Comments on Revelation Chapter 20/ Volume Six

The Catholic epistles—James through Jude in the New testament—form a necessary foundation in the bedrock upon which we Christians must build a sound superstructure of falsifiable yet infallible eschatology—and that is what this Volume Six of our Comments on Revelation 20 will endeavor to do.

w first century Christians grew from being a small despised and persecuted minority; how they transformed from being a tiny germ hidden inside the fiery crucible of late militant sectarian Judaism to the ostensible victor in A.D.70 to become the single winner of the Messianic contest by the default of all Jewish efforts, to the contrary is a great enigma that has puzzled and confounded historians, researchers, and scholars for hundreds of years. 

Despite plausible efforts to attribute Christianity’s success to St. Paul’s extensive travels (he labored in over fifty cities and traversed over 6,900 miles of road and sea) or the accidental or coincidental realities of the Roman world—its precise Greek lingua franca, its secured highways, and byways protected from robbers and gangs, its policed naval routes that protected ships and boats from pirates, its precise jurisprudence, which saw to it that a legal process was carried out in the face of each alleged charge for a crime—each theory that attempts to answer questions of how and why Christianity beat the odds in terms of Paul of Tarsus or his writings or preaching or the Roman Empire’s policies or infrastructure falls far short because none of them ever answers the question of the anomalous and providential Jewish military setbacks and failures to apprehend the hoped-for kingdom of God when they had every advantage and resource in that same period.

The fact remains that the Christians were not a collective group welcome in any positions of power (either socially, religiously, politically or militarily). Nor did they have a state or a stable base from which they could operate in safety away from foes and forces hostile to their beliefs, persons, and possessions (Hebrews 10:32-34). 

Humanly speaking, no agency was on their side and yet after all the expenditures the Jews were willing to spend to achieve their objectives of a discrete Jewish nationalist Third Temple, territory, kingship, and army, the fledgling Christians received the prize and became the unsung survivors of an explosive seventy years of bloody Messianic wars. It was the Christians (not the Jews) who went on to become the most successful revolution in the entire history of mankind, totaling almost three billion human beings as we speak! 

Why and how did this happen?

I propose in this essay that Revelation 20—which is neglected, but more often bent and distorted or (for all practical purposes) obsolete in every other form of eschatology, Futurist or Preterist—contains a unique transition period (a critical link quite different from the one that bridges A.D.33 to A.D.66). 

In this unique period, I aim to show that the work of Christ, the Apostles and the first Christians matured and blossomed further beyond the point of simply the Destruction of the Second Temple and first century Jerusalem.

Indeed, what was planted in the ground on the Day of Pentecost (in A.D.33), and what was saved from annihilation in the A.D.66-70 Jewish imbroglio between the Zealots and the Christians in the run-up to the Fall of Jerusalem, was made ready to stand on its own two feet as a legitimate force to be reconned with once the disappearance of a brand new Israelite State from the stage of world history had became an undeniable established fact.

I also hope to demonstrate that the Gog/Magog prediction (foretold so vividly in Ezekiel chapters 38-39 and briefly hinted at in Revelation 20:7-15) constitutes an ancient Hebrew military power surge at its sudden and unsuspecting zenith but equally catastrophic Waterloo in mid-second century classical Roman antiquity.

But above all I would like to maintain simplicity in this study.  This is a simplicity that will allow students of the Scriptures (from any level of familiarity with the subject) to cross-reference and begin to recognize how the events in Revelation chapter 20 interrelates with prophecies in Ezekiel and Daniel, Matthew and Luke, Romans and 1 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians and Revelation chapters 2, 3, 12-13 through 19 and how the narrative flow, sequence, and consequences of a Bible interpretation of a fleshly renaissance led to nothing less than fatal outcomes that reverberate to this very day in the Jewish psyche.¹

If this feat can be achieved, I believe a deeper understanding of the function, genius, and logic of Revelation chapter 20 and what it represents in real Jewish salvation history can be successfully transmitted to be a template for independent analysis, peer review and, of course, further studies.

Matthew Chapter 4-7

Matthew 8:5-12

Matthew 10:1-23

Matthew 11:16-21

Matthew 12:43-45

Matthew 16:1-2

Matthew 16:27-28

Matthew 21:33-46

Matthew 22:

Matthew 23:29-39

Matthew 24-25

Matthew 26:64

Matthew 27-28

Endnotes

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²

³

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Relatedd

Revelation 20

King James Version (KJV)

1 And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand.

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Matthew 11:16-19; Matthew 12:43-45; Matthew 22:1-14;

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To begin with a discussion about the thousand years of Revelation has to take into consideration the specific generation our Lord spoke of in Matthew 11:16-19.  1 The social world of the Apostles Matthew 10:23

• In Matthew 10:23 Jesus said his return would be early, certainly within reach of the Apostles lifetime.

A Specific Generation

2 This generation discussion . . .here. MATTHEW 11:16-19.

• In Matthew 11:16-19 “this generation” stands for the contemporaries of our Lord’s earthly ministry.

The Wicked Spirit’s U-Turn and No Going Back

• In Matthew 12:43-45 the departure and turn around time for Satan was foretold to be within the parameters of the marked generation (εντός των παραμέτρων της επισημασμένης γενιάς–the very same γενιάς as Matthew 11:16-19).

3 Now, when dealing with text and context what should be the aim of the interpreter? The aim of the interpreter is not to hold true to some preconceived notion, idea, or agenda, but to remain true to the flow of the story, from its inception, its body, and its conclusion. And as we hinted at before, the Gospels, Matthew and Mark, Luke and John are that “topic sentence”–a topic sentence where Jerusalem and the Second Temple existed in full view of the light of the day or the candle and moonlight by night.

The Acts, the epistles, and the bulk of the Book of Revelation insinuate this same sacerdotal reality at least up to Revelation chapter 19 and then we must examine key places in Revelation where miscomprehension severely hampers progress because prior notions insidiously inserts itself.

• Revelation 2:9 and 3:9 are such that pride of place makes sense only if the city and the Second Temple are still intact and no defeat or humiliation has been suffered.
• Revelation 6:10-15 assumes that the Second Temple is intact. It is a spiritual recepticle of the souls of Christians who had been brutally killed for their belief in Jesus as the Son of God and in his third day resurrection.  There is direct evidence from Josephus that the souls of a multitude of people already disincarnated where abiding under the Altar of the Second Temple.⁵ 
• Revelation 11:1-2 assumes that the Second Temple was intact and directly indicates that the prophecies of our Lord found in Matthew 24:15 and Mark 13:14 were being fulfilled–which puts the events of Revelation 11:1ff at the autumn events of A.D.66
• Revelation 16:21 also assumes the Second Temple still existed because we know from Josephus that Titus and Vespasian launched their catapult attacks against Jerusalem’s city walls starting only in April fo A.D.70 and the siege of the city and the downfall of the Temple happened one hundred and twenty days later on the 9th and 10 of Av.

