Mark Hitchcock: Russia Rising: Tracking the Bear in Bible Prophecy

There’s an often-told story that Vernon Grounds relates. When a friend of Grounds’s was in seminary, he would play basketball at a public school because there was no gym at the seminary. Each week as he and some other seminarians played, an elderly janitor would wait patiently until they were finished. He always sat in the stands reading his Bible. One day Grounds’s friend approached the custodian. “What are you reading?” he asked. The janitor answered, “The book of Revelation.” Grounds’s friend was surprised. “Do you understand what you’re reading?” “Oh, yes,” the janitor replied. The seminarian was even more surprised and asked, “What does it mean?” The janitor answered him, “It means that Jesus is gonna win.” Grounds writes, “That’s the best commentary I have ever heard on that book. Jesus is going to win.” [9] Vernon Grounds, “Jesus Is Going to Win,” Morning Glory , January 4, 1994, 9, https://bible.org/illustration/jesus-going-win .

Jesus wins the final game of thrones. None can stand against him. All will wither under his mighty hand.

It’s great to get the big picture in mind and know up front who the key players are and how the story ends. But we’ve gotten way ahead of ourselves. Now that we have a broad overview of some of the events of the end times, we’re going to slow down, back up a bit, and look in detail at key prophecies that must be fulfilled before Jesus comes, including the rise and fall of Russia.

Let’s zero in on the king of the north and track the Bear in Bible prophecy.

Ezekiel 38 is the biblical entry point for any discussion of Russia in biblical prophecy. All agree the names Russia and Moscow do not appear in this chapter or anywhere else in the Bible. Yet as you will see, many reputable scholars believe that the ancient prophet refers to the nation we know today as Russia. Ezekiel 38:1-2 is the beginning of a list of nations that will join together, forming a northern storm in the end times: “The word of the LORD came to me saying, ‘Son of man, set your face toward Gog of the land of Magog, the prince of Rosh, Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him’” (NASB).

Two key words in this verse have been associated with Russia— Rosh and Magog . Some claim that any attempt to associate these ancient places with modern Russia is speculative and sensationalistic. [2] Douglas Stuart, for example, claims Ezekiel 38–39 is widely misinterpreted. He says, “Many people who know little about how apocalyptic prophecy is properly interpreted have tried to equate Gog with some modern ‘northern’ nation…. No modern nation is mentioned in the Bible…. The history of any particular modern nation is not a subject that God has chosen to cause to be incorporated into His Word.” Douglas Stuart, Ezekiel , Mastering the Old Testament, gen. ed. Lloyd J. Ogilvie, vol. 18 (Dallas: Word Publishing, 1988), 351. Stuart doesn’t take any of the nations in Ezekiel 38 literally, but he does take all the nations in Ezekiel 25–32 literally. He makes the distinction based on his designation of Ezekiel 38–39 as “apocalyptic.” Yet there is nothing in the text that indicates the places in Ezekiel 38 are to be taken in any way other than literally. I agree that modern nations aren’t mentioned per se in Scripture; however, I believe that the places in Ezekiel 38 are ancient locations that represent the nations in the end times that will reside in those places. Others believe the ancient prophet identified the ruler of the modern nation of Russia as the final king of the north described in Daniel 11:40. To discover which view carries more weight, we have to examine the evidence. But before we look at Ezekiel 38, let’s briefly consider one other biblical passage that some have associated with Russia.

Because of the symbolism of a bear, some believe Daniel 7:5 is a reference to modern Russia: “Then I saw a second beast, and it looked like a bear. It was rearing up on one side, and it had three ribs in its mouth between its teeth. And I heard a voice saying to it, ‘Get up! Devour the flesh of many people!’” Those who believe this refers to Russia in the last days place undue emphasis on the modern designation of Russia as the Bear, which would have been foreign to the original audience. Those who hold this view usually interpret the lion with wings of an eagle in Daniel 7:4 as a reference to Great Britain (the lion) and her offspring the United States (the eagle).

However, interpreting ancient prophecies based on modern national symbols is misguided. I, as well as an overwhelming number of Bible commentators, believe the lion in Daniel 7 refers to the ancient Babylonian empire while the bear refers to the ancient Persian empire. The basis for this interpretation is simple. In Daniel 2, four empires are symbolized by four metals in a great statue that King Nebuchadnezzar sees in a dream. The four metals are gold, silver, bronze, and iron. Daniel reveals that the first empire (represented by the head of gold) is Babylon (see Daniel 2:38). Then he says that Babylon will be succeeded by another empire. We know from history that the Medo-Persians followed Babylon, overtaking the city of Babylon in 539 BC. The Persians were followed by Greece and then Rome. Commentators are almost unanimous that the four metals of the statue in Daniel 2 refer to Babylon, Medo-Persia, Greece, and Rome.

The four beasts in Daniel 7:1-7 are parallel to the four metals in Daniel 2, which means the bear in Daniel 7 is not Russia but the ancient Persian empire. We know this because the entire section from Daniel 2–7 is structured as a chiasm, an intentional literary device in which a sequence of ideas is repeated in reverse order, mirroring the original sequence in order to focus attention and highlight the center of the chiasm. Items in a chiasm are parallel, working toward the central point. The chiastic structure reveals that Daniel 2 and 7 cover the same ground, employing different images for the same empires.

Daniel 2 presents the four world empires from man’s perspective as a great metallic man, while Daniel 7 views the same empires from God’s perspective as wild, ravenous beasts. The bear in Daniel 7:5 is ancient Persia, not Russia.

The first place mentioned in Ezekiel 38 is Magog (see Ezekiel 38:2; 39:6). [3] Gog is mentioned before Magog, but Gog is the leader of this invasion. We will discuss the meaning of Gog in the next chapter. Besides its mention in Ezekiel, the name Magog is found in the Bible only in Genesis 10:2 and 1 Chronicles 1:5—where he is listed as a son of Japheth (one of Noah’s three sons)—and in Revelation 20:8, a connection we’ll examine in chapter 8. [4] Daniel I. Block, The Book of Ezekiel, Chapters 25–48 , The New International Commentary on the Old Testament, gen. ed. R. K. Harrison and Robert L. Hubbard Jr. (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1998), 433.