Anatolian) Meshech and Tubal. Included in the mountainous territory of these northern nations was the Ararat region where Noah’s ark came to rest.

Noah’s ark was designed as a replica of the three-story universe, the cosmic city-temple of God (cf. Isa 66:1).[35] Established in sabbatical rest on the Ararat mountaintop, the ark was a redemptive restoration of the mountain of God in Eden, itself a replica of the heavenly Zaphon.

Supportive of the allusive relation of Ezekiel 38–39 to the flood event is the fact that the list of the seven military nations gathered by Gog, along with the three mercantile peoples introduced in 38:13, is patently based on the Genesis 10 list of nations that developed in the postdiluvian movement of the Noahic families out from Ararat. Indeed, the northern nations more closely associated with Gog, and Magog itself, appear at the head of the Genesis 10 list (vv. 2–3).

Understood against this Ararat background, Gog’s pretensions are again exposed as nothing less than claiming for himself the headship over the traditional mount of deity in his ancestral land in the north. Genesis 11 reports that the Babel-builders attempted a rebellious restitution of the lost Eden/Ararat mountain of God. Gog takes the challenge against the God of Zaphon to the ultimate, antichrist stage.

2. Destination of Gog. As related in Ezekiel 38–39, Gog’s antichrist challenge takes place according to God’s preannounced purpose and his sov-ereign orchestration of the event. Lured by the Lord to this final confrontation, Gog advances against “the mountains of Israel” (39:2, 17). It is God’s chosen Mount Zion in the heart of those mountains that is his central point of attack. As in the case of the mustering of the bestial armies in Revelation 16, the destination and intended target for Gog and his hosts is Har Magedon, where the Lord’s Anointed is enthroned at his right hand.

The indications for this are clear, even though Zion is not mentioned by name in Ezekiel 38–39. God does speak of the mountains of Israel as “my mountains” (38:21) and of the land of Israel as “my land” (38:16). Implicit in that is the royal mountain-city where Yahweh dwells and rules over the mountainous domain he claims as his own. Also, such a capital city on the cosmic mountain was regarded as the center of the earth, and in 38:12 Gog is described as scheming to assault the people of God dwelling at “the center (lit. navel) of the earth.”[36] In that concept Gog’s real objective is exposed—Yahweh’s Mount of Assembly, rival to Gog’s pseudo-Zaphon. In the Revelation 20 version of Ezekiel 38–39, Gog’s armies are explicitly said to compass “the beloved city” (v. 9), which is Jerusalem/Zion.

Though the term ṣāpôn is not applied to the mountain of God’s Pres-ence in Ezekiel 38–39, it is so used at the beginning of the book to denote the divine source of the prophet’s visions. In Ezek 1:4 the storm-wind (rûaḥ sĕʿārâ),[37] the fiery cloud (ʿānān) that is the theophanic chariot, is said to come from Zaphon.[38] The same term for storm, sĕʿārâ, is used for God’s golden whirlwind confrontation of Job (Job 38:1; 40:6), for the theophanic chariot in Elijah’s translation into heaven (2 Kgs 2:1, 11), and for the storm chariot of the divine warrior advancing above his people as their defender (Zech 9:14). Ezekiel saw the theophany “coming” not as a storm moving across the earth from the geographical north[39] but as a parousia advent out of heaven. Ezekiel 1:4 is an expansion of the introductory statement (v. 1) that heaven was opened and Ezekiel saw visions of God. The storm-cloud theophany of v. 4 corresponds to the visions of God in v. 1, and the ṣāpôn of v. 4 is the heavens of v. 1. Divine appearances are comings, advents. Anticipatively setting the scene for Yahweh’s revelation to Job out of the theophanic storm (sĕʿārâ, Job 38:1), Elihu announced that God’s awesome golden majesty was “coming.” Indeed, it was “coming from ṣāpôn” (Job 37:22).[40] The ṣāpôn of Ezek 1:4 is then the heavenly site of God’s Glory, the celestial place of God’s enthronement,[41] here opened up to be accessed by Ezekiel, as was characteristic of the call experience of OT prophets. It is therefore in keeping with an attested concept and terminology of Ezekiel if we interpret the Ezekiel 38–39 scenario as a coming of antichrist Gog from his pseudo-Zaphon to challenge Yahweh on his true Zaphon. Agreeably, Gog’s coming is portrayed in 38:9, 16 as a coming like a storm-cloud over the land and thus as a counterfeiting of the storm-cloud parousia of God’s Glory by a pseudo-parousia.

The antichrist identity of the Gog figure of Ezekiel 38–39 is evidenced by the identification of this archenemy with the pseudo-Zaphon in the north and by his gathering of his universal hordes against Mount Zion, the authentic Zaphon/Har Magedon.

Some detect in this motif the influence of the myth of the conflict be-tween the gods of order and the chaos powers. In Ugaritic texts, for example, it is in connection with Baal’s sovereign station at Zaphon that he must do battle against such rival divine beings. And with respect to Ezekiel 38–39 in particular, M. C. Astour suggests a more specific inspiration in the Cuthean Legend of Naram-Sin, which relates the ordeal of that king against northern hordes that are the embodiment of chaos demons.[42] But whatever imagery of the chaos myth has been taken up into the Scriptures, it appears there as demythologized figures of speech. In the Bible the conflict is not cosmological-existential but redemptive-eschatological.