On Saturday, 17 Tammuz 3831 (or 14 July A.D.70 of that year) the sacrifices and oblations in the Second Temple ran completely out.  That office was over–as the Book of Hebrews had already predicted. 

From all this information we can safely conclude that the events of Revelation 19:1-4, at the very latest, happened in the summer of 3831, 9-10 of Av precisely on the Gregorian calendar dates of Saturday and Sunday the 4-5 August, A.D.70.  In other words, our historical progress has brought us all the way up to the paean of Revelation 19:1-4: THERE IS NO SECOND TEMPLE OR FIRST CENTURY JERUSALEM AFTER THIS POINT IN THE REVELATION NARRATIVE.

Important Considerations for Christian

Officials, Teachers, and Bible students

Below are a list of points that will help remind Christian leaders, teachers, and students a systematic way of thinking about the issues we are discussing in this essay . . .

3 The King’s Son’s Wedding . . .Matthew 22:1-14

• Even in the immediate days and years after the crucifixion Satan was not off the scene in Judæa:  See, e.g., the case of Ananias and Sapphire in Acts 5:1-9.  That was in at least A.D.34.

In 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 the Apostle Paul declared boldly,

“But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:  In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.” 

How could Satan be the god of the world if he was already being confined and punished in the bottomless pit?  Nothing in the Gospels, nothing in Acts, and nothing in 2 Corinthians comes anywhere close to suggesting that Satan was already cast into an abyss!

See, moreover 2 Corinthians 11 which textual authorities believe was written during the reign of Nero in A.D.55.⁵  Satan, according to the Apostle Paul, was among the false brethren and Israelite false prophets and alive and well enough to make them appear as ministers of light while he himself was able to transform to appear as an angel of light–he certainly wasn’t bound in the bottomless pit nor fit with leg-chains to limit his actions and reach!  

The Book of Ephesians provides even more information on the whereabouts of Satan.  According to authorities it was written either in the years 60–61 or 61–62 while Paul was incarcerated in Rome.  But what the Apostle Paul says in chapter 2 and chapter 6 is extremely relevant to our discussion and completely appropriate for reflection.  If Satan was already in the bottomless pit what Paul says in Ephesians 2:1ff MAKES NO SENSE WHATSOEVER.  He can do nothing with or in the children of disobedience if he is already out of the air and supposedly incarcerated! 

The next occasion that alerts us to where Satan was in A.D.49-51 is 1 Thessalonians 2:18 where the Apostle Paul writes, 

“13 For this cause also thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe.  14 For ye, brethren, became followers of the churches of God which in Judæa are in Christ Jesus: for ye also have suffered like things of your own countrymen, even as they have of the Jews: 15 Who both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary to all men: 16 Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins alway: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost.  17 But we, brethren, being taken from you for a short time in presence, not in heart, endeavoured the more abundantly to see your face with great desire. 18 Wherefore we would have come unto you, even I Paul, once and again; but Satan hindered us. 19 For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at his coming? 20 For ye are our glory and joy” (1 Thessalonians 2:13-20).

We know from Hegesippus that our Lord’s half brother was executed at Passover in A.D.62 (this incident is also hinted at in Josephus’ Antiquities of the Jews 20.9.1:197-203 where the political circumstances surrounding his death are explain in great detail.  Hegesippus’ account reads as follows–

Concerning the Martyrdom of James,

the Brother of the Lord, From Book V.

“James, the Lord’s brother, succeeds to the government of the Church, in conjunction with the apostles. He has been universally called the Just, from the days of the Lord down to the present time. For many bore the name of James; but this one was holy from his mother’s womb. He drank no wine or other intoxicating liquor, nor did he eat flesh; no razor came upon his head; he did not anoint himself with oil, nor make use of the bath. He alone was permitted to enter the holy place: for he did not wear any woollen garment, but fine linen only. He alone, I say, was wont to go into the temple: and he used to be found kneeling on his knees, begging forgiveness for the people-so that the skin of his knees became horny like that of a camel’s, by reason of his constantly bending the knee in adoration to God, and begging forgiveness for the people. Therefore, in consequence of his pre-eminent justice, he was called the Just, and Oblias, which signifies in Greek Defence of the People, and Justice, in accordance with what the prophets declare concerning him.

Now some persons belonging to the seven sects existing among the people, which have been before described by me in the Notes, asked him: "What is the door of Jesus?” And he replied that He was the Saviour. In Consequence of this answer, some believed that Jesus is the Christ. But the sects before mentioned did not believe, either in a resurrection or in the coming of One to requite every man according to his works; but those who did believe, believed because of James. So, when many even of the ruling class believed, there was a commotion among the Jews, and scribes, and Pharisees, who said: 

“A little more, and we shall have all the 

people looking for Jesus as the Christ.”

They came, therefore, in a body to James, and said: “We entreat thee, restrain the people: for they are gone astray in their opinions about Jesus, as if he were the Christ. We entreat thee to persuade all who have come hither for the day of the passover, concerning Jesus. For we all listen to thy persuasion; since we, as well as all the people, bear thee testimony that thou art just, and showest partiality to none. Do thou, therefore, persuade the people not to entertain erroneous opinions concerning Jesus: for all the people, and we also, listen to thy persuasion. Take thy stand, then, upon the summit of the Temple, that from that elevated spot thou mayest be clearly seen, and thy words may be plainly audible to all the people. For, in order to attend the passover, all the tribes have congregated hither, and some of the Gentiles also.”

The aforesaid scribes and Pharisees accordingly set James on the summit of the temple, and cried aloud to him, and said: 

“O just one, whom we are all bound to obey, forasmuch as the people is in error, and follows Jesus the crucified, do thou tell us what is the door of Jesus, the crucified.” 

And he answered with a loud voice: 

“Why ask ye me concerning Jesus the Son of man? He Himself sitteth in heaven, at the right hand of the Great Power, and shall come on the clouds of heaven.”

And, when many were fully convinced by these words, and offered praise for the testimony of James, and said, “Hosanna to the son of David,” then again the said Pharisees and scribes said to one another, 

“We have not done well in procuring this testimony to Jesus. But let us go up and throw him down, that they may be afraid, and not believe him.” 

And they cried aloud, and said: 

“Oh! oh! the just man himself is in error.” 

Thus they fulfilled the Scripture written in Isaiah: “Let us away with the just man, because he is troublesome to us: therefore shall they eat the fruit of their doings.”

So they went up and threw down the just man, and said to one another: 

“Let us stone James the Just.” And they began to stone him: for he was not killed by the fall; but he turned, and kneeled down, and said: “I beseech Thee, Lord God our Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.”

And, while they were thus stoning him to death, one of the priests, the sons of Rechab, the son of Rechabim, to whom testimony is borne by Jeremiah the prophet, began to cry aloud, saying: 

“Cease, what do ye? The just man is praying for us.” 

