Friday in the 34th Week of Ordinary Time, November 27, 2020

Revelation 20:1-4, 11—21:2

I, John, saw an angel come down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the abyss and a heavy chain. He seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, which is the Devil or Satan, and tied it up for a thousand years and threw it into the abyss, which he locked over it and sealed, so that it could no longer lead the nations astray until the thousand years are completed. After this, it is to be released for a short time. Then I saw thrones; those who sat on them were entrusted with judgment. I also saw the souls of those who had been beheaded for their witness to Jesus and for the word of God, and who had not worshiped the beast or its image nor had accepted its mark on their foreheads or hands. They came to life and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years. Next I saw a large white throne and the one who was sitting on it. The earth and the sky fled from his presence and there was no place for them. I saw the dead, the great and the lowly, standing before the throne, and scrolls were opened. Then another scroll was opened, the book of life. The dead were judged according to their deeds, by what was written in the scrolls. The sea gave up its dead; then Death and Hades gave up their dead. All the dead were judged according to their deeds. Then Death and Hades were thrown into the pool of fire. (This pool of fire is the second death.) Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the pool of fire.  Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth. The former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. I also saw the holy city, a new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

The sixth vision in the Book of Revelation concludes with the Battle of Armageddon, described in the three verses of 19, 19-21, and its aftermath, with a mention of the great judgment at the end of time and the damnation of the beasts, the dragon, and those mortals who belonged to him.  The seventh and final vision in the Book of Revelation is comprised of Chapters 21-22, in which the New Jerusalem is revealed and described, and the delights of the just are spoken of.  It ends with the warning and promise of Christ that he is “coming soon”.  St. John probably received these visions over a period of time, whether over the course of a week, a month, or a couple of months, just as the Prophets Isaiah and Ezekiel received their visions not all at once but spread over time.  John implies as much when he writes at various places, “And then I saw, etc.”  It stands to reason that if he had seen it all at once, he could not have remembered it all or kept the events straight in his head.  Indeed, the experience of a single vision must have staggered him.  The Holy Spirit would have aided him even so, but the Spirit prompts, inspires, and guides; he does not dictate and in no way does he replace the human author.  John almost certainly would have dictated the content of the visions to a secretary.  The use of secretaries (or scribes) by the Apostles is well attested.  St. Paul occasionally gives the names of some of the men who took down his letters, and once the secretary writing for him introduces himself.  Peter’s use of St. Mark as a secretary is attested to by both St. Irenaeus and St. Jerome.  

“I, John, saw an angel come down from heaven, holding in his hand the key to the abyss and a heavy chain.”  This angel is the Son of God who “comes down” from heaven in his Incarnation in order to overthrow and chain the devil.  “He seized the dragon, the ancient serpent, which is the Devil or Satan.”  The enemy of mankind is called a “dragon” because of his ferocity; a “serpent” on account of his guile; “the Devil”, from a Greek word meaning “slanderer” or “accuser”; and “Satan”, from an ancient Hebrew word for “accuser”.  “And tied it up for a thousand years and threw it into the abyss.”  This verse has been the occasion of much confusion by those who read it without understanding.  From the beginning of Chapter 20 and continuing to its end, the vision recapitulates the history of the salvation wrought by the Lord Jesus from the time of his Incarnation until the last judgment.  The “thousand years” mentioned here is that period of human history.  We are to understand this number as a sign rather than as indicating an actual number of years.  The ancient Jews and Christians understood the world as passing through six ages (or “years” or “days”).  The first begins with Adam, the second with Noah, the third with Abraham, the fourth with Moses, the fifth with the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians.  The sixth begins with the coming of the Lord Jesus among us.  We are living in this age.  The seventh age or year or day will be the eternal Sabbath, beginning immediately after the last judgment.  Each of these periods was said to endure for “a thousand years” as a general way of conveying their lengths.  The Lord overcame Satan by his Death on the Cross and currently “chains” him, that is, he restricts his power by the coming of the grace into the world by which the faithful might resist him.  “Which he locked over it and sealed, so that it could no longer lead the nations astray until the thousand years are completed.”  Satan’s power before the time of the Lord’s Incarnation was so great that he could “lead the nations astray” in all sorts of riotous idolatrous practices such as orgies and human sacrifice.  