3. Millennial applications. According to the premillennial position, the thousand-year era of Rev 20:1–6 with the Gog-Magog episode at its close (vv. 7–10) follows chronologically the judgment of the antichrist beast portrayed in Rev 19:11 ff. A common and telling criticism of this view calls attention to various points of identity between the Rev 20:7–10 crisis and the one referred to in 19:11 ff. (and the series of parallel Apocalyptic passages, including 16:14–16).

The war (polemos) of Rev 20:8 is certainly “the war of the great day of God, the Almighty,” the battle of Har Magedon described in 16:14–16. In each case it is the war to which Satan, the dragon, gathers the nations of the whole world. This universal gathering against the Lamb and the city beloved of the Lord is also referred to as Satan’s deception of the whole world through the signs wrought by his agents, the beast from the sea and, particularly, the false prophet. Indeed, this theme of the deception-gathering appears in a series of five passages in the Apocalypse, concentrically arranged according to the subject(s) of the action, with 16:13–16 the centerpiece and 20:7–9 the concluding member. Satan as the ultimate deceiver is the subject in the first member of the chiasm (12:9) and in the last (20:7–9), where the deception is specified as the gathering. The false prophet, acting in association with the dragon-like beast, is the subject in the second member (13:14), which speaks of his world-deceiving signs, and in the fourth (19:17–20), where his deceptive signs are identified with the gathering of the kings of the earth against the messianic horseman and his armies. At the center of the chiasm (16:13–16) all three subjects appear together as the source of the demonic signs by which the kings of the whole earth are gathered to Har Magedon for the great war. This identification of Satan with his two agents in the disastrous enterprise is also brought out in the fifth member of the chiasm (20:10).[43]

The identity of the war of 20:7–10 with the antichrist-Har Magedon battle is further indicated by other parallels between Satan and the beast. In Revelation 20 Satan emerges from his imprisonment in the Abyss, instigates his final challenge against the Lord and his city, and goes to his doom (vv. 7–10). The beast comes up out of the Abyss in the climactic stage of the eighth king, makes war against the witnesses of the Lamb in the true Jerusalem, and goes to his destruction (17:8–14; cf. 11:7–8; 19:20).

Our thesis at this point is that Ezekiel 38–39 proves to be the common source behind Rev 20:7–10 and the series of passages in Revelation refer-ring to the antichrist-parousia event. Cataloguing the details that substantiate this will at the same time underscore and supplement the evidence cited above for the correspondence of Rev 20:7–10 and the other Apocalyptic passages with one another.

The relationship of Rev 20:7–10 to Ezekiel 38–39, obvious enough from the adoption of the Gog-Magog terminology in Revelation 20, is also evidenced by a set of basic similarities: the marshaling of hordes from the four quarters of the earth (Ezek 38:2–7, 15; 39:4; Rev 20:8); the march of the gathered armies to encompass the saints in the city of God, center of the world (Ezek 38:7–9, 12, 16; Rev 20:9); the orchestration of the event by God (Ezek 38:4, 16; 39:2, 19; Rev 20:3, 7); the timing of the event after a lengthy period in which God’s people were kept secure from such a universal assault (Ezek 38:8, 11; Rev 20:3); the eschatological finality of the crisis (Ezek 39:22, 26, 29; Rev 20:10 ff.); and the fiery destruction of the evil forces (Ezek 38:22; 39:6; Rev 20:9–10).[44]

Just as clearly, the Gog-Magog prophecy of Ezekiel 38–39 is a primary source drawn on by Rev 16:14–16; 19:17–21 and the other Apocalyptic prophecies of the final conflict. Prominent in these passages is the major feature that marked the dependence of Rev 20:7–10 on the Ezekiel prophecy—namely, the universal gathering of the enemy armies (Rev 16:14–16; 17:12–14; 19:19; and compare 6:15 with Ezek 39:18–20), including too the historical setting of that event at the close of this world-age (Rev 6:12–17; 11:7–13; 16:16–17 [cf. 17:10–14]; 19:15–21), following an era in which it is given to the Church to fulfill its mission of gospel witness (11:3–7; cf. 12:6, 14).

Further (and of central interest in this essay), the Har Magedon of Rev 16:16 is identifiable with Mount Zaphon, the provenance of Gog in Ezekiel 38–39. Particularly important is the significance of this location for the identity of Gog. His claimed lordship over the Zaphon site of the divine council, a challenge to the true Lord of Har Magedon, reveals the Gog of Ezekiel 38–39 to be the bestial antichrist agent of Satan in the Apocalyptic prophecies of the war of the great day. Such self-exaltation over all that is called God is the affront of this man of sin that provokes the parousia of the Lord Jesus to overthrow and destroy him (2 Thess 2:3–10). The pseudo-parousia attributed to this antichrist, a spectacle of satanic deception (2 Thess 2:9), is another feature found in Ezekiel’s prophecy where, as we have noted, Gog’s coming is portrayed as an advent in storm-cloud theophany (Ezek 38:9, 16).