But one among them, one of the fullers, took the staff with which he was accustomed to wring out the garments he dyed, and hurled it at the head of the just man.

And so he suffered martyrdom; and they buried him on the spot, and the pillar erected to his memory still remains, close by the temple. This man was a true witness to both Jews and Greeks that Jesus is the Christ.

And shortly after Vespasian besieged Judæa, taking them captive.”⁶

James 4:7 therefore, does not bode well in this litany of passages and verses that show that Satan was active and able in the run up to the beginning of the Jewish revolt, but furthermore, we know that Satan was loose into the after A.D. 62 and before Peter’s demise in A.D. 64 because, according Silas, Satan was walking about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may desire 1 Peter 5:8-9.  But the Apostle Peter was allegedly executed in A.D.64 in Rome–so we know these two epistles reflect conditions in Asia Minor at least until the fourth year of the sixth decade A.D.

There’s more, however!

Satan in Nineteen Chapters of

the Book of Revelation

Now, it is inevitable that we will have to think about and discuss the whereabouts of Satan at differing points of time in the Book of Revelation because the material there in no way suggest a uniform sitaution.  The first three chapters of the Book of Revelation also depict Satan on the lam–but more importantly where his throne was not in the bottomless pit but in Pergamun on the peninsula of Asia Minor, Revelation 2:13.

Furthermore, although Revelation 12:7-9 shows that although Satan’s seat was in Pergamun, his reach was at least as high as the air and was able to permeat the thinking of the Christian's adversaries in Asia Minor (Revelation 2:24), later on his battle with Michael the Archangel, and recorded in Dissertation 3.5.3, was to maintain his sphere of influence.  Yet he lost even this in A.D.66, at least around 8 Marchesvan of that year.

Nevertheless, Revelation chapter 12 has Satan in the Land of Israel seeking the demise of the fleeing Church as well as lives of Christian stragglers who did not manage to be on the entourage to Pella (Revelation 12:17).  However, the next thing that takes place is deadlier yet: In Revelation 13:1ff John describes the coming to fruition of something we already witnessed in prophecy in Daniel 7:7-25, the fourth kingdom of Bible prophecy as a warring entity bent on its misguided spiritual and political ambitions, which really shows that what the Apostle Paul described in 2 Thessalonians 2:1-13 was happening only then in the full light of day: Here Satan displayed his full range of power to the detriment of those who refused to “receive the love of the truth of the truth that they might be saved.” 

Paul explains,

“And for this cause (for this reason) God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: that they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (2 Thessalonians 2:11-12).

The moment of this event is, in reality, in the first week of November in A.D.66 (and 33 years and some months after the Cross and forty-two months ahead of the material destruction of the Second Temple and Jerusalem).  By keeping tabs with these historic facts we can moniter where we are on the Book of Revelation timeline and at the very same time cumulative evidence brings us to Revelation chapter 16:15-21 which, according to the chronology of Josephus basically we are led, finally, to 14 Nisan A.D.70 when the direct Roman attacks against Jerusalem’s high city walls are getting ready to happen which is why is this information important . . .

• • Revelation 1:1, 3 and 7 cf. Revelation 16:15, what was foretold to be soon is getting ready to be realized in the city's unlikely fall . . .
  • What was assured to the martyrs under the Second Temple Altar in Revelation 6:12-13 will be shortly fulfilled when Jerusalem is punished because the high priest of Jerusalem authorized their executions (Acts 9:1-2 cf. Revelation 18:20, 24).
  • While the false Israelite brethren, false apostles, and false ministers were ministering, all the while Satan was posing as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 11:12-22).
  • While the Second Temple stood Satan was also loosed (2 Thessalonians 2:3-12 cf. Revelation 13:13-18).
  • While first century Jerusalem was standing Satan was still active (Revelation 16:12-14 cf. Revelation 18:2).
  • Revelation 13 shows signs, power and lying wonders at their zenith once the Jewish nationalists got total control over Jerusalem and the Second Temple.  (Revelation 11:1-2 cf. Wars of the Jews 4.3.8:155-157).

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In the verses and passages above, numerous constraints are placed on any backward or forward movement of events in the Revelation narrative, however, in conventional wisdom (that pleads for redundancy, recapitulation, you name it) these texts cannot be allowed to flow in a consistent forward orderly direction.  Our concern here is that these matters be treated in a way that preserves the integrity and sense of the larger narrative.  But in order to acheive this, moving forward is the only way to allow these verses to speak to an progressive stage of developments that are pertinent to the expectations, experiences and safety and well-being of the Christians who received the autograph copies of the Book of Revelation.

The Seals, Trumpts, and Bowls Form Discrete Sectors 

But, if allowed to stand, the six Seals make up a discrete unit of events; the sixth Seal and the seven Trumpets make up the second set of disasters and then Revelation chapters 15:5-8 and 16:1 through 21 bring to a head the seven Bowl Judgments—the third set of discrete events which begin near the end of the First Jewish Revolt as it stretched into the spring of the year A.D. 70.

These finalize God’s verdict against wayward and wicked first-century Jerusalem which is now immortalized in infamy how the great city and those fighting for so-called ‘freedom’ lost their bid for kingdom power—receiving power as kings for only one hour with their beastly leader, Simon Bar Giora (Revelation 17:12).  And thus, when we approach and pass Revelation 19:21 and enter the introductory verse of Revelation 20:1, we are in brand new territory.

But not everyone agrees that we are looking at new developments: there are some of those who call themselves Full Preterists who at this point want to inject the Day of Pentecost into Revelation 20:1-4 in order for the end of Revelation 20 (e.g., Revelation 20:7-15) to fall into place as a retelling of the A.D.66-70 events.  But, the events in Revelation 20:1 cannot, should not, and must not be conflated, crisscrossed, or confused with the events of Revelation 12:9!

The reason this interpretive maneuver is questionable is because Michael and his angels fought Satan and his angels in Revelation 12:10 (which was in A.D.66, not here!) and that was at the beginning of the Jewish war in A.D.66 (again, not here in A.D. 70!).  Again, in Revelation 20:1 we are at the aftermath of the Destruction of the holy city (at the very least as much as four years after the war began!). 

And so here we are looking at a single mighty angel; here he comes down from heaven; here he apprehends and binds Satan.  Note that the angel does this against Satan AFTER Satan has already empowered the Sea Beast, and after he gave the Lamb Beast power to do lying wonders in Revelation 13:13 (cf. Revelation 16:13-14), and more than forty-two months AFTER he has backed them in their war against Jerusalem in Revelation 16:14; 18:1-2. 

Finally, (for emphasis sake) it should be noted here that Satan has to face these consequences AFTER the holy city has been completely destroyed and here, finally, Satan meets a preliminary (but not permanent) end.

