Category: Understanding Torah

The Rage and Age
of Gog and Magog

Let’s start with our familiar text:

Awake, O north wind,

And come, wind of the south;

Make my garden breathe out fragrance,

Let its spices be wafted abroad.

May my beloved come into his garden

And eat its choice fruits!” (So 4:16)

This call to “Awake, O North” is thought to encompass three distinct calls recorded in

1. Jeremiah 31:7-8 (exiles of Israel),

2. Isaiah 41:25 (Messiah)

3. Gog and Magog (Ezek 38:2)

Why are all three being called to “Awake” simultaneously?

To awake in Scripture can have a few connotations. The contextual explanation is that there has been a period of inactivity, and the prophetic call is to arouse each group to action. Messiah will begin to gather the exiles who have aroused from a period of spiritual apathy, and simultaneously, Gog and Magog will awaken in that generation to create the chaos and darkness necessary to awaken Israel from spiritual “sleep.”

Because the gematria of Gog and Magog is 70 [Gimmel-Vav-Gimmel Vav-Mem-Gimmel-Vav-Gimmel, 3+6+3+6+40+3+6+3], they are thought to represent the symbolic 70 nations of the world, which will gather against both 1. Adonai and 2. Israel.

Various commentaries make oblique references to Gog and Magog, but it will not be understood fully until the day arrives. Some say it is the descendants of Amalek among the nations. Amalek, from which King Agag arose, is the murderous spirit of Edom, or Rome, the fourth beast, headed by Babylon.

In that sense, Gog (chief person) and Magog (his nation, people) has arisen in every generation to provoke the Holy One and people who trust in Him and obey Him. The Scriptures cited below reiterate that Gog and Magog are not a single ruler and nation, but a wicked remnant embedded among all nations. In some generations, they will rise up with enough strength and cunning to marshal huge numbers of the population to join their murderous schemes.

The pre-millennial war will bring Israel to repentance, and Adonai Himself will destroy Gog and Magog with confusion, thunder, hail, blood, and lightning (Ezek 38-39). In other words, an amalgam of Egypt and Assyria’s judgments.

Psalm Two is traditionally associated with Gog of Magog:

Why are the nations in an uproar and the peoples devising a vain thing?The kings of the earth take their stand and the rulers take counsel together against the LORD and against His Anointed, saying,“Let us tear their fetters apart and cast away their cords from us!” He who sits in the heavens laughs, the Lord scoffs at them. Then He will speak to them in His anger and terrify them in His fury, saying, “But as for Me, I have installed My King upon Zion, My holy mountain.” (Ps 2:1-6)

The commentators note that in this attack of Gog, it revisits an important precedent in Babel: at the tower of Bavel, the united conspirators agreed to attack Heaven itself. As a result, YHVH confused them, and the 70 languages of the nations were born. This is the traditional location of Nebuchadnezzar’s golden statue. Amalek in the Torah portion Balak is referred to “first of the nations,” in other words, the first to openly rebel against Heaven itself by attacking Israel in the wilderness; this “first” attack was also the first direct attack against Heaven since the “nation of mankind” attempted to penetrate it rebelliously at the Tower of Bavel.

At the final attack of Gog from Magog, the nations will once again undertake to assemble and attack YHVH and Messiah DIRECTLY, thinking the Holy City Jerusalem has a “Patron” who will defend it. They believe this was the wicked Amalekite Haman’s fallacy, attacking the Jews first instead of their God. Something will cause them to believe they have the wherewithal to wage war directly against YHVH and King Messiah.

What do Gog and Magog have to do with the third “awakening” of the winds?

“Then I saw an angel coming down from heaven, holding the key of the abyss and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old, who is the devil and Satan, and bound him for a thousand years; and he threw him into the abyss, and shut it and sealed it over him, so that he would not deceive the nations any longer, until the thousand years were completed; after these things he must be released for a short time.” (Re 20:1-3)

The “satan” is the adversary, or yetzer hara, Evil Inclination, which wars and accuses humankind; it is adversarial to the righteousness of the Spirit. The yetzer hara, identified with satan, is in conflict with the image of Elohim in every person, for He is the Creator, and He made mankind in His image. We are “inclined” toward imaginative creative, thought. What should lean toward tov, good imaginations, the yetzer tov, instead wars against the mind of Elohim with evil imaginations:

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“Then the LORD saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth, and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.” (Ge 6:5)  

Not part time, but full-time yetzer hara.

The satan is the Dragon, who holds the authority that is passed on to ”The Beast.” He operates first in deception to usurp the Garden. In CG Workbooks Two and Four, you learned that The Beast represents the appetite, emotion, intellect, and desire of the nefesh (soul), which wars against the truth of the Ruach HaKodesh, “it is written.”

As nations/empires, the Dragon is represented by Egypt, and its deceitful “authority” was wielded by the Beast empires: Babylon, Medea/Persia, Greece, and Rome in conquering the nations. Greece’s “spots” were its systems, much adopted from Persia and Babylon, by which it enticed, coerced, and forced subjugation of the nations. These systems incorporate the natural leanings, “yetzer,” lust of the nefesh: appetite, emotion, desire, intellect.

A wicked seed is deception. It can take root and form intent. Intent leads to wicked action.

And I saw coming out of the mouth of the dragon and out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet, three unclean spirits like frogs. (Re 16:13)

Lacking the “food and water” of the Word, the beast/nefesh within a human creature is never completely satisfied because the nefesh, or soul, dominates the ruach/spirit.

When we fail to walk in ever-increasing holiness, immersing in the Word Yeshua, we are part of the serpent’s deception among the nations of our exile. Our sin deceives people concerning the purity of the Kingdom coming fully to this earth.

A believer should not be a deceiver.

We can deceive either through

1) not studying to understand the Word 

2) failing to apply it

To the undiscipled/undisciplined soul, an achievement or acquisition brings temporary happiness and satiety, but it quickly loses its luster, and the beast must hunt the next soul meal.

In contrast, a soul at rest is “like a weaned child,” (Ps 131:2) able to relax until the next challenge, test, or accomplishment, knowing the Ruach HaKodesh responds to the Word readily, but the nefesh is still in faith training [l’hitamen], re-wiring thoughts and actions to “It is written.”

“When the thousand years are completed, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them together for the war; the number of them is like the sand of the seashore. And they came up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, and fire came down from heaven and devoured them. And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, where the beast and the false prophet are also; and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.” (Re 20:7-10)

Although Gog and Magog (the hostile nations) are defeated at the beginning of the 1000-year-reign, when the evil inclination is released again, the evil remnant among the nations gather for war again. The “sand of the seashore” is a hint to the ruined King of Egypt’s dead Egyptian army who served the dragon, the crocodile of the Nile. They were last seen on the sand of the seashore of the Reed Sea, or Yam Suf (the final sea).

Are you awake yet?

Next week, we will learn why Gog and and Magog are so attracted to “the beloved city” and its inhabitants to destroy them. We will also learn why the power of satan is so strong against the holy things of this earth.