Jarl Waggoner's Reviews

Free Web space and hosting from jesusanswers.com

The Dark Side of the Millennium by Arthur Lewis. Baker Book House, 1980, 65 pp.

Reviewed by Jarl K. Waggoner

This small volume by a professor at Bethel College (Minnesota) represents another recent attempt to reinterpret the millennial passage of Revelation 20. Subtitled "The Problem of Evil in Revelation 20:1-10," it is the perceived enormity of this problem that leads the author away from any premillennial interpretation. He finds it impossible to harmonize the existence of evil with the reign of Christ and sets out to show that "evil is indeed an integral part of the thousand-year period described in Revelation 20. . . . This evil is sufficient reason to deny the identification of the Millennium with the glorious future kingdom of Christ" (p. 12). Lewis's solution is to apply the Old Testament kingdom passages to the eternal state of Revelation 21 and 22, while placing the Millennium of Revelation 20 in the present age. He labels his view "historical millennialism" but one quickly recognizes this as his term for what is essentially amillennialism. To Lewis, this appears to be the perfect solution: "When the 'thousand years' is understood to be coterminus with this day and age, the pieces all fall into place" (p. 19).

While premillennialists will agree there is evil during the Millennium, they will disagreee with Lewis's characterization of the Millennium as violent and insecure (p. 33). He insists that the Old Testament picture of a reign of peace is contradicted by Revelation 20. Yet this is hardly the case. The Millennium is a period of complete peace and security, and it is so for the very reason that the King smashes every outward manifestation of evil.

Perhaps the most disappointing thing about Lewis's book is his failure to examine the Old Testament kingdom passages in any detail. Reference is made to only a few selected Old Testament passages which contribute to the author's polemic. The explanation of Isaiah 65:20 seems quite inadequate, with the writer ruling out any literal sense of the verse which most naturally seems to include death and sin as part of the kingdom picture. Lewis's methodology is dubious at other points as well. To prove his contention he is quick to assume that similarity of language figures or a direct quote of an Old Testament passage in the New Testament limits the meaning of the Old Testament passage (cf. discussion of 2 Thess. 2:8, pp. 33f). He seems to overlook the fact that the New Testament writers may be using Old Testament language to illustrate a point without any intention of interpreting the Old Testament passage from which it comes.

Selectivity and inconsistency mar this work. The author cites Luke 20:34-36 as proof that those who attain to the kingdom will be like angels, not marrying or giving in marriage (i.e., glorified) and thus no sinful human beings are born in the kingdom (p. 42). However, he passes over the qualifying phrase "and to the resurrection of the dead," which could limit the statement to raptured saints as opposed to non-glorified tribulation saints. Likewise, while he insists that premillennialists have no right to insert the Millennium between verses 23 and 24 of 1 Corinthians 15, he himself is forced to break the chronological narrative of Revelation 19 and 20 to insert the Millennium back into the present age (p. 49).

A major problem with The Dark Side of the Millennium lies in its simplistic manner of solving the problem. Lewis concludes that the Old Testament kingdom is more easily identified with the eternal state, and the Millennium of Revelation 20 must be identified with the present age because of the existence of evil. He fails, however, to explore the implications of such identifications. The thousand-year period must be extended to an indefinite period of time, the binding of Satan must be explained, and the promises to Israel must be spiritualized. In short, he faces all the problems that traditional amillennialism does.

What Arthur Lewis has given us is a brief contemporary presentation of traditional amillennialism with all its inherent problems. The book has little to offer in the present discussion. Premillenialists would rather live with the "problem" of evil in Revelation 20, than to take on the hermeneutical problems of amillennialism.

This review originally appeared in The Fundamentalist Journal, February 1983.