2 And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years,

Note that Satan was cast from heaven to earth at the beginning of the war (in A.D.66) in Revelation 12:9, but here (apparently in A.D.73, if we are to understand Revelation 19:21 to signify the Masada debacle) he is captured and cast into the bottomless pit.

The Total Sum of Considerations

& Interpretive Latitude

From where we started from in Matthew 3 to this point and all we have considered to reflect upon our progress, it is possible to say with a fair degree of certainty that is is not possible to dovetail this thousand years period into an A.D.30-66 framework!  But that is another maneuver that often done but must not be done if what we want is a ‘best practice’ and a stable and inwardly consistent interpretation.  Otherwise this cannot happen without causing all kinds of intractable interpretive problems.

For example, you must also bear in mind Satan’s presence at the very beginning of Jesus’ ministry circa A.D.30 (Matthew 4:1-11); one has to understand that he would be cast out of Judæa from a future vantage point predicated from the standpoint of a time then present (Matthew 12:43-45); one also has to take into account that he was able to inhabit Judas on the eve of our Lord’s betrayal (Luke 22:3).

Furthermore, even after the cross, after the Ascension, and after Pentecost, Satan was still able to do the same thing to Ananias (See Acts 5:3).

Among the difficulties that arise when such is done,

(a) The span of time from Pentecost to the First Revolt period then has to become the time when Judæa’s house was ‘swept clean and garnished’. But was it? (Examine Acts 5:3 and 16 cf. 8:9-11; 13:6-11 and 19:13-17 and see if that is true).

(b) If Satan was bound at or around the ministry of Jesus then the opposition against the Apostles’ ministries in Jerusalem, Judæa and the Diaspora becomes inexplicable and unexplainable. But Romans 16:20 looks forward to Satan’s initial defeat, doesn’t it?

(c) It cannot be true that Satan was both in the bottomless pit AND walking about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour (note 1 Corinthians 5:5; 1 Thessalonians 2:18; 1 Timothy 5:15, and 1 Peter 5:8).  Either he was in one place or in the other; he could not be free and bound, sealed and shut up all at the same time!

How could a being (who was allegedly incarcerated around the time of the resurrection of Christ) still be on the lam years and years later “as if” on parole? Apologists and interpreters want to, but cannot have it both ways!  Either he was bound between A.D.33-A.D.66 or he was not.

³ And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.

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Zechariah 13:2; Acts 3:22-24; Acts 13:40-41

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A major problem with the idea that Satan was bound due to what happened on the Cross, or when Jesus overcame the grave, or ascended to heaven is that the New Testament EVERYWHERE declares THE VERY OPPOSITE: that Satan was deluding the people, blinding their eyes against seeing the truth of the Gospel (2 Corinthians 4:4; 11:13-15 and Galatians 3:1).

The popularity and ubiquity of the interpretation that Satan was bound prior to the Second Coming is a staple of the Amillennial paradigm and is shared and accepted by the Full Preterist view. Atavist Bible Eschatology is an ideology that totally disclaims, rejects, and repudiates such a narrative on the grounds that it destroys the meaningfulness of the actions and steps that take place along a logical continuum.  This continuum is only fulfilled when Jewish national opposition to the Gospel of God’s Son meets horrific and cataclysmic disaster in the third decade of the second century.

4 And I saw thrones, and they sat upon them, and judgment was given unto them: and I saw the souls of them that were beheaded for the witness of Jesus, and for the word of God, and which had not worshipped the beast, neither his image, neither had received his mark upon their foreheads, or in their hands; and they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.

Verse 4 is important because it qualifies Revelation 20 as a brand new, unique and special period in Jewish salvation history; it does this by telling us (in so many words) that the events in Revelation 20 CERTAINLY happen AFTER the events that developed in Revelation 13:11-18. Those events began in A.D.66; those events began when the Jewish war against the Romans made its fateful debut.  And those events began when the Jewish rebels succeeded spectacularly in every major plan they executed. What did they do?  They defeated the Romans at Masada in Elul (Wars of the Jews 2.17.2:408). 

Back-to-back with that they defeated the Roman garrison stationed at the Tower of Antonia (Wars of the Jews 2.17.7:430).  Next, on Saturday Elul 7, (August 16, A.D.66) they killed Ananias the high priest and his brother, Hezekiah and even succeeded in COMPLETELY routing the Romans out of Jerusalem.  On this important day they cleared the city of Rome’s presence for the very first time in the 129 years since Pompey the Great had conquered it in 63 B.C. (Wars of the Jews 2.17.10:449-456).

Then, two months later (at the end of the Feast of Sukkot in that same year) the Jews badly beat the Romans at the Beit Horon pass killing nearly 6,000 soldiers (Wars of the Jews 2.19.8:546-9:555). With these stunning initial Jewish successes it took an entire forty-two months for the Romans to come back and get the upper hand in Jerusalem in order to suppress the uprising.

What is important to bear in mind is that it was in that forty-two month time period that the image, name, mark and number of the beast was inflicted upon the people loyal to the Jewish cause (Revelation 13:5, 16-18 cf. Wars of the Jews 3.8.3:383). Likewise, it was in the same period (by necessity) that those who refused to take such an emblem lost their lives (Revelation 15:1-2). This tells us that the martyrs paid the awful ultimate price for their faith because of their decision not to cooperate with the Jewish war (see Revelation 14:8-13 and 15:1-2).

Recognizing these incidents and where they belong on the Jewish history timeline will not allow either the death of the martyrs nor the beginning of this millennium to be pushed back before the sacrileges that broke out in the First Great Revolt.

5 But the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.

The rest of the dead? Who are these? In the verses before and in a verse below we discover there are two groups of the saved: The martyrs are the saved that were set on thrones in the heavens, but below we will discover that on earth are another group of saved people: The Camp of the Saints. The former are resurrected from physical death (they had been beheaded), the latter did not suffer a physical death, but served some godly purpose that was resented by Gog and Magog (otherwise why would they encircle the Camp of the Saints if they agreed with its existence?). We are reading between the lines, sure, but our inferences (we believe) are not unwarranted in light of the prophecies of Isaiah 66:22-24 and Malachi 4:1-3.  If no Christians would be left on earth in the aftermath of the Destruction of Jerusalem, what could those predictions mean?

6 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.

It might be hazarded that the resurrected martyrs AND the Camp of the Saints are included in this blessed category. We do have Jewish history that says the Jerusalem Church that had fled to Pella came back after the war’s end and made Jerusalem their center of activity. If it can be imagined that a change (transcendent in nature, and obvious to the dead, but not to the living) occured for the righteous living and dead “in the twinkling of an eye” then we can believe that the Jewish Christian church (and all the churches everywhere) continued in an improved spiritual state without actually being aware of that important and profound fact. Their unknowingness would not subtract from a reality God had already promised to the Apostles Paul and John: “We shall be changed” (1 Corinthians 15:52 and 1 John 3:1-3). But what is important to remember is that the Last Trumpet was blown before Jerusalem fell (see Revelation 11:15 and 12:10); therefore, the promised changes happened forty-two months before the city fell, but the exaltation of the martyrs to their thrones happened after the city was in ashes.

