Revelation 20 gives the most straightforward statement of the Millennium and what is supposed to happen therein.
How does it fit into the wider part of Revelation and eschatology in general?
There are 3 main views:
- Amillennial – Christ reigns for 1000 symbolic/figurative years with his church and returns bodily at the end.
- Premillennial – the 1000 years is literal during which Christ bodily returns to earth and reigns on earth with his Church over unbelievers.
- Postmillennial – Christ reigns from heaven through his saints on earth for the 1000 literal years and then returns at the end.
- Preterism – Christ has already returned spiritually, and reigns through his saints now. He may/may not return physically. This will not be addressed here.
This is not an exhaustive discussion, as many have competently done this before me. I thoroughly recommend “A Basic Guide to Eschatology” by Millard Erickson. It is a short, but good starting point for those seeking to understand the study of the end times. This page simply examines the treatment of Revelation 20 in the various systems.
Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven holding the key to the abyss and a great chain in his hand. 2 He seized the dragon, that ancient serpent who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years. 3 He threw him into the abyss, closed it, and put a seal on it so that he would no longer deceive the nations until the thousand years were completed. After that, he must be released for a short time.
Revelation 20:1-4
Amillennialism
Amillennialism (Amil) and Post-millennialism (Postmil) are often indistinguishable unless clear delinations are used. For the purposes of this page, the exact differences are unimportant, as they largely have the same exegesis of Revelation 20, which is the focus of this page. Therefore, many of the critisisism of Amil, will be revisited in the Post-mil section, but addressed from a different angle.
Amil holds that the 1000 years is a figurative time of the expansion of the kingdom of God as men’s hearts and minds are brought into right fellowship with God and each other.
For the Amillenialist, the binding of Satan in the pit occurred at the cross. Post-millennialists and Amillennialists want to interpret ἔδησεν figuratively to mean bound in a spiritual sense so that Satan cannot work his evil during the present age. And so their claim is that despite appearances to the contrary, Satan is not free to roam (cf Rev 2:3; 1 Pet 5:8). Thus, the reigning of the saints (Revelation 20:4) is achieved spiritually as Christians faithfully bring all things into submission to him, of undefined duration.
For me, this view is contradicted by history and Scripture. Revelation 12 explicitly describes Satan’s time on earth after the ascension of Jesus, showing Satan moving and acting without bounds, which Peter describes as:
Your adversary the devil is prowling around like a roaring lion, looking for anyone he can devour.
1 Peter 5:8
Daniel 12 says that the power of the saints will be shattered during this time, until the return of Christ. Paul writes that Satan is active (Romans 16:20; 1 Corinthians 7:5; 2 Corinthians 2:11, 11:14, 12:17; 1 Timothy 1:20, 5:15; Revelation 2:13). It is indeed difficult to reconcile the idea that Satan cannot deceive the nations, with the events of the last 2000 years, and with Scripture. Indeed, Jesus himself says that the saints would be persecuted (Matthew 24) almost to extinction rather than reigning, and he doubts as to whether there will be faith on the earth at his return (Luke 18:8). Jesus does not describe a world in subjection to Christ nor of a reign by the saints, nor of a world where Satan is bound, unable to deceive.
From an exegetical perspective, Revelation 20:4-5 bookends the start and end of the 1000 years, whereby the start of the 1000 years is led by saints who refused the Mark of the Beast and other persecuted saints. This passage is intimately connected with the preceding chapters, especially chapter 19, and does not stand alone as a separate vision or event. The end of the 1000 years is marked by Satan being thrown into the Lake of Fire where the Beast and False Prophet are already (verse 10), who were thrown there in Revelation 19:20.
If the start of the 1000-year reign has saints who refused the Mark pushed by the false prophet, then the false prophet and Beast must be before the 1000-year reign. But chapters 19 and 20 are so intimately connected and sequenced, the only place that Christ’s return is specifically mentioned is in Revelation 19:11-21, and one must do great contortions to see Christ’s return after the millennium in Revelation 20, because it is not mentioned there at all.
Revelation 19:20 describes the Beast and False Prophet being thrown into the lake of fire. An identical description occurs in Daniel 7:11-12, whereby the Beast is thrown into the lake of fire. While Revelation 19:21 describes the armies following the beast being killed, it does not mention the armies of the rest of the world. Daniel 7:12 says that they are allowed to live for a time.
11 “I watched, then, because of the sound of the arrogant words the horn was speaking. As I continued watching, the beast was killed and its body destroyed and given over to the burning fire. 12 As for the rest of the beasts, their dominion was removed, but an extension of life was granted to them for a certain period of time.
