Correction: Revelation 20 "chilia" & Defending Amillennial Historicism

When I released my revised video on Revelation 20 in spring of 2024, one of the arguments that was used in that video to defend the amillennial position I hold was based on Greek grammar. Greek grammar is a wild jungle of complexity, but you don’t have to be a linguist or speak Greek to understand today’s post or what the issue is, or to learn a little about the original language of various texts so you can have a deeper understanding. Because nobody (that I have run into at least) holds the specific position I hold (amillennialism grounded in historicism), it is always a learning adventure and some things require modification and correction as new information is discovered, so that the position is as tight as possible and you have the best arguments ready to defend the truth.

So, with all that in mind, the argument about the “thousand years” in Revelation 20 in question went something like this, based on some theological forums I had consulted with seemingly convincing explanations. I said that the Greek word used there for “one thousand” (i.e. Revelation 20:2-7, etc.) is a plural (“chilia” — pronounced “KHEE-lee-ah”), not a singular (“chilioi” — pronounced “KHEE-lee-oy”). And because no number like “one” is in front of it, the phrase is indefinite and doesn’t really mean a literal 1,000 years but rather describes an appointed period of unspecified (but long) time — or, put simply, the Church Age. In other words, the “thousands years” or “thousands of years.”

Well, after looking into this more carefully, I need to correct it.

Important that you understand that this correction actually has no bearing on the argument, because the argument is still rock solid. We are just pruning out what doesn’t actually serve us so that we can defend these things to Preterists, Futurists, Dispensationalists, etc. I still believe there is no hermeneutical reason to insist on a literal 1,000-year earthly reign in Revelation 20 and I will reiterate the reasons why here, as I have outlined in other places too (like my Debunking Satan’s Little Season study). But the point of today is that the Greek grammar argument I used was wrong, and I want to explain that simply, without assuming anyone knows Greek, because Greek grammar is very complicated.

So, what I said before went something like this:

• The word in Revelation 20 is chilia (plural), not “one thousand” (singular) or chilioi.

• Because it’s plural and has no number in front of it, it’s “indefinite,” meaning it could just be “thousands” or some vague long period, not exactly 1,000.

• Therefore, premillennialism is building a lot on a shaky grammatical foundation.

That sounds technical and pretty decisive, but it actually turns out that it misunderstands how Greek numbers actually work and the arguments I studied to put this forward are fundamentally flawed. Now, you don’t need to know Greek to get part and my goal is to make this very easy to understand.

In English, we say:

• One year

• Two years

• Three years

• etc.

Notice that when the number is more than one, the word “years” becomes plural. This is so that the adjective describing the amount (two, three, etc.) agrees with the noun. You wouldn’t say “two year” or “three year” in a sentence like, “I was there two years.” There are times we may say something like, “It was a two-year journey” — but this works because “year” joins “two” and they both become adjectives describing the noun, “journey.” So these are basic grammar rules we all (hopefully) know and remember from grade school. In Greek these same kind of rules apply, but the misunderstanding is that just because the word in the original language is plural (“chilia”) — that must mean therefore we’re dealing with an indefinite, or symbolic time period. But that’s not exactly how things work. Back to our English example, having plural nouns (“years”) doesn’t make it a vague time period. “Three years” is still exact, even though both words are plural.

Greek basically does the same kind of thing:

• The word for “year” is plural when there is more than one.

• The word for the number also takes a plural form to match it.

So in Revelation 20, the phrase is “thousand years”. Both the word “thousand” and the word “years” are in plural forms, not because it’s “thousands of years,” but simply because in Greek, that’s how you say “a thousand years.” It doesn’t need to say the number “one” (as in “one thousand years”) in order for this to be saying, simply, “a thousand years” as written. If John had wanted to say “thousands of years” in a vague or indefinite sense, he had other ways to do that. But he doesn’t. He uses the regular way to say “a thousand years.”

So, to sum this up:

• It does not say “thousands years.”