7 And when the thousand years are expired, Satan shall be loosed out of his prison . . .

We have come a very long way in a very short time and, it is no wonder that the Book of Revelation, after all this time, has proved to be so challenging to interpret.  There is, however, a sliver of hope in all this and that is the faith and confidence that, in all events, if we continue to expland our imaginations and try to account for all the information the New Testament gives us about this specific situation then we are not very likely to be too far from the truth in our final, theorectical, or tentative interpretations.

But the expiration of the thousand years once again brings us face to face with the question about which way we should interpret the expression ‘thousand years’?  Should we automatically assume it is a literal one thousand years?  Should we reason it to be a ‘long, long time’ (as some do)?  One thing is for sure: Even if we interpret it literally, we will be obliged to commence it at the same historical crisis—the Destruction of Jerusalem (or thereabouts). If we do that and take the thousand years literally that will take us out to approximately A.D.1070-1073 or so.

But we have reason NOT to do that! AND THAT REASON IS THE WORD OF JESUS HIMSELF. IN HIS PARABLE OF THE WICKED SPIRIT THE GIST OF THE TIMETABLE OF JUDAEA'S RENEWAL AND RE-DEFILEMENT IS PLACED WITHIN THE LIFETIME OF JESUS’ CONTEMPORARIES. Since this is so, THERE is no possible way to imagine a first century Judæan living out to the eleventh century; it is much more reasonable to hazard that a generation might extend as far out as roughly one hundred years (and see Isaiah 65:20 on this).

When we take this route things make much more sense, especially when we look at events in the Jewish timeline from Christ to the very end of the state almost one hundred years after Jesus’ earthly ministry.

Eschatology and the Parable

of the Wedding Invitation

3Now that Jerusalem was destroyed in accordance with many promises, we must bear in mind the Parable of Jesus recorded in Matthew 22:1-14. That story speaks of two invitations (one BEFORE the destruction of the city and another AFTERWARD).

¹And Jesus answered and spake unto them again by parables, and said, ² The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king, which made a marriage for his son, ³ And sent forth his servants to call them that were bidden to the wedding: and they would not come. ⁴ Again, he sent forth other servants, saying, Tell them which are bidden, Behold, I have prepared my dinner: my oxen and my fatlings are killed, and all things are ready: come unto the marriage. ⁵ But they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandise: ⁶ And the remnant took his servants, and entreated them spitefully, and slew them. ⁷ But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth: and he sent forth his armies, and destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city.

⁸ Then saith he to his servants, The wedding is ready, but they which were bidden were not worthy. ⁹ Go ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall find, bid to the marriage. ¹⁰ So those servants went out into the highways, and gathered together all as many as they found, both bad and good: and the wedding was furnished with guests.

¹¹ And when the king came in to see the guests, he saw there a man which had not on a wedding garment: ¹² And he saith unto him, Friend, how camest thou in hither not having a wedding garment? And he was speechless. ¹³ Then said the king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. ¹⁴ For many are called, but few are chosen.

As in the Parable of the Invitation, Revelation 19 depicts the eulogy of the city of those murderers—none other than the citizen armies of those whose capital city was first-century Jerusalem.²  Then, stepping away from Revelation 19:21, Revelation 20:1 embarks upon a whole new day away and beyond all that is contained in Revelation chapter 19: 

1. 1. The aftermath of the destruction, 
   2. The marriage of Christ to his church, 
   3. The supper of the great God
   4. The punishment of the beast, and 
   5. the punishment of the false prophet.

It should be noticed at the outset that this list of five items could not have been achieved anywhere in the Gospels, anywhere in the Book of Acts or anywhere in the epistles, Pauline or otherwise.  Even with regard to the material conditions of Revelation chapters 1:1 through Revelation 18:24 this subject would be turned on its own head were we to contrive a way of saying the issues addressed in Revelation chapter 20 run parallel or concomitant to it.  In other words, the aftermath of the Destruction of Jerusalem (described in Revelation 20) would act as an eraser of the total setting that defines the Gospels–an intact city and Second Temple, Acts–an intact city and Second Temple, the epistles of Paul, the Hebrew writer, James, John and Jude–an intact city and Second Temple, and finally, at the very beginning of the Book of Revelation till, at the very furthest, Revelation 19:1-4: the metropolis of the Jews and their famed Second Temple stood proudly against the skyline of the Judæan mountains until the 9^th and into the 10^th of Av and then both were gone like a misty dream.

In this way we can understand how and why Revelation 20:1 can be considered its own Minyan Shtarot–a brand new contract–a new contract not only for the desolate ones, but also for the Christians in order that each of these would guage what this new period was intended to represent and what did any group claiming to be the people of God believe would happen next?³ 

Based on the typology of the Tanakh these interpreters had every reason to believe a repeat of what happened after the First Temple was destroy would turn around and happen again seven decades after the Second Temple was destroyed–and this viewpoint supplied much needed hope in the face of the then present circumstances where otherwise all hope was gone.  For first and early second century Christians this same period of apparent uncertainty represented something completely different–and unlikely: Could it really be true that the A.D.70 destruction of Jerusalem was the final and last word on the controversy that had slowly heated up between the believers in Jesus and the traditional Jews basically from A.D. 34 to the Destruction?  Could it be that, from A.D.70 or at any rate, from the Masada drama of 14 Nisan A.D.73 the church would go forward unmolested by Jewish nationalism’s enthusiastes, their claims and their clamour, their violence and their commotions?  

No!  Peace was not to be had!  Since the Jews had a completely contrary and perfectly legitimate interpretation of what this interregnum stood for they would certainly fight and at the same time prepare for what they believe would be victory of their cherished ambitions at the final end: And this was the basis of the logic of the Jewish hope.⁴ 

In Revelation 20 the Parable of the King’s Son’s second invitation finds distinct relevance not only as an event prophecy but more so as a political prophecy of a second mass Jewish rejection of their nation’s true Messiah, our Lord Jesus.  In the parable a brand new invitation is sent out; apparently, the wedding feast was an ongoing event.  Now, at some point, according to the parable, there would be an “inspection.”  And as we are told that such was customary in Jewish wedding celebrations, the guests were provided with the appropriate attire for the event.  Yet despite this a “guest” refused to be decked for the occasion but showed up inappropriately attired only to be questioned, bound, and cast into “outer darkness–where weeping and gnashing of teeth” occur. 

