More Calvin

The following critique may seem to be a bit tedious to some of you, but bear with me as I attempt to extract a (hopefully) reasonable defense of a much-maligned and mocked word.  That word would be chiliasm.   Rather than proactively defending the concept of a literal one thousand year reign of Christ (Rev. 20:4-7) - a task later to be addressed on this site - I have chosen to respond to Calvin's vigorous denial of same (Institutes, 3,25,5).

One can imagine the mind-set of the Reformers in those early days.  What must it be like to be on fire for one's beliefs, knowing that those beliefs proclaim light in the midst of much religious darkness and that eternal lives are at stake? How much more sobering must it have been to understand that proclaiming that light is resulting in the death of many of your contemporaries?  Calvin's response to the contemporary surroundings were with vigor and not always kind.

In defense of the resurrection of the saints he addresses chiliasm in this manner:

But Satan has not only befuddled men's senses to make them bury with the corpses the memory of resurrection; he has also attempted to corrupt this part of the doctrine with various falsifications that he might at length destroy it....But a little later there followed the chiliasts, who limited the reign of Christ to a thousand years.  Now their fiction is too childish either to need or to be worth a refutation.  And the Apocalypse, from which they undoubtedly drew a pretext for their error, does not support them.  For the number "one thousand" (Rev. 20:4) does not apply to the eternal blessedness of the church but only to the various disturbances that awaited the church, while still toiling on earth.  On the contrary, all Scripture proclaims that there will be no end to the blessedness of the elect or the punishment of the wicked (Matt. 25:41, 46).

Now all those matters which elude our gaze and far exceed the capacity of our minds must either be believed as from actual oracles of God or utterly cast away.  Those who assign the children of God a thousand years in which to enjoy the inheritance of the life to come do not realize how much reproach they are casting upon Christ and his Kingdom. For if they do not put on immortality, then Christ himself, to whose glory they shall be transformed, has not been received into undying glory (I Cor. 15:13 ff.)

If their blessedness is to have an end, then Christ's Kingdom, one whose firmness it depends, is but temporary.  In short, either such persons are utterly ignorant of everything divine or they are trying by a devious malice to bring to naught all the grace of God and power of Christ, the fulfillment of which is realized only when sin is blotted out, death swallowed up, and everlasting life fully restored! (Bold added)

Perhaps it would be advantageous to drop the word chiliasm at this time.  Some baggage appends to that title and rightfully so.  It seems that Calvin's disgust is pointed to the universalists' claim that all men will eventually be saved and that the chiliasm of his day suggests that Christ's glory is limited to that literal one thousand years (and thus that somehow the belief in resurrection is questioned?).  Consider reading between the lines and footnotes of his thoughts as recorded in the Institutes, 3, 25, 5.

For our ruminations in the day in which we now live, let's replace the baggage of chiliasm with the claims that Rev. 20 should be taken literally, futuristically and as part of the glory and universal reign of Christ that will immediately usher in the eternal glory of chapters 21 and 22.  For all of us who are serious concerning such matters, why don't we all sit down and have coffee with Calvin?  I have some questions that I would like to ask us all.

How does one determine that those who believe that Christ will literally reign for a thousand years "limit" that reign?  Do not those who believe such a literal understanding of the passage (Rev. 20:4)  also believe in the continuing glory of Christ to be immediately found in the following chapters (Rev. 20,21)?  I plead ignorance here.  If the subject matter is dealt with, it is not dealt with in the entire passage alluded to above (Westminster Press, vol. 2, pp.994-6).

Calvin has determined that Rev. 20:4 alludes to the "various disturbances that await the church, while still toiling on earth".  Though I disagree with this assessment, I understand it to be a reasonable (although incorrect) position; one held by intelligent, thinking men and women of integrity before God and one that is worthy of discussion.
Now, when the claim that the "oracles of God are cast away" by those who claim a literal thousand year reign  of Christ, one can reasonably retort by claiming that the oracle of God as recorded by John indeed uttered-forth literally that Christ would reign for 1000 years (20:4-7).  Further, it should be a continuous thought that chapters 20 and 21, also being oracles of God, shout-out the continuing glory of the Lamb of God throughout eternity. 

One can readily understand Calvin's distain for the chiliastic position since, in his mind, that position blunts the understanding of resurrection and possibly proclaims a universalist claim of reconciliation of all of mankind. The man was a warrior in the midst of incredible evil and spiritual darkness.  My intent here is to address those of you who's  belief system is akin to that of that great Reformer.  Chiliasm, with all of its baggage is not the subject matter, rather, I appeal to you that you address the formal claims of the pre-millennial and literal understanding of the final three chapters of the book of Revelation. 

Finally, here is the question:  To those of us who so believe; do you subliminally, or overtly, believe that we are really believing in "childless fiction, casting away the oracles of God and are casting reproach upon Christ"?  Such a mind-set seems to blunt  Christian dialogue for us all, don't you think?

Let's close with this thought.  It has been said that "Covenant Theology isn't so much a 'theology' in the sense of a systematic set of doctrine as it is a framework for interpreting Scripture."  Now here is a problem for all Christian belief systems, namely, that so many of us are guilty to some extent of forcing our hermeneutical tendencies to distort our "exegetical" conclusions.  To what degree does an a-millennial mind-set force an eisegetical conclusion upon a literal and declarative biblical statement?  Remember, we are having coffee here.  Let's all put our eschatological and theological ping-pong paddles away.  Calvin gets a pass because he was fighting a war against tyranny.  We should not be given that same pass.

Let's have coffee - There's a freight train coming.