Also, beast symbolism is used for the antichrist phenomenon in Revelation, and beast imagery is applied to Gog in Ezek 38:4; 39:2. Extensive evidence of the Ezekiel source is afforded by the Apocalyptic accounts of God’s judgment on the beast. Instruments of judgment mentioned by both Ezekiel and John include earthquake (Ezek 38:19–20; Rev 6:12; 11:13; 16:18–20), sword (Ezek 38:21; Rev 19:15, 21) and destructive hail and fiery brimstone (Ezek 38:22; 39:6; Rev 16:21; 19:20). Most striking is the distinctive motif of God’s summoning the birds and beasts to feed on the carcasses of the defeated armies Gog had gathered, the banquet theme elaborated in Ezek 39:4, 17–20 and incorporated into the account of Christ’s victory over the beast and his assembled armies in Rev 19:17–18.

The conclusion is amply warranted that Ezekiel 38–39 is the common source of Rev 20:7–10 and the passages earlier in Revelation that deal with the eschatological battle. This confirms the standard amillennial contention that the Gog-Magog episode of Rev 20:7–10 is a recapitulation of the accounts of the Har Magedon crisis in these other passages. And the capstone for that argument is what we have discovered about the equation of Har Magedon (môʿēd) with Gog’s place, Magog, the equation established by the Zaphon connection in Isa 14:13; Psalm 48; Ezekiel 38–39. It now appears that the very term har magedōn itself identifies the Rev 16:14–16 event as the Gog-Magog event of 20:7–10.

Revelation 20:7–10 is not, as premillennialists would have it, an isolated, novel episode, not mentioned elsewhere in the book of Revelation. Rather, it belongs to a series of passages, including Rev 19:11–21, which premillennialists rightly regard as referring to the antichrist-Har Magedon crisis and the parousia of Christ. It therefore follows that the thousand years that precede the Gog-Magog crisis of Rev 20:7–10 precede the Har Magedon-parousia event related in the other passages. Har Magedon is not a prelude to the millennium, but a postlude. Har Magedon marks the end of the millennium. And that conclusion spells the end of premillennialism.

The conclusion that Har Magedon is the end of the millennium also contradicts the preterist approach to the Apocalypse. Preterists interpret the series of passages (except for Rev 20:7–10) that we have taken as prophecies of the final conflict as referring instead to past events, like the fall of Jerusalem or the collapse of the Roman empire. This approach with its drastic reductions of the Apocalyptic emphasis on the final global Gog crisis is understandably popular with postmillennialists, whose distinguishing notion is that the present age, the millennium, is—at least in its latter phase—a time not only of surpassing evangelistic success for the Church but one of outward prosperity and peace.[45] Indeed, postmillennialism of the theonomic reconstructionism variety, in keeping with the theonomic insistence that Torah legislation enforcing the theocratic order is definitive of the Church’s duty today, anticipates that the millennial success of the Church’s mission will involve its worldwide political dominance and the forcible elimination of public practice of non-Christian religions. They expect a fulfillment in this Church age of the OT prophecies of the restoration of the kingdom in the dimension of external dominion to the ends of the earth.[46]

For such postmillennial expectations, the Biblical forecast of a global surge of anti-Christian forces as the immediate precursor of the parousia is obviously a problem. The postmillennialists’ strategy is to confine the problem to Rev 20:7–10 by adopting the preterist approach and then to try to minimize the enormity of the crisis described in that passage. But once the preterist option is removed, their exegesis loses all plausibility as they attempt to deal with the whole series of Har Magedon-Gog passages and the recurring, progressively elaborated theme of the worldwide suppression of the gospel witness in which the millennium issues. Actually, Rev 20:7–10 by itself refutes the postmillennial projections, for it is evident there that the nations of the world have not become officially “Christianized” institutions during the millennium.[47] That is in accord with the consistent eschatological pattern of Scripture. In the visions of Daniel 2 and 7, for example, the imperial power clearly retains its beast-character throughout history, ultimately prevailing against the saints. Not until the parousia of the Son of Man and the final, total elimination of the bestial empire do the people of the Most High receive the kingdom of glory and universal dominion.

Recognition of the identity of the Har Magedon and Gog-Magog events thus proves to be decisive for the rejection of any view, premillennialist or postmillennialist, that understands the millennium as an age that witnesses the fulfillment (at least in a provisional form) of the OT prophecies of the coming of God’s kingdom in external earthly grandeur. The kingdom of glory does not come until final judgment is executed against antichrist/Gog, and therefore not before the end of the millennium. There is no transitional stage in its appearing between the first and second advents of Christ. The glory kingdom comes only as a consummation reality and as such it abides uninterrupted, unchallenged for ever and ever.