“After this, it is to be released for a short time.”  This occurs near the end of the world.  The Venerable Bede comments: “If he should never be loosed, his malign power would be less manifest, the most faithful patience of the holy city would be less proven, and finally, the less would it be discerned how well almighty God used the devil's great evil.”  That is, God shows forth his great glory in allowing us to fully see and understand the total malignancy of the Devil, but also in the perseverance of his Saints against such ferocious evil, and in how the Devil is powerless, despite the appearance of his power, to prevent the growth of the Church.  Here it is useful to recall the Lord’s words: “The gates of hell shall not prevail against it [my Church]” (Matthew 16, 18).  

“Then I saw thrones; those who sat on them were entrusted with judgment.”  This brings to mind the words of the Lord to his Apostles: “Amen I say to you, that you who have followed me, in the regeneration, when the Son of man shall sit on the seat of his majesty, you also shall sit on twelve seats judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (Matthew 19, 28).  “I also saw the souls . . . They came to life and they reigned with Christ for a thousand years.”  John backtracks a bit here and tells how he saw the souls of the martyrs who went to heaven directly upon their deaths and “reigned” with Christ during the remainder of the present age.  

The lectionary reading skips ahead several verses at his point.  Let us look, though, at the important verse 5 of Chapter 20: “The rest of the dead lived not, till the thousand years were finished. This is the first resurrection.”  The Saints go to heaven after they die.  The wicked “live not”, for they go to hell when they die.  What happened immediately to the soul after death was a great question, particularly for the Gentile Christians.  St. Paul deals with it extensively in his letters to the Thessalonians.

“Next I saw a large white throne and the one who was sitting on it. The earth and the sky fled from his presence and there was no place for them.”  Having skipped over several verses, the lectionary takes us to the time of the final judgment.  Bede has a prescient comment on the fleeing of the earth and sky: “Indeed, after the carrying out of the judgment, this means that heaven and earth cease to be when, by the changing of things, but not in any way by their destruction, a new heaven and a new earth begin.  ‘The form of this world is passing away’ (1 Corinthians 7, 31) — he says, ‘form’, not substance.  It is to be believed that the same things are to be changed into better things.”  The heavens and the earth will not be destroyed, but changed into new heavens and a new earth.  

“I saw the dead, the great and the lowly, standing before the throne, and scrolls were opened. Then another scroll was opened, the book of life.”  This is the final image John sees of the great judgment.  “All the dead were judged according to their deeds.”  The necessity of performing good works while we are alive.  We also recall that, “For even as the body without the spirit is dead: so also faith without works is dead” (James 2, 26).  

“Then Death and Hades were thrown into the pool of fire. (This pool of fire is the second death).”  “Death” is personified here.  “Hades” was both the Greek name for the place of the dead, and of the god who ruled over it.  Perhaps this name is used for a chief lieutenant in Satan’s kingdom.  “The second death”.  The “first” death is that which we suffer at the end of our lives on earth, or, alternately, it means the death of the soul with mortal sin.    “Anyone whose name was not found written in the book of life was thrown into the pool of fire.”  Bede: “He who was not judged as ‘living’ by God.”  This fire, of a kind not to be imagined on the earth, will burn both body and soul.  It will never go out, it will never lessen, and there will be no respite for those engulfed in it.  

“Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth.”  Note how abruptly the final vision begins following the end of the one preceding it.  The chapter divisions made in the early 1200’s help us very much here.  It truly is a new vision.  Gone now are images of destruction, slaughter, plague, and persecution.  There are no more monstrous beasts or dragons.  It is as though a tremendous storm has past and the sky has quickly cleared.  For lovers of good music, this might evoke the catastrophic end to the first movement of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony and the calm beginning of the second movement.  It is jarring, rattling.  There is no way to prepare for it.  And such will be the case when the judgment occurs and is ended, with the utter disappearance of the wicked and the revealing of a new world of stupendous beauty.  “The former heaven and the former earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.”  The beauty of the new heavens and earth is such no comparison is possible between them and the old, and no familiar places.  

“I also saw the holy city, a new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.”  It is God who has built this City, this habitation for his loved ones, and so no flaw exists in it, nothing that is not perfect.  There is nothing in it that can be more stunning than it is.  This is the Church Victorious.  The image of the bride and her husband remind us of words written long, long ago: “A man shall leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they shall be two in one flesh” (Genesis 2, 24).  The Lord who “left” his Father in heaven in order to bring the Church, his bride, to his home, “cleaves” to her in an intimacy the merest shadow of a sign of which is that between husband and wife.

This Book, and particularly these last few chapters, make great demands upon the reader.  I hope that these explanations have provided some clarity.  If anyone has any questions about any of this, feel free to email me or to ask in the comments section.