We see right away that the parable has an ominous conclusion to it that says eternal damnation awaits any and all who chose to dress a certain way and we believe the Měḥaššěbê ̉ittōts misled the whole nation of the Jews with an interpretation of the Destruction of the Second Temple and Jerusalem which was, for all intents and purposes, plausible but in actuality completely false–but we definitely can try to understand how the thought of believing what happened in A.D.70 was utterly final was simply unthinkable in the normative Jewish way of thinking.  And so, in light of this refusal to concede the recent losses, the meaning of this points to Judæa’s willfully dressing in military attire and being thrown out when Christ performed a second inspection in the final moments of the their state’s existence.

When we take this route things make much more sense, especially when we look at events in the Jewish timeline from Christ to the very end of the state almost one hundred years after Jesus’ earthly ministry.

Surprising and singular events that commenced in the eighteenth year the reign of the Roman Emperor Hadrian best fits what John and the earliest Christians saw looming on the horizon after the Destruction of the city and the Temple: A final gigantic, well-organized effort of the Jews to realize their Messianic hopes completely apart from the message and ministry of Jesus of Nazareth and his claims. Realizing this also helps us understand why the Christians after the destruction still believed a great apocalyptic event was threatening in the not too distant future.

8 And shall go out to deceive the nations which are in the four quarters of the earth, Gog, and Magog, to gather them together to battle: the number of whom is as the sand of the sea.

On Israel’s immense numerical count beyond the borders of the Roman Empire, Josephus writes,

“When [Ezra] had received this epistle, he was very joyful, and began to worship God, and confessed that he had been the cause of the king's great favor to him, and for the same reason he gave thanks to God. So he read the epistle at Babylon to those Jews that were there, but he kept the epistle itself, and sent a copy of it to all those of his own nation that were in Media; and when those Jews had understood what piety the king had towards God, and what kindness he had for [Ezra] , they were all greatly pleased; nay, many of them took their effects with them and came to Babylon, as very desirous of going down to Jerusalem; but the entire body of the people of Israel remained in that country; wherefore there are but two tribes in Asia and Europe subject to the Romans, while the ten tribes are beyond the Euphrates till now, and are an immense multitude, and not to be estimated by numbers”⁷

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Matthew 22:11-14; Romans 9:27; Hebrews 11:12

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It is a fact noted by Jewish chroniclers (e.g., Yadin, Borchsenius, Harkabi, et al) who detail the aftermath of the A.D.66-70 war that thousands of prisoners were carried captive into all nations, many to work in Roman munitions factories. Yadin tells us that there they made weaponry substandard and deliberately defective so that they would be rejected by inspectors and then salvaged. And what could be the purpose of this clever trick? None other than a means to supply themselves arms for their own use in a do-or-die war! According to James J. Bloom (in his treatise, The Jewish Revolts Against Rome) they carefully planned to execute this effort at the beginning of the seventh decade after the Destruction.⁸

This gives us material to work with in order to understand how Revelation 20 fits into the bigger picture of redemptive history—and especially is this crucial when we are trying to grapple with the end of Old Testament Judaism and the exigency of the New Testament faith at this most critical nexus.

9 And they went up on the breadth of the earth, and compassed the camp of the saints about, and the beloved city: and fire came down from God out of heaven, and devoured them.

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Ezekiel 38:1-16 John 5:43

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As we intimated earlier on, the Camp of the Saints obviously has to be the People of God on earth (and specifically in Judaea and more specifically in what was once Jerusalem). There would be no point in Gog and Magog first targeting the Camp of the Saints if the camp was not, somehow, an annoying or irritating presence among them. It makes sense, historically, that it was the Jerusalem Church, a church which had fifteen bishops between A.D.62 and the year A.D.133 when the Sanhedrin executed and destroyed the Jerusalem Church for refusing blaspheme Jesus of Nazareth, acknowledge Simon Bar Kokhba as Israel’s king and Messiah and join hands with them in desperate rebellion against Rome. As for the punishment God inflicted upon Bar Kokhba we do not have enough detailed accounts to know precisely what it was. “Fire came down from God out of heaven” could mean it was a Kill-shot a literal or figurative device standing for a total overthrow harking back to God’s stern vengeance against the cities of the Plain (cf. Ezekiel 38:22).

But what we know from John’s allusion to Ezekiel 38 and 39 is that this incident is positioned after the Destruction of Jerusalem (for the reasons we outlined above). Also, it is clear from a careful reading and reflection of the texts of Ezekiel that the Gog/Magog event is happening because of forces invading the Land of Israel.

Ezekiel 38:11-12 makes it apparent that the Land of Israel is definitely in a state of disrepair (unlike its condition prior to the outbreak of the First Revolt).  It also must be observed that the people (or certain people) in the Land of Israel are oblivious as to the reasons and goals of the war. Gentile nations are also involved with the effort and they equally suffer the consequences of the downfall of Gog.

The only event near enough to the lifetime of Jesus’ contemporaries that fits into these conditions is the Final Jewish Revolt against the Romans, the Bar Kokhba Revolt of A.D.132-136.

10 And the devil that deceived them was cast into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are, and shall be tormented day and night for ever and ever.

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2 Corinthians 4:4 Ephesians 4:14 Galatians 3:1

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The devil that deceived them . . .how did Satan deceive Gog and Magog?  In order to answer this question we need only reflect back on the deception that was taking place during the last days of the Second Temple period.  What was it then?

a Jesus is the Lord Psalms 110:1

b Jesus the suffering servant of Isaiah 53

c Jesus to return in the clouds to judge the Jewish kingdom 7:7-27.

d Jesus to die before the Destruction of the Second Temple Daniel 9:24-27.

e The scattering of the power of the Holy People, which happened in A.D.132-136 ends all prophecies.

What was being taught to the people about Jesus? His resurrection and his being Lord?  Were these truths being affirmed or denied?  Of course these were being denied by the leaders and revolutionary authorities of Judæa and this specific deception was the lie that Jesus of Nazareth was not the Christ, the Son of the living God. 

“Who is a liar but he that denieth that Jesus is the Christ?  He is antichrist that denieth the Father and the Son” (1 John 2:22)

A second deception relates to Daniel 9:25-27 which shows that Israel's true Messiah would come and die BEFORE the destruction of the Second Temple (and later on, many Rabbinic authorities such as Rambam knew this, but concealed this fact from the Jewish people in Medieval times, even as Rabbis generally do today). All these lies and deceptions in the last days of Bible Judaism were surrounding the Deity, message and ministry of Christ and the Apostles; therefore, when Satan was released from the bottomless pit it makes sense that he reintroduced those same lies, denials and objections and caused Gog and Magog to go to war over issues that had already been settled by the authority and power of the Son of God in the previous century.

11 And I saw a great white throne, and him that sat on it, from whose face the earth and the heaven fled away; and there was found no place for them.

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Daniel 7:9; Matthew 17:2; Daniel 2:35;

Daniel 12:7; Micah 3:11-12; Act 6:14; Romans 10:4;

2 Corinthians 5:1; Hebrews 9:24

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Jesus, the Ancient of Days, was given the power to judge all flesh (John 5:22); therefore, it must be true that the combatants and civilian mass casualties who died as a result of Hadrian’s brutal onslaught against Bar Kokhba’s gains, stood before the One they never supposed they would see (much less be judged by).