Here is the fundamental difference in the eschatology of the several millennial views, the difference that our names for them should reflect. Two of the views are pre-consummation. They hold that a (transitional) realization of the OT prophecies of the kingdom as an external imperial power occurs during the millennium and thus before the consummation. These two can be distinguished from each other in terms of how they relate the millennium to the parousia as pre-parousia (the postmillennialists) and post-parousia (the premillennialists).[48] The amillennial position alone represents the post-consummation view of the coming of the kingdom of glory.[49]

Notes

1. C. C. Torrey, “Armageddon,” HTR 31 (1938) 237-248.
2. See also Rev 6:12–17; 11:7–13, 18; 13:7; 14:17–20; 17:11–14. Cf. M. G. Kline, “A Study in the Structure of the Revelation of John” (unpublished). A full exposition of the recapitulatory structure of Revelation will be found in the forthcoming commentary on this book by G. Beale in NIGTC.
3. The prophetic idiom is typo-symbolical, not literal, but that is a separate issue.
4. Cf. Ps 48:1–8(2–9); Isa 24:21–23; Mic 4:11–13; Zeph 3:8.
5. Examples especially pertinent in the present context are ṣāpôn, ʾăbaddôn, and the spelling of Megiddo as mĕgiddôn in Zech 12:11.
6. For further discussion of the terms yarkĕtê and ṣāpôn see below.
7. Perhaps a desire to flag the correspondence with Abaddōn prompted the addition of -ōn to magedōn.
8. For a similar situation involving the ʾōhel môʿēd, the tent of gathering, compare the experience of Korah in Numbers 16.
9. Cf. nai, amēn (Rev 1:7).
10. The explanatory role of the Greek is clear in the Aramaic-Greek sequence found in Matt 27:33; Mark 15:22.
11. On this see further below.
12. For other examples of yāʿad translated by synagō in the LXX cf. Neh 6:2, 10; Ps 48:4(5).
13. “Zaphon” has been traced to ṣpw/y, “to look out” (used e.g. in Ps 66:7 for God’s surveillance of the nations from the heights of heaven), or to ṣpn, “to hide.” Opinions differ on whether its application to Mount Zaphon was direct or secondary, with a (storm)wind as the primary designee.
14. Most now explain this as another instance of naming quarters of the globe after prominent topographical features, in this case after Mount Zaphon to the north of Israel.
15. Ezekiel 32:30; Ps 89:12(13) are possible instances of this usage.
16. The semantic equivalent of yarkĕtê ṣāpôn is found in the Ugaritic ṣrrt ṣpn, apparently meaning “insides/heart of Zaphon.” Interestingly, one text in which this expression appears deals with a pretender to the divine throne—namely, with Ashtar the Rebel’s futile attempt to ascend to Zaphon and occupy the throne of Baal.
17. The other is Job 37:22; on this see below under the discussion of Ezek 1:4, another such passage.
18. The astronomical reference in v. 7a is to the pole of the ecliptic, devoid of stars (so M. M. Kline in unpublished address). Another view is that ṣāpôn refers to the clouds suspended in the sky. Cf. J. De Savignac, “Le sens du terme Sâphôn,” UF 16 (1984) 273-278.
19. There is no comparative preposition before yarkĕtê ṣāpôn and no need to take this as comparatio decurtata (cf. GKC 118r).
20. This arrangement (contrary to the numbered verses) into three triplets (A.B.C.) brings out some artful poetic features: the correspondence of the three cola (a.b.c.) of B and C (on the equivalence of Bc and Cc, cf. Isa 24:10–11); the summary inclusio provided by Cc with Aa-c. In Biblical and mythological texts reference to the exalted throne-city of deity tends to prompt clusters of descriptive phrases in apposition.
21. Cf. Ps 15:1. Similarly in Canaanite mythology the tent of the deity and his mountain are conjoined.
22. Cf. Ps 78:69. On the replication of the heavenly archetype in the tabernacle see M. G. Kline, Images of the Spirit (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1980) 39- 42.
23. The same situation obtains in Ezekiel 38–39, to be examined presently.
24. In secular texts both the Greek ekklēsia and equivalents of môʿēd are used for a civil assembly. An example of the latter is the designation of the Byblos assembly in the Wen-Amun text.
25. See M. G. Kline, Kingdom Prologue (privately published, 1993) 76.
26. For further details see below.
27. “Antichrist” is used here in the popular sense, as a designation for the man of sin figure referred to in 2 Thess 2:3–10.
28. It may be recalled that such Har Magedon features were observed in the other yarkĕtê ṣāpôn passages. Psalm 48 relates the marshaling of enemy forces against Zaphon/Zion, and in Isaiah 14 the antichrist aspect of the Rev 16:16 episode is articulated in the aspirations of the king of Babylon, a prototypal antichrist who claims for himself supremacy on har môʿēd.
29. The two elaborations on the destruction of Gog are arranged in thematic parallel, each treating in turn (1) the destruction of Gog’s weaponry (vv. 3, 9–10), (2) death-burial (vv. 4a, 11–16), (3) banquet (vv. 4b–5, 17–20), and (4) devastation of the nations (vv. 6a, 21).
30. Cf. Job 34:20; Ps 144:4. See M. S. Odell, “The City of Hamonah in Ezekiel 39:11–16: The Tumultuous City of Jerusalem,” CBQ 56 (1994) 479- 489.
31. Cf. Ezek 14:17; Zech 9:8.
32. Cf. hămônâ (Ezek 39:16).
33. As in māqôm itself.
34. Cf. Ezek 38:2–6, where Magog (v. 2) and yarkĕtê ṣāpôn (v. 6) form an inclusio for the survey of nations gathered by Gog.
35. See Kline, Kingdom Prologue 139-140.
36. Cf. Ezek 5:5.
37. The combination of rûaḥ with sĕʿārâ involves a play on rûaḥ as both wind/breath and Spirit, frequent in references to the Glory-Spirit theophany.
38. Haṣṣāpôn exhibits the use of the definite article for unique objects, like the sun; cf. GKC 126, 2(c).
39. This is the common interpretation of haṣṣāpôn. Confusingly it identifies sĕʿārâ as the stormy approach of enemies from the north (a recurring theme in Ezekiel, to be sure) after first recognizing that it is the Glory theophany of Yahweh.
40. See the comments above on the use of ṣāpôn in Job 26:7 for the cosmic north, heaven, the polar antithesis of Sheol/Abaddon.
41. In Ezek 3:12 this locus of God’s Glory is called “his place,” another term for the seat of divine sovereignty. The vision of the Glory-Spirit in Ezekiel 43 (explicitly linked, v. 3, to the prophet’s opening vision) describes it as “the place of my throne” (v. 7).
42. M. C. Astour, “Ezekiel’s Prophecy of Gog and the Cuthean Legend of Naram-Sin,” JBL 95 (1976) 567-579.
43. The NIV foists a pluperfect sense on the verbless clause that refers to the fate of the beast and false prophet.
44. Some of these points were mentioned earlier by way of demonstrating that the Gog of Ezekiel 38–39 is the final antichrist.
45. The postmillennial label is often given to those whose optimism is limited to the evangelistic sphere. See below for a suggested revision of millennial terminology.
46. Cf. D. Chilton: “All nations are absolutely required to be Christian, in their official capacity.. .. Any nation that does not submit to the all-embracing rule of King Jesus will perish; all nations shall be Christianized. .. in this world as well as in the next,” The Days of Vengeance (Fort Worth: Dominion, 1987) 489, commenting on Rev 19:16.
47. This problem drives some to the so-called consistent preterist position, which extends the preterist hermeneutics to Rev 20:7 ff. and so regards as past history what all others recognize as events that will usher in the world to come.
48. Their shared pre-consummation status signalizes a hermeneutical kinship between theonomic postmillennialists and (dispensational) premillennialists: Both fail to understand the typological nature of the Israelite theocracy
49. Within the post-consummation view there is room for differing expectations as to the extent of the Church’s missionary success and of Christian influence on culture, as long as the latter is perceived within the limits imposed by the terms and guarantees of God’s covenant for the common order (cf. esp. Gen 8:20–9:17). It is a basic theological flaw in all pre-consummation views that their millennial scenarios entail violations of those divine covenantal commitments.

