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Who is Gog and where is Magog?

Another of Ezekiel’s visions has led to a great deal of continuing speculation because of its prophecy warning of a great apocalyptic battle to come, a prophecy that the Christian author of the New Testament book of Revelation seized upon to refer to a coming Satanic invasion. In Ezekiel, the “chief prince” Gog is a foe who will come from “Magog,” to the north, to attack Israel. After a cataclysmic battle, Gog will be defeated and God will be acknowledged by all nations. In historical context, the identity of Ezekiel’s Gog and Magog is a mystery, although it seems likely that the prophet was referring to Babylon, traditionally identified as the greatest source of evil in the Hebrew world. Following the decline of Babylon as a political force, literalists throughout history have suggested a variety of alternative nations as the biblical “Magog.” More recently, fundamentalist Christians, in particular, have pointed to the Soviet Union, now dismantled and presumably no longer a threat, Russia, or Iran as this evil empire that would come “from the north.” Magog has been loosely identified as an area in the Caucasus Mountain region near the Caspian Sea.

• Haggai

Go up to the hills and bring wood and build the house, so that I may take pleasure in it and be honored, says the Lord. You have looked for much, and, lo, it came to little; and when you brought it home, I blew it away. Why? says the Lord of hosts. Because my house lies in ruins, while all of you hurry off to your own houses. (Hag. 1:7-9)

Nothing is known about the life of the prophet Haggai, to whom the book is attributed, other than that he was in Jerusalem to help oversee reconstruction of the Temple in 520 BCE, a year of blight, drought, and general dissatisfaction for the exiles who had returned from Babylon. Haggai attributed all of these misfortunes to the failure to complete the new Temple. Haggai says that God is punishing the people for concentrating on the decoration of their own houses before completing the house of the Lord. Haggai urges Zerubbabel, the governor of Judah, and Joshua (Jeshua), the high priest, to rally the people to the crucial task of completing the Temple.

After work commences again, the people must be further encouraged, and Haggai rallies them a second time by prophesying that the spirit of God will remain with them, that God will bring silver and gold from all nations, and that the new Temple will one day be even greater than the first, a prophecy that did not literally come to pass. As previously noted, the Second Temple, whose precise dimensions are unknown, was far less grandiose than Solomon’s Temple had been.

While Haggai lacks the great poetic visions or sweeping dramatic voice of many of the other prophets, the book is valuable because it documents the history of the period of the Return from Babylon. Besides Ezra and Nehemiah, only Haggai and the short Zechariah (see below) cast any light on this significant period.

• Zechariah

Not by might, nor by power, but by my spirit, says the Lord of hosts. (Zech. 4:6)

Like Haggai, Zechariah, a priest and prophet, also spoke to the returning Jews, urging them to finish the restored Temple during the reign of Darius I (522-486 BCE). But only the first eight chapters of the book could have been written by Zechariah. The later chapters are occasionally obscure visions of a messianic era to come and they differ from the first eight chapters in style, language, theology, and historical background. These later chapters contain references to the Greeks, whose influence did not become great until after the era of Alexander. Scholars suggest that these sections may have been written more than two centuries after Zechariah lived, or between 300 and 200 BCE.

However, the first eight chapters reflect the period immediately after the Babylonian Captivity (538 BCE) and are concerned with the reconstruction of the Temple and Jerusalem in preparation for a coming messianic age. Jewish tradition