See also: Amillennialism
Definition · Webster 1828 · Scriptures · Corruption · Roots · Usage · Related
📖 Biblical Definition
Amillennialism is the view that the thousand years of Revelation 20 symbolize the entire present age between the first and second comings of Christ, during which He reigns spiritually from heaven through His gospel and Spirit, and the saints who have died reign with Him. It holds that there is no distinct future earthly millennium, but one continuous reign of Christ now being exercised, to be consummated at His single return. On this reading the binding of Satan signifies his restraint from deceiving the nations as he once did, so that the gospel runs freely to all peoples; the “first resurrection” is the believer’s regeneration or his entrance into glory at death; and the second coming brings at once the general resurrection of the just and unjust, the last judgment, and the new heavens and new earth. Amillennialism, rooted in Augustine and dominant through most of church history and in the Reformed, Lutheran, and Roman communions, reads the “thousand” as a symbolic number of fullness rather than a calendar measure. It expects no utopia before Christ’s return, but rather the parallel growth of wheat and tares, the kingdom advancing amid tribulation until the King appears. Its hope is realistic about this age and unreserved about the next.
📜 Webster 1828 Definition
Webster 1828 has no entry for “amillennialism”; it defines MILLENNIUM as the thousand years during which Christ shall reign, which amillennialists identify with the present age.
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MILLENNIUM, n. — A thousand years; a word used to denote the thousand years mentioned in Revelation xx, during which holiness is to be triumphant throughout the world.
Amillennialism, a modern term, holds that this thousand years is the present gospel age in which Christ reigns spiritually, not a future earthly kingdom.
📖 Key Scripture
Revelation 20:4 — "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 they lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years."
John 12:31 — "Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out."
Colossians 2:15 — "And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it."
John 5:28-29 — "Marvel not at this: for the hour is coming, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, and shall come forth; they that have done good, unto the resurrection of life; and they that have done evil, unto the resurrection of damnation."
⚠️ Modern Corruption
No major postmodern redefinition; this is a historic intramural debate among orthodox Christians over the millennium. Its characteristic danger is a defeatism that expects only decline and forgets the gospel’s real advance.
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Amillennialism is one of the three historic readings of Revelation 20 held by orthodox, Christ-confessing believers, and the debate among them concerns the interpretation of a notoriously symbolic chapter, not the gospel itself. Amillennialists read the thousand years as the present reign of Christ, reject every earthly utopia before His return, and expect wheat and tares to grow together to the end. The view is exegetically serious, historically dominant, and confessed by the great Reformed churches; it is no mark of unbelief but a sober reading of apocalyptic numbers.
Its peculiar temptation is not heresy but a mood—a defeatism that, expecting tribulation to the end, can slide into expecting nothing but decline, and so loses the New Testament’s genuine note of advancing victory. Christ is reigning now, the strong man is bound, the nations are being discipled, and the gospel is no failure in history even if it triumphs fully only at His coming. The amillennialist guards his view from this gloom by remembering that the same chapter shows the saints reigning, not merely surviving, and that the King who walks among the lampstands is even now subduing His enemies beneath His feet.
🔗 Greek & Hebrew Roots
The view hinges on reading the chilia etē (thousand years) of Revelation 20 as a symbolic fullness, and on the New Testament language of Satan already bound and cast out.
Usage
"The amillennialist reads the thousand years as the present reign of Christ, not a future earthly golden age."
"Augustine’s amillennialism shaped the church’s reading of Revelation 20 for a thousand years and more."
"Amillennialism expects wheat and tares to the end, yet confesses Christ reigning even now from heaven."