# Lehre und Wehre_St. Louis Missouri_Juli 1860_S209
# AI translation — CHI Digital Archive (demonstration)

The So-Called Millennial Kingdom. 209

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

The chief questions here are these: Is what is said here of the binding of Satan to be understood of the unconditional cessation of his influence, or does it refer only to the fact that during the thousand years he may no longer storm against the church in the manner in which he did in the time when the Apocalypse was written, a time of bloody persecution aiming at annihilation, when Satan went about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he might devour? — Does the "first resurrection" denote the resurrection of the flesh, or does it rather denote the heavenly blessedness that, during the thousand years, is enjoyed by those who have departed this life before its dawning? — Does "to reign with Christ" refer to the privilege of all believers, immediately bound up with blessedness and independent of all conditions of time, or is something quite peculiar thereby denoted, which is to take place during the thousand years — whether it be that the risen ones descend to the earth and there conduct the government, or that they govern the earth from heaven? — On the answer to these questions depends directly the answer to the last question: are the thousand years still future, or have they already passed? Those who decide that the binding of Satan is an absolute one, the resurrection a bodily one, the dominion an extraordinary one, so that the whole matter steps entirely outside the domain of church history, are commonly designated by the name of chiliasts, the adherents of the doctrine of the millennial kingdom. Before we set forth the reasons why we cannot join them, we wish to cast a glance at the history of this doctrine.

In the church of the first centuries, chiliasm had numerous adherents and significant representatives. How it was then conceived, we may illustrate by citing a passage from Lactantius: "Those who are then still alive will beget an innumerable multitude of children consecrated to the Lord, and will have the risen ones as their leaders. Then a new city will be built in the middle of the earth, where the Lord dwells with His own. The moon will shine like the sun, and the sun will shine seven times as large as now. The earth, without cultivation, will bear the most glorious fruits; the rocks will sweat honey, and the animals will be tame." This sample alone can show that the present-day repre-

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