And no place was found for them. . .

The war’s efforts were to rebuild the Place (i.e., the Third Temple) made with hands (that had disappeared in A.D.70), yet here they are denied an even greater Place—the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched and not man (Hebrews 8:2).

12 And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before God; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works.

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Romans 2:12; Romans 3:20;

Galatians 3:16; Galatians 6:13-14

_____________________________________________

The dead small and great here refers to the ‘rest of the dead’ who refused to believe the Gospel even after the prediction of the Fall of Jerusalem and the end of the sacrifices and the oblations and the Destruction of the Second Temple had become a glaring fact (as was predicted and preached by the Apostles and first Christians for close to forty years in advance). A book was opened which contained the Law for their lives (written by Moses) and another book was opened to see if they were recorded in the Lamb's book of life. The dead small and great of this verse appear to be a separate group of people from the dead in the verses below.

13 And the sea gave up the dead which were in it; and death and hell delivered up the dead which were in them: and they were judged every man according to their works.

As the group above was judged “according to their works” this group from the sea, death and hades also were judged "according to their works.” Neither group was “in Christ;” therefore, they were not judged according to grace).

14 And death and hell were cast into the lake of fire. This is the second death.

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Romans 2:8-11; Hebrews 10:28-31

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The Apostle Paul foresaw the victory of the Lord over death and the strength of sin and the sting of death (1 Corinthians 15:54-57). Earlier in that same chapter, he had declared that the last enemy to be destroyed would be death (1 Corinthians 15:26). And he said this would be done when Jesus “delivered up the kingdom to God the Father” vs. 24. What kingdom would Jesus deliver up to God and what does the expression “deliver up” mean? There Paul speaks about Jesus “putting down all rule, and all authority, and all power”—but does it mean his own rule, authority, and power?

Verse 28 gives us the answer: “deliver up” and “put down” mean the subjugation of the power of Christ's enemies.   It does not mean deliver up or put down his own rule, authority, and power!  And its relevance to this chapter is this: Although Jerusalem was destroyed in A.D.70, Satan was only bound temporarily after that fact to arise to provoke national opposition to the kingdom of Christ in a last defiant show of rule, authority, and power. But like the former show of strength, this later display of glory was granted to last but three years and six months—a “little season.” With that opposition concluded death and hades are eliminated, transposed into the lake of fire.

15 And whosoever was not found written in the book of life was cast into the lake of fire.

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Matthew 7:21-27; John 8:24; 1 John 2:22

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The popular concept of universal salvation because of the death of Jesus for the sins of all men, is not here borne out as a truth. The consistent message of the New Testament is this: In order to appropriate and enjoy that salvation, the scriptures teach very clearly that mankind must believe in Jesus, repent of sins, confess Christ to be the Son of the living God, and be baptized into Christ for the remission of sins. Any delay in those steps does not necessarily disqualify the initiate, but refusal to obey is fatal to salvation.

A Q & A for Christians

Considering Atavist Eschatology

Full Preterism has developed without the knowledge or acknowledgment of Intertestamental realities (e.g., the defeat of the Seleucids by the Maccabees; the establishment of the Hasmonean Empire; the rise of Herod the Great; the reduction of the Hasmonean estate into a fragmented Judaeo-Græco polity under Roman domination), it has retained Amillennial presuppositions about Revelation 20 (that it commences at Pentecost). These handicaps hinder a proper assessment of important interpretive issues; these issues are ultimately responsible for stunting and retarding the progress of Bible prophecy understanding around an artificial deadline: A.D.70. 

The gravest result of Full Preterist inuendos is this: the rejection of a legitimate eschatology AND ecclesiology AFTER the destruction of Jerusalem; and this affects the reality and legitimacy of a world-wide Church today. If Full Preterism is true it would mean that there is no need for and no reason for New Covenant relationships between God and men and women after the fact of the destruction of Jerusalem. Furthermore, it would mean that there is no real reason to be a Christian after the demise of Biblical Judaism—a dead-end teaching!

Issues to Think About

Full Preterist theologians and many of their devotees have unwittingly painted themselves into a proverbial corner; they seem to be unable to conceive of a functioning Christian Church clear of the first-century Jewish debacles. One of the problems with the view is that the debacles were not even limited to the first century anyway; the challenges went all the way to the end of the Jewish State.

Besides that, a functioning Christian Church system is only possible on a local level and can only be realized now with an interpretation of eschatology that is amenable and permits and fully endorses, justifies, and mandates such a development. But we have seen above that the framework of Bible prophecy hardly justifies a reading of a termination of the Church at the end of the millennium endorsed and venerated by Amillennialism and Full Preterism. Instead, examination, critique and analysis show that the Jerusalem Church, the Pella episode and the Camp of the Saints are the critical link that connects traditional and historic Christianity to the tumultuous events of its Jewish and Semitic past.² 

But to appreciate how important and far reaching this information is one must ask and ponder the following critical questions:

(a) Is it not true that if one’s eschatology won't let the Church exist beyond an A.D.70 deadline, one is in big trouble? Such a terminus already defies the known history of the Christian religion by basically saying the entire second century Church down to the present is an illegitimate, illegal and even a fundamentally wrongheaded development. If the Church is pointless after Jesus' initial successes against militant Jewish nationalism, then any study of the matter after the fact is purely a social and historical exercise and not one related to faith in God, a pious life and hope for eternal life.

(b) What were Jesus and his Apostles doing and did they intend for it to last? Only prayer, prayerful study, meditation and remembrance of what God’s Word give us the answers we really need.  It is not the Atavist belief that the Church is only a temporary manifestation.

(c) If God intended to end Jesus and the Apostles’ work why did he not catch up the Jerusalem Church with her offspring on November 15, A.D.66? If it was his intention to end the Church he could have done it then, but he sent her to the safety of the Romans in Pella (see Revelation 12:5, 6 and 13-17).  Why?

(d) Why would he go even further, protect her there for almost four years and then allow her to come back to the ruins of Jerusalem to be the Camp of the Saints? From that time to A.D.133 the Church had thirteen Jewish bishops in all.3 This leadership precedence AFTER the A.D.70 Destruction of Jerusalem does not indicate that bishops were only a Pre-70 phenomenon, as Preterists tend to believe! Instead, it shows that this was a norm first and second century Christians understood to be part and parcel of their organization as the new People of God.

(e) The most important question that can be asked by anyone who presently believes New Testament commands, precepts, practices and relevance only pertain to a pre-A.D.70 Christian realities is this: Did the historical Jesus begin a movement and establish a blood purchased Covenant he intended to last only four decades, a mere forty years?  If he intended it to last beyond the scope of the events that dismantled the Second Commonwealth, then we are on our way to understanding how first and second century Christianity dovetail into conventional Christianity, while the mysteries of exactly what happened in the eschaton did not now seem apparent to the living, we believe it was very apparent to the saints who were able to believe and perceive or who were directly involved during the processes and for those even able to see what has now been lost to history (Isaiah 65:17).

