Where and When Do the Souls Under the Altar -jews Who Died in Pogroms of the Ages Resurrect? Will They Be in the Millenium?
1) Direct answer
They will not rise in the first resurrection to reign in the Millennium. The souls under the altar (the Jewish martyrs of the ages) remain at rest until the great tribulation is finished, and they come up after the thousand years, at the general resurrection, to receive their portion among the saved. They are not the Bride and do not reign in the Millennium.
2) Scriptural explanation
- Identity and timing: Revelation 6:9-11 shows them “under the altar,” crying for justice, and they are told to “rest yet for a little season, until their fellowservants also and their brethren… should be killed as they were.” That “little season” reaches its fulfillment when God finishes dealing with Israel in the tribulation, when their “brethren” (the sealed of Israel and those martyred under that final persecution—see Revelation 7:1-8; 11) complete the number.
- Who reigns in the Millennium: Revelation 20:4-6 shows the first resurrection—those who “lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years.” That reigning company is the Bride (Revelation 7:9-17; Revelation 20:4). Notice the description in Revelation 20:4 centers on those with the witness of Jesus and who refused the beast. The souls under the altar in Revelation 6 are not identified as having the witness of Jesus; they were blinded in part (Romans 11:25), yet given white robes by grace and told to wait.
- When they rise: Scripture states, “the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished” (Revelation 20:5). Those not in the first resurrection rise after the Millennium to stand at the Great White Throne (Revelation 20:11-13). From there, the “nations of the saved” walk in the light of the New Jerusalem (Revelation 21:24). That is where the white-robed, non-Bride redeemed have their portion—saved, but not the ruling Bride in the City.
3) Simple clarifying logic
- They are told to wait until their brethren are also killed—so their case is not finished until after the tribulation.
- The Bible clearly limits the Millennial reign to those in the first resurrection (Revelation 20:4-6). Since Revelation 6 does not place those souls in that reigning company, they do not rise to reign then.
- Therefore, they remain at rest through the tribulation and the Millennium, and they rise after the thousand years to their place among the saved, while the Bride (Revelation 7:9-17; 20:4) reigns with Christ during the Millennium.
4) Reinforcing statement
So, the souls under the altar will not be in the Millennium as rulers. They are preserved by grace, awaiting vindication, and they come forth after the thousand years to their eternal portion among the redeemed nations, while the Bride alone reigns with Christ during the Millennial Kingdom.
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What did the Laodicean Church Age (our age) Angel (- messenger) Say about this?
Ranked passages from the local William Branham sermon and Church Age Book database. Relevance is relative, not a statement of doctrinal certainty.
Church Ages, part 9: The ten virgins, and the 144,000
60-1211M §156
Now do you understand what the remnant of the Jews is, the 144,000? Where they're sitting, waiting? Right at the hour? Can you see now that the foolish virgin that won't take the ... wouldn't take the oil, and will have to rise and be separated---the rights and wrongs---at the day of the judgment? Do you understand that when the foolish virgin began to receive (just like now) that she needed this, she went after it, it was that very minute that the bridegroom came? Then how close are we? Right now. We have just a s...
Souls that are in prison now
63-1110M §26
He never left His body see corruption, neither did He leave His soul in hell, but raised Him up on the third day and He's alive forevermore. And we will have a body like His own glorious body. That's why we're baptized into His name that we might come forth in His name, in His death, in His resurrection... That we rise again testifying to the world that we have new Life, that the old man is dead. We buried that first nature. That first nature is gone, and now we are the nature of Him. He lives in us, and we don't d...
Who is this?
59-0510E §15
And we're told that the souls of those mothers and so forth we spoke of this morning, just under the altar of God, are screaming, "How long, Lord, how long?" Mother wants to see you as much as you want to see her. And our loved ones wants to meet us as well as we want to meet them. What a reunion that'll be when He comes: to meet our loved ones and see them in their resurrection body, and glorified, and walking around with the air of the resurrection. Watching their character, how it's changed: the meekness and qui...
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 4:E-57
Now you might desire to scold me right here for what I have said. All right. They call themselves Pentecostal and Full Gospel. Let them prove it. At Pentecost the fire came in a cloud and separated over each of them like a tongue, and fell on each one. Where is the fire? They spoke in tongues at Pentecost and the people who listened understood. Where is that? The whole multitude of believers acted like one family. Pentecostals are as badly divided as any group in history. No man durst join himself to the early chur...
An Exposition Of The Seven Church Ages
CAB 9:E-76
"They are poor." Now of course that means Spiritually poor. The sign of this age as it closes, is bigger and better churches, with more and more people, with more and more manifestation of what is supposed to be demonstrations of the Holy Ghost. But the filled altars, the gifts of the Spirit in operation, the remarkable attendance is not the answer from God, for those who come to the altars very seldom stay to go on with God, and after the great campaigns are finished, where are all those who came down the aisles?...