5-32 Michael And The Great Dragon

Revelation 12: 7-9: “And there was war in heaven: Michael and his angels fought against the dragon; and the dragon fought and his angels, And prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in heaven. And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him”.

Popular Interpretation

This is one of the most popular passages used to suggest that there was a rebellion in heaven amongst the angels, resulting in the devil and his angels being thrown down to earth, when, in the form of the serpent, they began to create trouble and sin on earth.

Comments

1. All that we have learnt so far in this study must be brought to bear on this passage. We have seen that angels cannot sin and that there can be no rebellion in heaven. Thus this passage - which is the only one of its kind - must be interpreted in a way that does not involve angels sinning or there being sinful angels making people sin on earth, seeing that sin comes from within us, not from outside of us (Mk. 7: 20-23).

2. The serpent is cast out of heaven, implying it was originally there. But the literal serpent in Eden was created by God out of the dust of the earth (Gen. 1: 24-25). There is no implication that the devil came down from heaven and got inside the serpent. The language of “cast down” and “cast out” does not require literal downwards movement- Babylon is “thrown down” in Rev. 18:21. The O.T. basis of “cast out” is in the nations / beasts being cast out from God’s presence in the land of Israel. In Rev. 12 we have another woman in the wilderness, who enters the Kingdom [cp. the land] once the beast is cast out. In Dan. 7:9 the thrones of the beast / kingdoms are “cast down” before the Kingdom is established on earth, just as the beast is cast down before the establishment of the Kingdom in Rev. 12. The idea of being cast out of Heaven was and is common in Semitic languages and even wider culture for a loss of power- thus Cicero comments about Mark Anthony: "You have hurled your colleagues down from heaven".

3. Note carefully that there is no reference here to angels sinning or rebelling against God, only to a war in heaven.

4. After the drama of vv. 7-9, v. 10 says that there was “a loud voice saying in heaven, now is come salvation and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night”. If vv. 7-9 occurred at the beginning of the world, before the time of Adam and Eve, how could it be said that after satan’s fall there came salvation and the kingdom of God? After Adam’s sin, mankind began his sad history of slavery to sin and failure - a state hardly to be described as “salvation” and the kingdom of God. There is rejoicing that the devil - the accuser - has been cast down to earth. Why should there be rejoicing if his coming to earth was the start of sin and disaster for man? If a fall from heaven to earth is understood figuratively rather than literally, as representing a fall from authority (as Is. 14:12; Jer. 51:53; Lam. 2:1; Matt. 11:23), much more sense can be made of all this. If all this happened before the time of Adam, or at least before the fall of man, how could the devil have been accusing “our brethren”, seeing they did not then exist?

5. There is nothing indicating that all this happened in the Garden of Eden. A vital point is made in Revelation 1:1 and 4:1 - that the Revelation is a prophecy of “things which must shortly come to pass”. It is not therefore a description of what happened in Eden, but a prophecy of things to happen at some time after the first century, when the Revelation was given by Jesus. Any who are truly humble to the Word will see that this argument alone precludes all attempts to refer Revelation 12 to the Garden of Eden. The question has also to be answered as to why the identity of the devil and information about what happened in Eden should be reserved until the end of the Bible before being revealed.

6. “The great dragon was...that old serpent” (Rev. 12:9). The dragon had “seven heads and ten horns” (v. 3), therefore it was not literally the serpent. It being called “that old serpent” shows that it had the characteristics of that serpent in Eden, in the sense of being a deceiver, as the serpent was. Thus the devil is not literally the serpent. If it is, then the dragon is the snake. But the dragon is a political power, manifesting sin 9satan). Pharaoh is likened to a great dragon (Ez. 32:2) but we can’t reason that therefore he was a literal dragon. Similarly, “the sting of death is sin” (1 Cor. 15:56), but that does not mean that death is a literal snake. It has the characteristics of the snake, through it’s association with sin.

7. The devil was cast down onto the earth and was extremely aggressive “because he knoweth that he hath but a short time” (v. 12). If the devil was cast down in Eden, he has had the opportunity to torment man throughout his long history - which is hardly having only “a short time” in which to wreak havoc.

8. How could the devil have deceived “the whole world” (v. 9) before he was thrown out of heaven seeing that there was no one in the world before Adam?

