Revelation’s sixth vision—The Vision of the Great Whore (Rev. 17–20)—mentions a thousand-year reign of Christ (Rev. 20:2–7).1Commentators call this period “the millennium.” This word comes from the Latin words mille,“thousand,” and annum, “year.”
The traditional prophetic frameworks derive their names from this period. Postmillennialism believes the Lord will return after the millennium. Premillennialism teaches he will return before the millennium. This school of thought has two branches, historic premillennialism and dispensational premillennialism. Amillennialism teaches that the thousand years is not literal.2
We have proposed another scheme, inmillennialism. This name comes from the Latin prefix of the same spelling. It shows we are now in the millennium.
Our next few posts will attempt to answer often-asked questions about the millennium. This post will focus on a single question: Is the millennium 1000 literal years?
Arguments Against a Literal 1000 Years
Let’s define the term “literal.” It means “adhering to fact or to the ordinary construction or primary meaning of a term or expression.”3 The literal sense of a word is its usual or most basic sense without metaphor or allegory.
Inmillennialism asserts that the millennium is not a literal 1000-year period. If we could measure the elapsed time in this period, our stopwatch would not read “1000 years” at its end. Instead, “a thousand years” (Rev. 20:2–7) is a metaphor that represents a long period. Two facts support this position.
First, Revelation uses symbols as a primary tool to convey its message. Its first verse announces this method. An angel would “signify” the revelation to John (Rev. 1:1). This means he would “show by a sign”4 without stating the literal facts (cp. John 18:32; 21:19).
John sees “signs” or “wonders” throughout the book (e.g., Rev. 12:1, 3; 13:13, 14; 15:1). He expects the reader to recognize his symbology without calling attention to it. Jesus said “the seven candlesticks . . . are the seven churches.” He did not mean a literal candlestick stood in each of the seven cities of Asia (Rev. 1:20).
To understand “a thousand years,” we should recognize this reality. “Much of Revelation is portrayed in symbolic concepts.”5 Therefore, our first inclination is to view this number as non-literal.
Second, the Scriptures almost always use the number 1000 figuratively. God says, “every beast of the forest is mine, and the cattle upon a thousand hills” (Ps. 50:10; emphasis added). He does not mean we could use a click counter to measure the number of hills on which he owns cattle. “A thousand hills” is a metaphor that means all hills; all cattle on all hills belong to the Lord.
A prophet said, “A little one shall become a thousand.” This is the same as saying, “a small one (shall become) a strong nation” (Isa. 60:22). The metaphorical thousand is also the metaphorical strong nation. This shows the great increase with which God would bless Israel. Literal numbers are not in view. We should not imagine that a census would measure a literal 1000-person multiplication.
Other examples of figurative uses of “a thousand” (or multiples thereof) include: Deut. 1:11; 7:9; 1 Chron. 16:15; Ps. 68:16–17; 84:10; 90:4; 91:7; 105:8; Eccles. 6:6; 7:28; Song of Sol. 4:4; Isa. 7:23; 30:17; Amos 5:3; 1 Sam. 18:7; etc.
The analogy of faith requires us to examine John’s “thousand year” term in its context. At the book level, Revelation declares its reliance on symbols to convey its message. At a higher contextual level, the Scriptures use “a thousand” as a figure many times. So, inmillennialism takes “a thousand years” in Rev. 20 as a metaphor that represents a long time.
Arguments for a Literal 1000 Years Considered
Many Christians believe Revelation’s millennium is a literal thousand years. We will examine some of their arguments for this opinion and respond to them.
Some writers appeal to other literal elements in the “thousand years” passage. They make a simple argument. If these other elements are literal, the “thousand years” must be literal, too.
Dwight Pentecost, a dispensational premillennialist, takes this approach. He says, “It is generally held . . . that the angel, heaven, the pit, Satan, the nations, the resurrections mentioned in this chapter [i.e., Rev. 20] are literal. It would be folly to accept the literalness of those and deny the literalness of the time element.”6 Pentecost believes “a thousand years” is literal because of other nearby literal elements.
This reasoning is open to criticism. Pentecost’s list contains at least one item whose literalness is debatable. “The pit” here does not carry “its usual or most basic sense.” John does not see the angel cast Satan into “a hole, shaft, or cavity in the ground.”7 “The pit” is not a subterranean compartment whose volume we can calculate. This is a metaphor for hell, the place of misery God has prepared for wicked angels and men (cp. Rev. 1:18).