Daniel 7:11-12
The remainder of Daniel 7 reads very much like the start of Revelation 20. All in all, these passages suggest the binding of Satan occurs at the start of the 1000 years (after the Beast and False Prophet are thrown into the lake of fire) at the same time that the saints are resurrected, and then there is a 1000-year reign of the saints before Satan is also thrown into the lake of fire and the rest of the dead are resurrected.
Special mention should be made concerning the phrases “they came to life” and “this is the first resurrection”. The amil view is that this is conversion. I will address just three reasons why this does not fit the text:
- The phrasing of Revelation 20 suggests that these saints came to life after they had been beheaded, or after they refused the Mark of the Beast, not that they reigned through being beheaded or refusing the Mark. Since they came to life after they were beheaded, it cannot be symbolic of conversion.
- And the phrase “the rest of the dead did not come to life until the thousand years were completed” indicates that the rest-of-the-dead came to life in the same way that the reigning saints came to life in the previous verse. This implied second resurrection, is agreed by all to be a physical resurrection at the end of the 1000 years. However, the saints (not being the “rest of the dead”) are excluded by the text as having already undergone “they came to life”. And if the “rest of the dead” “come to life” in the same manner, as the saints, the 1st resurrection cannot be a conversion.
- To be resurrected requires that life has already been lived and died. Paul writes that this resurrection occurs at Christ’s coming (1 Corinthians 15:23, 51-52), and does not connect it to conversion. Much more can be written about this, but Scripture equates conversion with “birth” “and being “born again”, not resurrection. While both do have the term “made alive” applied to them, even the amil does not suggest that “made alive” only applies to spiritual events.
This is rudimentary stuff. If the above is true, one must wonder how the Amil Reformers could have missed it. I have several theories, but it boils down to a lack of understanding, through no fault of their own. The angel speaking to Daniel about the times of the end, says that the understanding would be kept secret until then (Daniel 12:4, and 12:9).
While Amil goes back to the time of Augustine, and even to Tyconius, it was rooted in the time that Christians saw the ascendancy of the Church to civil power in the Roman Empire which appeared without a miraculous interposition of Jesus. Augustine associated this church as the visible empirical form of the Kingdom of God. Thus it seemed that the fulfillment of prophecy was indeed spiritual, not literal.
The Refomers looked around and saw the Catholic Church, which many called the anti-christ, and Whore of Babylon, but failed to see other fulfilments. And, when we fail to see literal physical fulfilment after so long, we naturally, like Abraham seeking to fulfill God’s promises through Hagar, seek to see these promises come alive in our time, positing that these prophecies are fulfilled spiritually.
Even so, many of the Reformers had great insight into the literal, physical fulfilment of Revelation, especially in chapters 4-11. Jonathan Edwards wrote extensively on how Islam fulfilled many of the acts described in chapters 7-9. Many others wrote about Islam and Revelation (click here) or wrote about the 1260 days of Revelation 12 are years (click here). However, critical things mentioned by Daniel and the angel were understandably missed because they were to be kept secret, such as correctly identifying the Abomination of Desolation, which is key to understanding Jesus, Paul, Daniel and Revelation.
With all of that said, Amil does recognise that many prophecies are not as literal as many pre-mil teach.
Post-Millennial
Post-millenialism holds the view that as the gospel goes forth, individuals and nations will be converted. The start of the 1000 years is not marked by a cataclysm, but at some point in its often imperceptible growth. It holds that rather than Jesus reigning bodily on earth, he reigns through his saints.
Post-millennialism has the Amil difficulty in the sequence of Revelation 20 in its context. While they rightly exegete that the 1000 years cannot be an arbitrary amount of time, it nevertheless also disputes the nature of the binding of Satan which we have dealt with above. Revelation is one description after another of Satan treading down the saints. It is not descriptive of a gloriously reigning church where all nations submit to Christ.
Revelation 12 describes Satan being thrown to Earth, and actively attacking the saints, which climaxes in Revelation 19, where Jesus personally intervenes, throwing the Beast and False prophet into the Lake of Fire. Revelation 20 is the first hint that Satan will be bound in the abyss, unable to deceive, and then in verse 20:7, Satan is released for a short time, before being thrown into the Lake of Fire where the Beast and False prophet are already. It is difficult to reconcile that Satan is bound in the abyss, with Satan roaming around seeking who he may devour and trampling the saints. These two ideas are opposites.
PostPost-millennialism bases its view on very carefully selected verses. Matthew 24 undeniably indicates a worsening world prior to Christ’s return.