(f) The events of Ezekiel chapters 38 and 39 are stationed by the Apostle John AFTER the A.D.70 destruction of Jerusalem. Therefore, Ezekiel’s prophecies and the circumstances surrounding them cannot be parallel to the Destruction of Jerusalem IN A.D.70, let alone be the same thing as the destruction of Jerusalem.

It is clear from Ezekiel 38 that the Gog/Magog event is an overwhelming invasion of the Land of Israel by a large and overpowering military force that loses its bid to seize the land, hands down. While it is true that the Romans had to respond to the Bar Kokhba threat with overwhelming forces, it cannot be shown that, in the end, the Romans lost the war. Since the Jews lost the war we are forced to conclude that the overwhelming forces invading the land were, indeed, Jewish forces—the forces that elicited the Roman response in the first place.⁴

I encourage Christians to reflect on Revelation 20 and the part it plays in the larger New Testament story.  That story is not one isolated to mean the apocalypse is a separate and discrete event, but the culmination of Acts of God to hinder, make null and void and destroy all Jewish efforts to thwart the progress of salvation history with high things and pretenses that stood against the knowledge of God.

Study the evidence, study the implications and study the respective answers and draw your own conclusions from the evidence we present and whatever you come up with in your own research.

I believe, that after everything is said and done, you will agree that it is preposterous to avert that God would establish a Levitical animal sacrificial system to last for fifteen centuries and then send his own Son to die and rise again for an enterprise that would last thirty seven years in all! If it was even possible to sustain such an argument—which shouts loudly that it makes no sense at all—it would mean that everyone was doomed after A.D.70 by virtue of the successful fulfillment of Bible prophecy!

The Scripture themselves speak decidedly against this misguided and, ultimately, debilitating interpretation of the matter when they say,

“The Lord has sworn and will not repent, You are a priest forever, after the Order of Melchizedek” (Psalms 110:4 cf. Hebrews 7:21).

With that promise before us, a rational way to explain how and why Jesus’ priesthood should disappear on the same day the Aaronic and Levitical priesthood slipped into history seems impossible because the Hebrew writer argues that “He takes away the First that he may establish the Second” (Hebrews 10:9).

Finally, if the establishment of the Second can be sustained, then it must also be true that the ministry of Jesus continues indefinitely, according to God’s promise to mankind, given by an oath (Hebrews 6:13, 17, 18 and 20 cf. Ephesians 3:21).

Endnotes

^{1 Harkabi, Yehoshafat, The Bar Kokhba Syndrome,  ‏Rossel Books, 1982.}

² See Luke 9:30-31

³ The Jeremiah prophecies of 70 years (Jeremiah 25:11 cf. Daniel 9:1-2) came into play for those called the calculators of the times, or “Měḥaššěbê ̉ittōts.”  These teachers believed the Jewish people would recover all their affairs and achieve the long-sought-for building of a Third Temple under the direction of a national warrior Messiah. These “calculators of the time” maintained that the seventh decade (i.e., A.D.132) promised a cataclysmic war, a war that would see the Roman Empire destroyed by God's judgment and the disappearance of the empire forever.

But, in fact, history tells us the very opposite thing happened!  Instead of the Romans being destroyed the brand new Israelite State of Bar Kokhba was obliterated and the narrative of New Testament eschatology neither could or would be complete without the second-century end of this political miscalculation which came about by the egregious errors and willful lies that caused the A.D.70 destruction of Jerusalem in the first place.

⁴ Anchor Bible Dictionary, Volume 1, A-C Bar Kokhba, p. 603.

⁵ See, e.g., Wars of the Jews 6.5.3:300.

⁶ http://www.earlychristianwritings.com/text/hegesippus.html

⁷ See, Antiquities of the Jews 11.5.2:133).

⁸ The best explanation for Revelation chapter 20 appears to be that it represents the ‘house swept clean and garnished’ period of Jewish salvation history (an interlude after the wicked spirit departed and before the wicked spirit returned with others worse than himself). On Jesus’s authority, we can rest assured that such an interpretation can safely limit the thousand years reign to events inside the lifetime of Jesus’ contemporaries and their children—and this means more than may at first meet the eye. It means (ultimately) that everyone who rejected Christ, down to a man, was killed before or by the time the Jewish State reached to its termination point in A.D.136.

⁵ Characters or entities in Revelation 20 include (a) A mighty angel. (b) Satan, (c) The saints who refused to accept the mark of the beast (d) the Camp of the Saints (e) Gog and Magog (f) God (g) Christ.

⁴ The existence of the Pella Christian refugees, their return to Jerusalem and their establishment of continuous work appears to be what the Camp of the Saints stands for after the Destruction of Jerusalem. The Jerusalem church subsequently was neither leaderless nor ineffective. The names of the thirteen bishops are as follows: (1) Simeon, 62-107 (crucified by Trajan); (2) Justus; (3) Zacchaeus; (4) Tobias; (5) Benjamin; (6) John; (7) Matthias; (8) Philip; (9) Seneca; (10) Levi; (11) Ephram; (12) Joseph; (13) Judas.

Bar Kokhba's destruction of the Jerusalem church and Emperor Hadrian's massacre and ban of any Jews living in the environs made it impossible for the Jewish Church to exist from the end of the revolt onwards.

⁵ A large enough group of people (and who probably were not involved in the war itself) would also have survived to mark bones and help bury Gog and Magog, according to the prophecies of Ezekiel 39:11-15. This all tells us two things (at least), (1) Life on earth as we know it had to survive the events foretold in Ezekiel 38 and 39. (2) The Great White Throne Judgment could not have been a biological resurrection because (a) the birds ate the flesh of the dead and (b) those in the land spent seven month searching and setting up markers for bones. And, incidentally, those packed and stored bones were discovered by Yigael Yadin and his Israel Exploration Society team in 1961.

^*If first century New Testament churches are seen as a charter in embryo, that gives Christians after the eschaton both permission and latitude to develop and implement a sacred and social world free of the restrictions imposed upon it by an extreme and unyielding emphasis on audience relevance. In Atavist Bible Eschatology Revelation chapter 20 is an ‘umbilical cord’ that connects historic conventional Christianity to its Semitic origins in the vanished Second Jewish Commonwealth. With this knowledge, the prophecies are permitted to hold their integrity, whilst the precepts and protocols of faith, piety, and practice can be worked out for administration and services in local congregational settings (just like it once was spread and practiced throughout the Roman, Byzantine and Sassanid Empires). The proliferation of churches that was happening in the ancient Roman world should be happening on the same basis everywhere and all the time in the here and now.

Bar Kokhba Documentary

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