I COME!!! 4-9-23@ 10:07am

My Redeemer Lives - Nicole C. Mullen

The First Resurrection

By Meredith G. Kline

[Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, Hamilton, Massachusetts.]

One of the critical points in the exegesis of Revelation 20 is the interpretation of prōtos in the phrase, “the first resurrection” (v. 5). Premillennarians understand it in the purely sequential sense of first in a series of items of the same kind. They interpret both “the first resurrection” and the resurrection event described in verses 12 and 13 of this chapter as bodily resurrections. The contextual usage of Prōtos, however, does not support such an exegesis; it rather points compellingly to an interpretation of “the first resurrection” found in (so-called) amillennial exegesis.[1]

The Meaning of Prōtos

The vision of the recreation of the world in Revelation 21:1ff will be a good starting place for our survey of the relevant data concerning prōtos. This word is employed here as the opposite of “new.” The consummation of history brings “a new heaven and a new earth” (v. 1) and a “new Jerusalem” (v. 2). Indeed, God as Consummator will make “all things new” (v. 5). And the word “first” is used for that which is superseded by the “new”: “the first heaven and the first earth were passed away” (v. 1). Indeed, when God makes all things new, all “the first things” pass away—tears, death, sorrow, crying, pain (v. 4). In this passage to be “first” means to belong to the order of the present world which is passing away. Prōtos does not merely mark the present world as the first in a series of worlds and certainly not as the first in a series of worlds all of the same kind. On the contrary, it characterizes this world as different in kind from the “new” world. It signifies that the present world stands in contrast to the new world order of the consummation which will abide forever.

An alternate term for “new” in Revelation 21 is the word “second.” The death that is identified with the lake of fire and is the eternal counterpart to the death that belongs to the order of “first things” (v. 4) is called “the second death” (v. 8). Thus “second” as well as “new” serves as the antithesis of “first.” Whatever accounts for the preference for “first” over “old” in describing the present world, the use of “first” naturally led to the use of “second” alongside of “new” for the future world, particularly for the future reality of eternal death for which the term “new” with its positive redemptive overtones would be inappropriate.

In this antithetical pairing of first death (an expression virtually contained in verse 4) and “second death” (v. 8), Revelation 21 confronts us with the same idiom that we find in Revelation 20 in “the first resurrection” (vss. 5, 6) and the second resurrection (an expression implicit in this chapter). The arbitrariness of the customary premillennial insistence that “the first resurrection” must be a bodily rising from the grave if the second resurrection is such is exposed by the inconsistent recognition by premillennial exegesis that, although the first death is the loss of physical life, “the second death” is death of a different kind, death in a metaphorical rather than literal, physical sense.

