The Concept of Armageddon: A Study of the Ultimate Victory of God's Righteousness

A Voice in The Desert Podcast

The concept of Armageddon is related to military struggles, to the place of the great battle and wickedness, and is mentioned in the book of Revelation. This passage has its final fulfillment not in physical terms, but in the spiritual era when the true believers stand in their positions. This publication deals with the concept of Armageddon and is summarized in three headings, which indicate where, how, and when Armageddon takes place and what its consequences will be. The three aspects are deeply intertwined with each other. It is the site, the manner, and the period in which this event takes place that the author intends to provide material for analysis.

The word "Armageddon" is derived from Hebrew, and the original Greek script has the term "Harmagedon." The word has given origin to the mystique with which countries of the world always use terms like the "Third World War" and portray their physical-political viewpoints about last world events. Palestine (Israel) is the place where the Valley of Armageddon is located. Brother Branham indicated that it is about a 14-hour walk and a day's journey from Jerusalem to this Valley. Its first mention is in the passage of Judges 5:19. This text is related to the victory of Barak and Deborah over King Jabin of Canaan and his general Sisera.

The Hebrew term, Har Megiddô, denotes the towering hill about fifty miles north of Jerusalem upon which the fortress of Megiddo was built. There, toward the end of the second millennium, Thutmoses III won a major victory which climaxed his campaign against Palestinian Amorites. Fifteen centuries later, in 609 B.C., Pharaoh Necho II, returning to Egypt after assisting Syria in repelling aggressive Babylon, pursued some remnant of Judah's force under King Josiah which sought refuge behind these walls. According to the account in Second Chronicles, the king was slain, and his body was transported back to Jerusalem for burial.

It is first of all important to understand just what Armageddon is. The term "Armageddon" comes to us from the Book of Revelation, itself at the end of the New Testament. It is presented in descriptive purport as a prelude to that supreme finale in which God's righteous rule is asserted upon the earth as it is in Heaven and an eternity is ushered in of happiness and peace for the remaining ones of mankind.

However, anybody who reflects on our world as an enduring totality of time and space is now increasingly faced with the thought that the destiny of that world is evil. More prosaically, we are all agreed, including the secular humanists, that we have to do something about it, but the fact that the problem is now perceived in a secularized manner does not make it any more tractable. The earlier belief that the notion of a beneficent God, who will ultimately bring about the final victory of His will, could give a total and an acceptable answer and provoke a total and unambiguous belief, has disappeared. It is a question of very fundamental importance to note that this traditional belief, in the clarification of which an understanding of the notion of Armageddon is crucial, will continue to lose ground.

In terms of cultural and historical significance, the notion of Armageddon is of a very different order from the more or less forgotten notions of devil and hell. Today we are seldom, if ever, agitated by the thought that at our death - and as far as life's duration goes, we are already amidst the children of eternity - one of us might go to hell. In fact, the concept of the omnipowerful, omniscient, all-knowing, and therefore necessarily benevolent God who might sentence some of his creatures to unremitting punishment for eternity seems now utterly alien to us.

The name "Armageddon" is not difficult to explain. The concluding verses of the 16th chapter give us a description of the Kingdom of the Beast and of the circumstances that lead it to provoke the intervention of Christ Jesus. Three unclean spirits, it would seem to be, two Beasts and a False Prophet, work miracles, induce the kings of the earth to assemble at a place with a Hebrew name, Har-Megiddon, after which they go forth to gather the kings of the whole world for the final battle. The name this refers to, as most Biblical commentators insist, is the plain of Esdraelon, which has formed throughout the course of the Iron Age the easiest communications route from north to south, and is thus of direct concern to the inheritors of the ancient Empires of Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Persia, of each of which Megiddo was at times the key fortress. It was a suitable location, in other words, for all the varied and Leviathanic opponents of the Israel of God, as it will be for all the varied and Leviathanic enemies of the Church. Other explanations are merely ingenious and unrelated to the events that serve as the background of the final apocalyptic catastrophe.

