Millennialism

Millennialism concerns the thousand-year reign of Christ described in Revelation 20. Traditions read it differently. Premillennial writers such as Papias and Irenaeus expected a future earthly reign; Augustine advanced an amillennial view, reading the thousand years symbolically of the present age; postmillennial readings differ again. This early hope, called chiliasm, was influential in the early centuries and later marginalized in much of the Church.