Before tying the data of Revelation 21 into the interpretation of Revelation 20 more closely, it will be useful to take notice of certain other New Testament instances of the use of prōtos in antithetical pairs, these too descriptive of comprehensive historical-eschatological structures.

In the Book of Hebrews the terms “first” and “new” are used to distinguish the Mosaic and the Messianic administrations of God’s redemptive covenant (cf. 8:7, 8, 13; 9:1, 15, 18; 10:9). The new covenant is also called “the second”: “He taketh away the first, that he may establish the second” (10:9). Here then in this terminology for the two-covenant pattern is the identical pairing of terms, including the same alternate for “new,” that we find in Revelation 20 and 21.

Although the term “second” appears along with “new,” it is “new” that predominates as the counterpart to “first.” Accordingly, the significance of “first” in this context is not so much priority in a series but opposition to the idea of “new.” Prōtos thus functions here as an equivalent for “old,” our traditional designation for the Mosaic covenant. Indeed, the author of Hebrews expressly observes that when God speaks of a “new covenant, he hath made the first old,” adding, “Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away” (8:13). This contrast between the first and new covenants does not correspond exactly to that between the first and new worlds in Revelation 21, but in both cases the reality described by the term “first” is one that passes away. In Hebrews as in Revelation 21 prōtos is used for the provisional and transient stage in contrast to that which is consummative, final, and enduring.

A similar usage of prōtos is found in connection with Paul’s treatment of the theme of resurrection in 1 Cor 15. Once again there is a binary pattern with contrasting parts which together span all history. In contraposition in this pattern stand the two Adams. The “first man Adam” (v. 45; cf. vv. 46f) is not first in the sense of heading an indefinite series of Adams but first in the antithetically qualitative sense of being counterpart to the “last Adam” (v. 45). Here again “second” appears as an alternate term of contrast to “first”: “the second man is the Lord” (v. 47). By eliminating the thought of any intermediate Adams between the “first” and “last” Adams, the term “second” here, as in the Hebrews and Revelation 21 passages, underscores the binary (as over against indefinitely seriatim) framework within which prōtos is functioning and derives its specific meaning.

The first Adam is earthy and psychical; the last Adam is heavenly and Spiritual (vv. 45, 47). Because of the federal positions occupied by the two Adams the qualities of each one also inform the life sphere at the head of which he stands (vv. 44–49). “First” is thus correlated with the preliminary, pre-consummative phase of kingdom development over against the eschatologically final stage of the kingdom which bears the image of the last Adam. The connotative force of prōtos in this passage is further articulated in the distinguishing elements of the world order that emerges out of the fall of the first Adam: dishonor, weakness, corruption, death (vv. 42f).

Instructive linguistic and theological parallels to the usage of prōtos in Revelation 21 are thus afforded by the exposition of the covenant theme in Hebrews and by the Pauline treatment of the two Adams. Like Revelation 21, Hebrews uses “first” for an historical stage that passes away. Like Revelation 21, Paul uses “first” and its opposite in 1 Cor 15 for a two-fold structure comprehensive of cosmic history. In none of these passages does prōtos function as a mere ordinal in a simple process of counting objects identical in kind. In fact, precisely the reverse is true in all three passages; in each case it is a matter of different kinds, indeed, of polar opposites. Whatever idea of priority still attaches to prōtos in these passages, it is thoroughly subordinated in all of them to the function of expressing in combination with an antonym (“new,” “second,” or “last”) a sharp antithesis. As for Revelation 21 itself, the framework within which prōtos performs its antithetical function is that age-spanning structure of biblical eschatology which divides universal history into the two stages: this world and the world to come. To be called “first” within that pattern is to be assigned a place in this present world with its transient order. That which is “first” does not participate in the quality of consummate finality and permanence which is distinctive of the new kingdom order of the world to come.

The Meaning of “The First Resurrection”

An interpretation of prōtos in keeping with the usage and meaning of the word found in Revelation 21 is required in Revelation 20, specifically in the expression “the first resurrection.” The proximity of the Revelation 20 and 21 contexts and the general thematic continuity between the two chapters would be enough to suggest and indeed to create a presumption in favor of such an interpretation. But the matter is put beyond reasonable doubt by the striking fashion in which the first- (second) resurrection pattern is interlocked in the “thousand years” context with the (first)-second death pattern of Revelation 21.

Thus, in the account of the post-millennial resurrection for final judgment in Revelation 20:13ff the issue of that judgment for those not found in the book of life is “the second death,” “the lake of fire” (v. 14). And, most to the point, “the second death” formula is directly conjoined with “the first resurrection” formula in the very verses where the latter expression appears: “This is the first resurrection. Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power” (vv. 5b, 6a). “The second death” is thus utilized right within the explanation of what “the first resurrection” is. Clearly the usage of prōtos in the first-(second) resurrection pattern must be the same as the usage of prōtos in the intertwined (first)-second death pattern, which is itself part of the broader first-new things pattern of Revelation 21.