• It does not become “indefinite” just because both words are plural.

• The translations “a thousand years” are actually a good, straightforward rendering of the Greek.

• Plurality of the word does not suggest symbolic reading — BUT — there are many other clues that this is still symbolic. Very important.

So with that out of the way, what does this phrase in Revelation 20 mean? Well, I’m glad you asked! It literally means “a thousand years.” Very straightforward. It does not mean:

• “a bunch of thousands”

• “an unknown number of years”

• “some vague long time because it’s plural and lacks a numerical before it”

• etc.

It’s just: “a thousand years.” The grammar itself doesn’t force you to decide whether that’s exactly 1,000 calendar years in a strict, literal sense, or a symbolic way of speaking about a complete, long period (especially in a book that uses numbers symbolically all the time). It is still symbolic, and we will reiterate why in this post, but the grammar argument needs to be abandoned for our amillennial historicist perspective. That’s because the question of literal vs. symbolic is not settled by the grammar, it’s settled by context — as all things are.

Why the 1000 Years is Still Symbolic for the Church Age

With that out of the way, as I said before: this has no bearing on the truth that Christ is ruling right now and that Revelation 20 is talking about the Church Age, not some literal period in the future or some literal period in the past. I have gone over these arguments in many places and I will repeat them here briefly for your edification.

1. Revelation is the most symbolic book of the bible. It was added to the canon of scripture last, in the 4th century. It has taken centuries of thought to understand what this book says, which should tell us that the literal hermeneutic must be used with extreme caution. It’s not that things can’t be literal — we are not gnostics — but we have to be very careful. I still believe the bowl judgments are literal, because there is good reason to believe that, as compared to seals and trumpets that are fulfilled throughout history and therefore are largely symbolic. Either way, Revelation as a symbolic book is also full of symbolic numbers (7, 10, 12, 144,000, etc.). The number “thousand” (10×10×10) is a natural symbol for completeness or a large, full span, because it is a cube of 10. This number is used in other places specifically to represent symbolic things, like 2 Peter 3:8 representing God’s timelessness, Deuteronomy 7:9 representing God’s mercy, and

   Psalm 50:10 representing God’s sovereignty. So there is a very solid hermeneutical reason to interpret the usage of this number as symbolic.

2. Regarding the ruling period itself, the objective definition of this ruling period is given to us by Psalm 110 and Daniel 7, when the Son of Man takes His seat at the right hand of power, receives dominion, and rules as His enemies are put under His feet. This is the objective definition according to scripture, and according to the overwhelming testimony of the apostles and even Jesus Himself — that reality was fulfilled in 31 AD when Jesus ascended on a cloud (Acts 1:9), fulfilled the vision and took dominion and sat at the right hand of God. Search for “at the right hand” in your bible app in the New Testament and you will see loads of testimonies that clearly show that, for those who were in the 1st century, this was a done deal — which is the good news. Paul says in 1 Corinthians 15:26-27 that the last enemy to be destroyed is death, which happens at the resurrection. And because the resurrection of all occurs at Jesus’ return (Daniel 12:2, Matthew 25, John 5:28-29), this means death is destroyed as Paul says — at the last trumpet, at the return of Christ. That means the ruling period comes to an end, not begins, upon the second advent.

3. Yet another important point is that the nature of “ruling” in these verses in Revelation 20 is symbolic according to Revelation itself. Early in the text, in the letters to the 7 churches, we see promises of enduring in faith given to each. All of these promises are just poetic symbols of the same thing, eternal life. Endure and you will receive the ultimate prize. But many times, the imagery of these promises uses conquering and ruling explicitly (Revelation 2:7;26-28, Revelation 3:21). If we are going to be consistent, then the “ruling” and “conquering” in Revelation 20 (because it comes after Revelation 2) is a recapitulation of these things and uses the same definition. It does not change from being symbolic to literal, nor would a literal reading of both make any sense whatsoever — as then Jesus would basically be granting everyone who endures to (literally) sit on God’s throne, which is incongruent with the rest of the bible.