9. Verse 4 says that the dragon drew a third of the stars of heaven to the earth with his tail. If this is read literally - and Revelation 12 has to be read literally to support the Popular Interpretation - the sheer size of the dragon is immense - a third of the whole universe (or solar system at least) could be contained just on his tail. There is no way the planet earth would be big enough to contain such huge creature sprawling over it. Most of the stars of the solar system are bigger than our earth - how then could a third of them land on earth? And remember that all this happened, or will happen, after the first century A.D., when this prophecy was given.

10. In view of this and many other things in Revelation 12 (and the whole prophecy) which are just incapable of any literal fulfilment, it is not surprising that we are told first of all (Rev. 1:1) that this is a message that has been “signified” - i.e. signified - put into sign language, or symbol. As if to emphasize this in the context of Revelation 12, Revelation 12:1 describes the subsequent action as “ a great sign” (A.V. margin).

11. In reading of what the devil does when he is on the earth, there is no description of him causing people to sin; indeed, vs. 12-16 show that the devil was unsuccessful in his attempts to cause trouble on earth once he arrived there. This contradicts the popular interpretation.

12. One of the key questions in understanding whether this passage supports the idea of a literal war in heaven, is whether the “heaven” spoken of here is literal or figurative. We explained earlier that “heaven” can figuratively refer to a place of authority (see “Suggested Explanation” No. 7 of Eph. 6:11-13). Revelation being such a symbolic book, we would expect this to be the case here.

13. In their eagerness to show that Rev. 12:7-9 refers to fallen angels at the beginning of the world, apologists for a personal satan have rather overlooked the context of the passage. A woman in Heaven, in the agony of childbirth and resting her feet on the moon, is faced by a dragon, whose tail throws down a third of the stars of Heaven to earth (Rev. 12:4). She gives birth, and the child "was caught up unto God, and to his throne" (Rev. 12:5). Clearly enough the "heaven" where all this occurs isn't the "heaven" where God lives and where His throne is. Next we read of a power struggle "in heaven", and the dragon and his angels are "cast out" (Rev. 12:9). The dragon throws one third of the stars of Heaven to earth- are these Angels? If so, how come the dragon and not God casts them to earth? That's quite the opposite of the scenario painted in Paradise Lost. How can a literalistic reading of this passage cope with the two episodes of Angels being cast down to earth? At the very least, care in thought and exposition is clearly lacking in the orthodox reading of this passage. The woman, who is never recorded as leaving "Heaven", then flees "into the wilderness" (Rev. 12:6). Once the dragon is cast to the earth, then he starts persecuting the woman by hissing huge volumes of water at her (Rev. 12:13). The earth opens and swallows this water (Rev. 12:16)- even though the woman is never recorded as losing her "in heaven" status. All this is reason enough to not interpret "heaven" and "earth" in this passage in any literal manner. The appearance of the woman and dragon "in heaven" is described as a semeion, a "sign", something that needs to be interpreted, rather than a literal fact (Rev. 12:1,3).

14. When we read that the devil-draqon "deceives" people, this is defined more specifically in Rev. 19:20 as referring to deceiving people in the very last days by false miracles worked in conjunction with the "false prophet". Thus the deceit is not to be understood as a general inciting of humanity to sin in their hearts- the deceit is specified as occuring only in the last days, immediately prior to the Kingdom of God being established.

15. The Greek word ballo translated "cast out" doesn't necessarily mean to throw down- Greek has words for this specific idea and it's significant that they're not used here. Here are a few examples of the usage of ballo, showing that it really means to expel or re-place:

- A wind "arose" (Acts 27:14); a crowd "threw" dust up into the air (Acts 22:23); a sword is "put up" into a sheath (Jn. 18:11) imply the word can mean to throw up as well as to throw down.

- Men "cast" stones (Jn. 8:7,59), "strike" another man on the face (Mk. 14:65), "put" fingers in the ear (Mk. 7:33), people "lay" upon a bed (Mt. 8:6,14; 9:2; Mk. 7:30)- horizontal movement.

- We "put" bits into the mouths of horses (James 3:3)- no vertical movement there. Thomas "thrust" his hand into the Lord's side (Jn. 20:27).

- Believers were "cast" into prison (Acts 16:24,37; Rev. 2:10)- the idea of vertical movement isn't there. Likewise love "casts out" fear (1 Jn. 4:18).

- The dragon casts water out of his mouth (Rev. 12:15,16), horizontally along the ground. Here the word clearly doesn't mean to throw down from a height- and the same word is used in that context for the devil being "cast out", i.e. ejected, from Heaven.