Revelation 20:7 does not mention a return of Jesus or the conclusion of the age; it merely announces the final judgement of Satan being thrown into the Lake of Fire, where the Beast and False Prophet are already. It also does not say that the nations were evangelised before Christ’s return. In fact, the clearest description of the millennium does not mention the return of Christ at the end of the 1000 years or of the rapture of the saints. In this whole description, the closest description we find is that the saints come to life at the start of the 1000 years which is in contrast with the “rest of the dead” who do not come to life until the 1000 years are over. If the phrase “come to life” means a spiritual resurrection in verse 4, the same phrase in verse 5 must mean the same thing. Thus, the “come to life” must mean a physical resurrection: the rapture.
Postmillennialism hinges itself on Jesus sitting at the right hand of the Father until the Father makes Christ’s enemies his footstool (Luke 20:43; Acts 2:35; Hebrews 1:13; 10:13).
However, Paul writes that Jesus is actively reigning now:
22 For just as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.
23 But each in his own order: Christ, the firstfruits; afterward, at his coming, those who belong to Christ. 24 Then comes the end, when he hands over the kingdom to God the Father, when he abolishes all rule and all authority and power. 25 For he [Christ] must reign until he puts all his enemies under his feet. 26 The last enemy to be abolished is death. 27 For God has put everything under his feet. Now when it says “everything” is put under him, it is obvious that he who puts everything under him is the exception. 28 When everything is subject to Christ, then the Son himself will also be subject to the one who subjected everything to him, so that God may be all in all.
1 Corinthians 15:22-28
In other words, Jesus is active in bringing his enemies under his feet now, and is not passively waiting for this to happen.
Considering NT eschatology, postmillennialism mistakes the cause of the millennium (the evangelization of the world) for the nature of the millennium. Put another way in Jesus’ words, the good news being preached to the whole world will cause the end to come (Matt 24:14), and the end will consist of the fullness of Christ’s reign and kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Thus, the evangelization of the world is preparatory for the reign of Christ, not the reign of Christ itself. Moreover, Rev 20:4-6 suggests a future, eschatological, bodily resurrection for God’s people during the millennium, not a spiritual, mystical resurrection in the heavenly realms. Thus, postmillennialism does not align with an exegetical reading
of Rev 20:1-10.1
Optimistic vs. Pessimistic Eschatology
One of the criticisms that Amil and Post-mil level at Pre-mil is that it is “pessimistic” seeing the defeat of the church before Christ’s return, while they regard themselves as “optimistic” believing in a glorious church having conquered the world before Christ’s return. Obviously Pre-mil will strongly disagree with their assessment. And I do not think these emotive labels are a sound way to determine Biblical truth. In fact, Jesus’ hope for the church is “Look, I am coming soon” (Revelation 22:7, 12), not that “you will usher in a great Christian age before I return.”
There are numerous passages that depict the saints being defeated before Christ’s return, one only has to read Matthew 24, and Revelation to see this. And while there are passages that speak of a church growing and being victorious, there is no hint that this occurs prior to his return. So the Pre-mil would shout their optimistic belief that Jesus is coming soon.
Rather than an optomisim that we can build this utopia, our optimism is in Christ’s return. Indeed it is our hope as we long for his appearing (Titus 2:13; 2 Timothy 4:8).
For the optimistic post-millennial, there are fewer Christians proportionally now, than there were 500 years ago; the world is awash with more immorality and perversion than ever before; heresies abound in “Christian” churches. If a shrinking base of Christians and growing immorality constitutes an optimistic view, I do not think they understand what optimism means.
Confounding Arguments
One of the arguments, is that the battle of Armageddon (chapter 19) and the Gog-Magog (chapter 20) war are the same event, described differently, rather than as reads naturally from the text, one before and one after the 1000 years. But this argument necessitates the question, how much of Revelation is therefore after Satan is released at the end of the 1000 years? And no Amil or Post-mil dares an answer. The numerous depictions of Christ’s return throughout the book of Revelation, under that argument, necessitates the entirety of Revelation 4 onwards to be at the end of the Millennium, which means that Jesus spoke more about what happens during the conclusion of the millennium rather than the last 2000 years.
Historical Notes
Historic premillennialism is the earliest interpretation of Rev 20:1-10 by the early church. Although Origen (A.D. 185-254) and Augustine (A.D. 354-430) later rejected historic premillennialism by developing
amillennialism, second century church fathers such as Papias (ca. A.D. 70-155), the Epistle of Barnabas (ca. A.D. 70-150), Justin Martyr (ca. 100-165), Irenaeus (ca. A.D. 130-202), and Tertullian (ca. A.D. 155-220) all shared this premillennial view. So then, amillennialism (4th century), postmillennialism (18th century), and dispensational premillennialism (19th century) are all later theological developments that have very little grounding in an exegetical reading of Rev 20:1-10. Historic premillennialism (2nd century), however, is both exegetically grounded in Rev 20:1- 10 and also represents the earliest interpretation of Rev 20:1-10 by the early church. For these reasons, historic premillennialism is much to be preferred.2