Last but not least, and something that I have not seen anyone else teach, is that the subjects of the ruling period the text emphasizes are the saints themselves, not Christ. Read it for yourself, capitalized emphasis mine: “Then I saw thrones, and SEATED ON THEM WERE THOSE TO WHOM THE AUTHORITY TO JUDGE WAS COMMITTED. Also I saw THE SOULS of those who had been beheaded for the testimony of Jesus and for the word of God, and those who had not worshiped the beast or its image and had not received its mark on their foreheads or their hands. THEY came to life and REIGNED with Christ for a thousand years.” (Revelation 20:4)

It is abundantly clear that the subjects of the verb “reigned” in this verse are the saints. The saints are ruling. This vision is about the saints. They ruling “with Christ” — but Christ is not the main subject of this reigning. He’s already reigning. The saints are reigning with him. But we know the bible doesn’t teach the Platonic, separate soul, so what’s going on? What’s going on is Christ is ruling in heaven as the firstfruits, and the saints are conquering and ruling on Earth parallel to His reign, by enduring in faith and conquering sin and death just as Jesus conquered. They will be resurrected and inherit all the promises as Jesus was resurrected and inherited the Earth.

This is important because it allows for nuance in understanding this issue. Most people are not aware that there are actually two parallel ruling periods, and in fact they are different. Christ’s ruling objectively begins with the ascension and ends with the 7th trumpet. The Church’s ruling period begins with Pentecost (when the Church began and people started to “come to life” spiritually) and yet ends slightly before Christ’s ruling period, when the 1st bowl judgment begins shortly after the mark enforcement reaches its peak. We know there is no condemnation for the elect (Romans 8:1), and these plagues are not designed for people to repent (Revelation 16:9), so the Church age (the appointed time to save all the elect) comes to an end. There are no more people to save, therefore no more people to come to life and conquer and reign.

Conclusion

I do my best to give you the truth as refined and precise as I possibly have it at the time. But because what I present is very unique, there are no “forerunners” necessarily to go off of and it requires occasional correction and refinement. Amillennialism today is either institutional (the visible church is “ruling”, which of course we know is the counterfeit) or highly gnostic — where everything because so symbolic and over-spiritualized you have no concept of any direction of history and get lost. Both are wrong, which is why amillennialism grounded in history is the true path. But I have yet to meet anyone that shares this view, so it’s a lonely road :P

Nevertheless, in an effort to have integrity with scripture, we have to be clear when something is wrong and has to be corrected. It is what it is, what matters is that this correction is inconsequential to the argument and conclusions. I also don’t want to give anyone the impression that the truth depends on clever “Greek tricks” that only specialists can access. The bible is clear where it needs to be clear and it was written for the average man. We are at the end of history, and sometimes it can be really useful to consult the original language. You don’t have to be a linguistic expert to do that or to glean useful truths, but sometimes it can be tricky. With Greek you have an interlinear online bible that’s free and you can consult the concordance, examine the range of meanings of a word and all of that is useful — but it isn’t magic nor 100% authoritative because when it comes to grammar things can often be a little more complex.

Last but not least, it’s important to have the tightest possible arguments so that we are not discredited. Preterism and SLS and Pre-millennialism or Dispensationalism are all wrong, and there are many solid reasons why. But if I’m going to critique these things, I want to do it on solid ground, not from shaky grammar arguments that don’t hold their weight if someone who is a language expert decides to chime in.

So I hope this was edifying for you, and helps you tighten your own approach to this very important issue. Today there are many who believe in SLS, Dispensationalism or Pre-millennialism, or even Post-millennialism. Some believe in hyper Preterism Tartaria dark ages Jesus golden ages. Adventists have their own backwards pre-millennial view because of Ellen White, where people are raptured while Satan is kicking rocks on Earth for a thousand literal years. All of these things are wrong and need to be refuted in your circles. Hopefully now you have better ammunition :)