Also, Pentecost’s list omits clear metaphorical elements in this passage. John sees “the key (Gk. kleis) of the bottomless pit” (Rev. 20:1; cp. Rev. 9:1). This key is no more literal than “the keys (Gk. kleis) of the kingdom of heaven” Christ gave Peter (Matt. 16:19). We could not measure this key’s weight on a balance scale.
This key is symbolic, like the one Jesus mentioned while talking to some lawyers. He said, “Woe unto you, lawyers! for ye have taken away the key (Gk. kleis) of knowledge” (Luke 11:52).
We see another non-literal key in Revelation. The Lord says, “These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key (Gk. kleis) of David” (Rev. 3:7). This key was not a metal object handed down through the generations. This vision-key is a symbol of authority, of David as king and Christ as King.
These passages do not describe literal keys like the one in the above picture.8 We should not understand them to be “metal instrument(s) by which the bolt of a lock is turned.”9 In like manner, the key in Rev. 20:1 is not a literal key.
Pentecost overlooks another figurative, non-literal element in the “thousand years” context. John sees a “great chain” with which the angel binds Satan (Rev. 20:1).
This cannot be a literal chain. John could not have determined its length with a tape measure. It is non-literal, like the “chain of darkness” that binds unhappy souls in the Apocrypha (Wisd. of Sol. 17:17).10
Physical chains like those that bound Peter (Acts 12:7) cannot bind spiritual beings. The one who transforms into an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14) is immune to the effects of literal chains. God has ordained that non-physical weapons overthrow Satan’s fortresses (2 Cor. 10:4).11
The chain in John’s vision was a metaphor for the restraining power of God (cp. Ps. 76:10). It was not a literal chain.
Pentecost ignores one other non-literal element. It is Satan’s “mark upon [the] forehead” of those under his control (Rev. 20:4; cp. Rev. 13:16, 17; 14:9, 11; 15:2; 16:2; 19:20). Johnson agrees with Henry Swete, who
argues that as the servants of God receive on their foreheads the impress of the divine seal [Rev. 7:3; 14:1], so the servants of the beast are marked with the stamp of the beast. In other words, the charagma [mark] is not a literal impress seal, certificate, or similar mark of identification, but it is John’s way of symbolically describing authentic ownership and loyalty.12
John could not have measured the length and height of this mark with a micrometer.
So, this passage contains a mixture of literal and non-literal elements. The mere presence of literal elements cannot determine the question as Pentecost argues. We must decide whether the “thousand years” is literal or figurative on other grounds.
Some writers use a broad literalistic interpretive method to defend a literal millennium. Charles Ryrie, also a dispensational premillennialist, takes this approach. He discusses “the question of literal interpretation . . . at length” in other Scriptures (i. e., those outside Revelation). This paves the way for his literal interpretation of Rev. 20. He bases it on “all that has been cited before.”13
Ryrie abandons the reader at the point. He does not show how to apply his literal method to the individual elements in this passage. For example, he does not show how to differentiate a literal “thousand years” from a non-literal “key” to hell.
Ryrie does not discuss how the symbolic-book context (Revelation) affects the “thousand years.” Neither does he address the use of “a thousand” as a symbolic number elsewhere in Scripture. These omissions weaken his arguments. His broad literalistic approach is of little value in answering our question. We lack guidelines for its application in this specific setting.
With sadness, we mention another class of writers. These contend for a literal “thousand years” on mere assertion. J. A. Seiss has a 536-page commentary on Revelation. He only devotes one sentence to our question. He says, “I understand these to be literal years, the same as all other dates given in this Book.”14 Such bare-bones statements are not helpful.15
Our sadness turns to joy through the honest admissions of other writers. George E. Ladd, a historic premillennialist, provides a good example. Contrary to inmillennialism, he thinks the millennium lies entirely in our future. Still, he admits that “the 1000 years may well be a symbol for a long period of time, the exact extent of which is unknown.” This admission comes from his method. He says, “all other considerations must be subservient to the exegesis of this passage.”16
Inmillennialism agrees with Ladd about the nature of the millennium. But, it places this non-literal “thousand years” in a different time slot. We hope to show why in future posts.
Conclusion
The “thousand years” of Rev. 20 involves a symbolic number. It occurs in a book full of symbols. The most intuitive answer to our question—is it symbolic?—seems obvious. The millennium is a symbol that represents the long time during which Christ reigns.
Postscript
I searched my library and study notes and found the scarcity of defenses of a literal “thousand years” surprised me. If I have missed more substantial arguments, please bring them to my attention.