“The first resurrection” is not, therefore, the earliest in a series of resurrections of the same kind, not the first of two (or more) bodily resurrections. The antithetical usage of prōtos in this context requires a conclusion diametrically opposite to the customary premillennial assumption. If the second resurrection is a bodily resurrection, the first resurrection must be a non-bodily resurrection.

The specific meaning prōtos bears in this context, as well as its grammatical function, contradicts the interpretation of “the first resurrection” as a bodily resurrection. For bodily resurrection is man’s introduction into the final order of the world to come. That which is constituted through the experience of bodily resurrection is permanent; it belongs to the sphere of consummated things. But the meaning of prōtos in this context is, as we have seen, antithetical to consummation and permanence. That which is “first” belongs to the order of the present passing world. “The first resurrection” must then be something this side of bodily resurrection, some experience that does not bring the subject of it into his consummated condition and final state.

What then is meant by “the first resurrection”? The answer must certainly be sought in terms of the striking paradoxical schema of which the expression is an integral part. In this arrangement two binary patterns are combined into a complex double pattern with antithesis between the parts within each pair (i.e., the first-new contrast) and also between the two pairs themselves, the one having to do with death and the other with resurrection. As we shall see, there is also a criss-crossing pattern of connections between the two pairs, “the first resurrection” and “the second death” being the explicit and metaphorical members of the two pairs, while the first death links with the second resurrection, both being implicit and literal.

Within this schematic pattern, where we would expect to find mention of the second resurrection we find instead “the second death.” When describing the event of bodily resurrection that at least includes if it is not exclusively concerned with the unjust (v. 13), the author deliberately does not refer to it as a “resurrection.” For the true significance of the event is to be found in the destiny in which it issues and in the case of the unjust the grave delivers them up (v. 13) only to deliver them over to the lake of fire (v. 15). Hence, the real meaning of the resurrection of the unjust to physical life is conveyed by the paradoxical metaphor of death, “the second death” (v. 14).

The proper decipherment of “the first resurrection” in the interlocking schema of first-(second) resurrection and (first)-second death is now obvious enough. Just as the resurrection of the unjust is paradoxically identified as “the second death” so the death of the Christian is paradoxically identified as “the first resurrection.” John sees the Christian dead (v. 4). The real meaning of their passage from earthly life is to be found in the state to which it leads them. And John sees the Christian dead living and reigning with Christ (vv. 4, 6); unveiled before the seer is the royal-priestly life on the heavenly side of the Christian’s earthly death. Hence the use of the paradoxical metaphor of “the first resurrection” (vv. 5f) for the death of the faithful believer. What for others is the first death is for the Christian a veritable resurrection!

This interpretation of “the first resurrection” is consistent with the contextual force of prōtos as descriptive of the pre-consummation stage of things. For bright as is the prospect that is opened up by the identification of dying in Christ as a resurrection to heavenly glories with exemption from the power of the second death assured (v. 6), that state is still not the ultimate glory of the Christian. It stands on this side of consummation. It is only the intermediate, not the final state.

The other major amillennial interpretation of “the first resurrection,” which views it as regeneration or baptism into Christ, would also meet the contextual requirement that prōtos refer to an experience within the present course of history. However, it does not handle satisfactorily the paradoxical schema we have been examining: in particular, it misses the clear correlation of first death and “first resurrection” in this pattern. It also encounters other difficulties. If “the first resurrection” were regeneration, the death of which “the first resurrection” was the triumphant reversal would be fallen man’s death in sin, his unregenerate state. But the living and reigning (v. 4) which is “the first resurrection” (v. 5) is surely to be regarded as answering to the death experience described earlier in the same verse, the death of Christian martyrdom: “(I saw) the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus…and they lived.” Though this martyrdom imagery is apparently a concrete, typical individualization of a more general kind of experience and is in that sense figurative, it is clearly a Christian experience that this figure portrays. Martyr death would obviously be a most unsuitable figure to depict death in sin. It would be incongruous even for the Christian experience of dying to sin. Those who participate in “the first resurrection” are not those who are dead in sins but those who are righteous in Christ. Their martyrdom is not the kind of death for which spiritual regeneration would be the remedy, but it is itself a consequence and seal of a spiritual regeneration that has been manifested in faithful Christian witness (cf. Revelation 2:10; 12:11). The same problem surfaces in the reference to “the rest of the dead” who do not take part in “the first resurrection” (v. 5). On the interpretation under criticism this would be another group of the unregenerate and verse 5 would then become a rather pointless statement to the effect that the unregenerate are unregenerate during the thousand years. However significant the theological observation that triumphant Christian death belongs to a spiritual process whose source is regeneration, spiritual resurrection from death in sin simply is not what is meant bv “the first resurrection” in Revelation 20:5f.

The Beatitude of the Christian Dead

For the Christian, to die is resurrection. This interpretation of “the first resurrection” finds further confirmation in the fact that the blessedness of Christian death is a recurring theme in the Apocalypse, as was to be expected in a book of its origin and purpose. The support is the stronger in that the parallelism between Revelation 20 and the other occurrences of this theme involves the literary form in which it is expressed. In fact, the parallels in concept and terminology are so close as to make the identification quite unmistakable.