The first mention of Armageddon in the Bible is in the 16th chapter of the Apocalypse or Revelation. The last of the series of seven Vial-plagues that bring to an end the reign of the Antichrist, who has shown himself both as against and in place of Christ Jesus, is poured on the air by an Angel, and a Voice from the Temple in Heaven proclaims: "It is done." In Biblical language, there is no hint of resignation or despair in such a declaration, but rather of achievement, with possibly overtones of relief. The Vial-plagues have brought to an end the trials and persecutions of the Faithful. The reign of the counter-Christ has been terminated, and in the brief but horrifying description that follows, we learn how the final defeat of the powers of darkness is accomplished.

It may indeed be concluded that the notion of an 'end of the age' was central to the anonymity of the apostolic teaching preached during the A.D. in a church which seemed to be already convinced that it was living in 'the Last Time'. In 2 Thessalonians, the apostle Paul justified his own unwarranted zeal (genuine enthusiasm, as Blaise Pascal was to say) on the grounds that the end of time was a phenomenon yet to make its initial appearance.

What this means is that he alone perfectly embodies the complex notion and the rigorous accompanying demands of divine love, and thereby fulfills the pledge of everlasting divine rule (victory for God's righteousness) by the fostering of peace which he alone can establish between God and his creation. When it comes to the manner of this realization, not all of the New Testament books offer a perspective which is exactly at one. Harnack observed that the apostle Paul, in common with all of his listeners, expected the literal earlier end of the world.

Revelation is the twenty-seventh book in the New Testament, although not the final one in the sequence of its date of origin. (2 Peter officially occupies that position.) As far as 'authorship' is concerned, it is to be included among the books in the New Testament about which there may be a query, if only because on both the Hebrew and the Christian models of prophecy, nearly everything found in it is just not to be discovered elsewhere throughout the rest of the book. "To Christ Jesus alone belong all splendor and power. May it be to him for all time," we are told in the closing verses of the twenty-seventh chapter of Revelations, and this glorious refrain seems to me to summarize the matter to the satisfaction of all.

At times, the prophets are given personal experiences that illustrate this final victory of righteousness over evil. Other times, the prophets or the psalmists use a myriad of expressive and compelling literary forms to present this deep-felt belief in the ultimate triumph. These writers give various prophecies to portray this incredible victory. The writings of Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Joel, Zechariah, Malachi, and the Psalms are spiritual dynamite. Their prophecies of things to come are profound. They minister to the deep, hidden psychic needs of men across the ages yet to come. Even Jesus was not exempt from quoting from many of these Old Testament prophecies. We are told He made reference not only to individuals but also to the great and dramatic events that were yet to come. With only a partial fulfillment, we would do well to carefully note these prophecies contained in both the Old and the New Testaments.

Beginning in the Old Testament, a rich vein of scripture exists that refers to the concept of Armageddon. This scripture portrays a time of final destruction of the forces of evil the world over - righteousness in the final battle between good and evil. The ultimate victory of God's righteousness seems to have always been an integral part of the Judaic teachings, just as it is part of the Christian faith today. From the earliest writings, this concept is put forward, passed on to sons and daughters across centuries, and thoughtfully expounded.

Turning to Islam, it is plain from the Qur'an that close affinities, and, to some extent, an overlapping of ideas exist with both Christianity and Judaism, but if one considers the concept of Armageddon specifically, it is observable that in the Muslim Rashidun and Umayyad rents eschatological speculation was unimportant due to conquests of territory, and that Muhammad's teachings, insofar as their details can still be ascertained, contained relatively little about a great end-time battle at all.

Although this book is concerned with the term "Armageddon" in the Christian tradition alone, it might be enriching to cast a brief eye across the beliefs of other religions and to determine if a process of heterogenization in the interpretation of that term was to be witnessed. Christianity, just one religion among numerous others capable of having differing eschatologies, roots itself first in Judaism whose eschatological literature covers virtually the whole period of its writing. Cognate concepts can be seen adumbrated in Isaiah and taken up into the Christian tradition: within the Jewish tradition we can note once again that, at the same time, differences thrived, for example between the Pharisees and the Sadducees.