- Men "cast" dust on their own heads (Rev. 18:19)

The Chronological Problem

The woman of v. 1 is “clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars”. These heavenly bodies, as well as the woman, apparently suspended in heaven, cannot be literal. She could not literally be clothed with the sun, or have stars as big as the earth on her literal head.

Another sign appears in heaven in v. 3 - a red dragon. This is commonly taken as a literal heaven, but why should it be, seeing that the same heaven is referred to in v. 1 and that is clearly figurative? Verse 4 shows the dragon casting a third of the stars of heaven to earth. We have seen that because of the size of the stars and earth, this cannot therefore refer to literal stars or heaven. The Kingdom of God is to be established on earth (Dan. 2: 44; Matt. 5:5), which will not be possible if the earth is destroyed (which it would be) by huge stars falling onto it.

The woman in “heaven” then delivered her child, who was “caught up unto God and to his throne” (v. 5). God’s throne is in heaven. If the woman was already in heaven, why would her child have to be “caught up” to heaven? She must have been a symbol of something on earth, although in a figurative “heaven”. She then flees “into the wilderness” (v. 6). If she was in literal heaven, this means there is a wilderness in heaven. It is far more fitting for her to be in a figurative heavenly place, and then flee to a literal or figurative wilderness on the earth.

We then come to v. 7 - “there was war in heaven”. All other references to “heaven” in Revelation 12 having been figurative, it seems only consistent that this was war in a figurative heaven. This must be the case, as there can be no rebellion or sin in literal heaven (Matt. 6:10; Ps. 5: 4-5; Hab. 1:13). The common view claims that wicked angels are locked up in hell; but here they are in heaven. They are not therefore literal angels.

I sometimes ask those who believe in the orthodox idea of the devil the following question: ‘Can you give me a brief Biblical history of the devil, according to your interpretation of Bible passages? The response is highly contradictory. According to ‘orthodox’ reasoning, the answer has to be something like this.
a) The devil was an angel in heaven who was thrown out into the garden of Eden. He was thrown to earth in Gen. 1.
b) He is supposed to have come to earth and married in Gen 6.
c) At the time of Job he is said to have had access to both heaven and earth.
d) By the time of Is. 14 he is thrown out of heaven onto earth.
e) In Zech. 3 he is in heaven again.
f) He is on earth in Mt. 4.
g) He is “cast out” at the time of Jesus’ death, according to the popular view of “the prince of this world” being “cast out” at that time.
h) There is a prophecy of the devil being ‘cast out’ in Rev. 12.
i) The devil is “chained” in Rev. 20, but he and his angels were chained in Genesis, according to the common view of Jude v 6. If he was bound with ‘eternal chains’ then, how is he chained up again in Rev. 20?

From this it should be obvious that the popular view that the devil was cast out of heaven for sinning cannot be true, seeing that he is described as still being in heaven after each occurrence of being ‘cast out’. It is vital to understand both heaven and the devil in a figurative sense.

Suggested Explanations

1. To try and expound this chapter fully is out of the scope of our present notes. A full explanation of these verses requires an understanding of the entire book of Revelation in order to get them in context.

2. The conflict in figurative heaven - i.e. a place of authority - was therefore between two power groups, each with their followers, or angels. Remember that we have often identified the devil and satan with the Roman or Jewish systems.

3. That the devil-dragon represents some kind of political power is indicated by it having “crowns upon his heads” (v. 3). Revelation 17:9 -10 also comments on this dragon: “Here is the mind that hath wisdom” - i.e. don’t try and understand this animal as a literal being - “The seven heads are seven mountains...these are seven kings”. One of the kings continuing “a short space” perhaps connects with the devil-dragon having “but a short time” in Revelation 12:12.

4. Various scholars have shown that this passage is full of allusion to contemporary pagan myths (1). This is in keeping with what we have seen elsewhere in the Scriptures- pagan myths are alluded to in order to deconstruct them. Surely the point of all the allusions here in Revelation 12 is to say: 'Take your attention away from all these myths of what supposedly is going on out in the cosmos. Get real. Here on earth, you are going to be persecuted by Rome [or some other adversary]. Prepare for it in your hearts. The real enemy isn't a dragon in the sky. It's Rome'.

Notes

(1) Neil Forsyth, Satan And The Combat Myth (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989) chapter 13.