In Revelation 20 “the first resurrection” prospect takes the shape of a beatitude: “Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power, but they shall be priests of God and of Christ, and shall reign with him a thousand years” (v. 6). This is one of the seven beatitudes of the Apocalypse (cf. 1:3, 14:13; 16:15; 19:9; 22:7, 14). Christian death is also the subject of the second beatitude in this series: “Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth: Yea, saith the Spirit, that they may rest from their labours; and their works do follow them” (14:13). This Sabbath blessing is very much the same as the millennial blessing of Revelation 20:6. For the biblical concept of sabbath rest includes enthronement after the completion of labors by which royal dominion is manifested or secured (cf., e.g. Isa 66:1). The sabbath rest of the risen Christ is his kingly session at God’s right hand. To live and reign with Christ is to participate in his royal sabbath rest. In Revelation 20:6 this blessedness is promised to those who have part in “the first resurrection” and in the Revelation 14:13 equivalent it is pronounced on the dead who die in the Lord. A similar promise of rest is given to the martyrsouls in the vision of the opening of the fifth seal (Revelation 6:11).

The letter to the church in Smyrna in Revelation 2 contains a section that closely parallels Revelation 20:4–6 in its treatment of the blessedness of Christian death. Like the Revelation 20 passage it speaks of martyrdom and promises that through such death the “crown of life” will be secured, a life exempt from “the second death”: “be thou faithful unto death, and I will give thee a crown of life…He that overcometh shall not be hurt of the second death” (vv. 10b, 11b). An additional point of resemblance is the contextual reference in both passages to the activity of Satan (2:9, 10 and 20:2f, 7ff). There is also the intriguing possibility of a relationship between the numerical symbols of the ten days of tribulation (2:10) and the thousand years of reigning (20:4, 6). The intensifying of ten to a thousand together with the lengthening of days to years might then suggest that the present momentary tribulation works a far greater glory to be experienced even in the intermediate state as the immediate issue of martyrdom. The equation of the state of Christian death referred to in this letter with “the first resurrection” state of Revelation 20 is of course firmly established by the common contextual mention of “the second death” (not found in any other context), the same assurance of deliverance from this “second death” being given in both cases. But the “crown of life” promise in Revelation 2:10 is also a strong confirmation of this equation. The crown, stephanos, though it might be the festive garland might also be the royal crown. If the latter image is intended here, the “crown of life” promised to the Christian dead is precisely the nominal equivalent of the verbal “they lived and reigned” in the account of the experience that attends “the first resurrection” in Revelation 20:4ff.

The way “the first resurrection” is identified with living and reigning with Christ a thousand years in Revelation 20:4–6 has the effect of connecting the qualifying force of prōtos quite directly to “the thousand years.” The millennium as such is virtually called a “first” age. It falls within the days of this present passing world characterized by “the first things.” The Parousia with its concomitant consummative events of resurrection and judgment must then follow these “thousand years.” The premillennial view of the Second Advent is excluded.

The postmillennial view will not do either. If the “thousand years” are, as postmillennarians hold, a late concluding phase of the interadvental age, and if (as is then the case) Revelation 20 is the only place in the book where this special phase of kingdom development is mentioned, it would not seem possible to discover a satisfactory explanation for the almost exclusive focus of this one and only millennial disclosure on the intermediate state, while nothing is said, beyond what might be implied in the prior binding of Satan, about the distinctive situation of the church and the nations on earth during the thousand years. This same difficulty obtains on the premillennial view. On an amillennial approach, earthly developments in church and world during the time denoted by the “thousand years” are dealt with all through the book. The special attention given to the church in heaven in Revelation 20 is then simply a supplemental emphasis and quite understandable in this book, as we have noted.

If the postmillennial view were to account at all plausibly for the almost total concentration on the intermediate state in the Revelation 20 description of the millennium, the justification would have to involve the assumption that the features here assigned to the intermediate state were at least peculiar to the millennial phase of it. But if the millennium is restricted to a late phase of the present church age, such an assumption is quite unacceptable. For in this book the beheaded faithful who provide the individualizing image for the Christian company who are said to live and reign during the thousand years (20:4) will naturally be understood to include those persecuted first century believers with whom the author identified himself as a companion in tribulation for the testimony of Jesus. And certainly, according to the perspective of the series of Apocalyptic beatitudes to which Revelation 20:6 belongs, the Christian dead have participated in the blessedness of the millennial “first resurrection,” the blessedness of the intermediate state of royal rest with Christ, from the time of the church’s beginnings when the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ was revealed on Patmos. For the voice from heaven said to John: “Write, Blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth” (14:13).

Notes

1. Two articles on Revelation 20 appearing in the forum of this journal within the last two years (cf. The Westminster Theological Journal 35, 3 (1973), 281–302 and 36, 1 (1974), 34–43) were in agreement on the negative conclusion at least that “the first resurrection” is not a bodily resurrection. I find that the supplementary evidence for that conclusion to be offered in the present comments is not altogether unanticipated in the commentary literature, but I wish to call attention to it because it seems to be generally overlooked in current discussions and because it has, I believe, a quite decisive bearing on the whole millennial issue.

Because He Lives (Official Music Video) | Celtic Worship