That second group in Revelation 14:19 are also living.
If there are any "dead rising" at that time, it is because God wants [some] people from the past to actually experience the Wrath of God 'firsthand-and-personal'.
Note that the first group was 'reaped' while the second group was 'gathered'.
Gary,
May I suggest that it is impossible to understand Rev 14:14-20 without recognizing what its companion passage (Mat 13) tells us?
"The harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels." Obviously there are two groups of people being discussed in both passages, the wheat and tares of Mat 13. Here the tares are gathered and burned up while the wheat is gathered into His barn. We are then told,
"The righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father." This statement should sound familiar as it is the same message found in Dan 12: 2
"And many of those who sleep in the dust of the earth shall awake, Some to everlasting life, Some to shame and everlasting contempt. 3 Those who are wise shall shine Like the brightness of the firmament..." Both passages describe the brightness of the good. We are as bright lights in the spiritual realm.
It is critical to understand that at all times in Revelation "earth" is symbolic of Israel. Wheat is harvested with a sickle as found in Rev 14:15. The wheat harvest begins in Sivan around the time of Pentecost. Josephus claims that just before the war during the feast of Pentecost
"they felt a quaking, and heard a great noise, and after that they heard a sound as of a great multitude, saying, "Let us remove hence." The voice of God is often described in the OT as the sound of a great multitude accompanied by an earthquake so we know the presence of God/Christ was there. Thus the righteous of Israel is being harvested at the end of the Jewish age. Thus Rev 14:14-16 is discussing the resurrection of the just that occurred at the end of the Mosaic or Jewish age.
As for the second group, the tares. I agree they are living, at least as the passage begins. Here in Rev 14 they are referred to as grapes. In Revelation 14:18 sickles are used by the angels to cut grape clusters from the vine. The Roman offensive under Cestius began at the start of the grape harvest in 66 AD. These grapes are thrown into the great wine press of the wrath of God. Here the destruction of Israel prior to the siege of Jerusalem is pictured as the crushing of grapes during the grape harvest. This symbolism is not without precedence: In this verse, as in Isaiah 5:7, Israel is symbolized as a vineyard; and as is the case in Lamentations 1:15, the slaughter of the Israelites is represented as grapes being crushed in a winepress. This imagery is also clearly presented in Isaiah 63:1-3.
In v. 20 we see the winepress was trampled outside the city, and blood came out of the winepress, up to the horses’ bridles, for one thousand six hundred strata. 1,600 stadia is the exact length of the Jordan River and as such is an estimate of the length of Israel “from one end to another.” Interestingly, Josephus also uses similar language to Ezekiel 32:6 and 2 Kings 21:16 in recording the fulfillment of Revelation 14:20:
“Galilee was all over filled with fire and blood.” And along these same lines concerning the excessively bloody aftermath of the Jewish War, the Talmud records the following claim:
“For seven years did the nations of the world cultivate their vineyards with no other manure than the blood of Israel.”
Though the image of blood rising as high as a horse’s bridle is meant to symbolize Jesus “treading the winepress” on His white horse during the second coming as He comes in judgment on Israel, v. 20 appears to have been fulfilled in a surprisingly literal way during the Jewish War. These verses seem to have been fulfilled when thousands of fugitives from Gadara were cornered by the Roman army at the Jordan River. Extending a long way along the Jordan, the men of Gadara could not cross the river as a result of a strong current from recent rainfall. There along the Jordan, the men of Gadara
“sustained the darts that were thrown at them as well as the attacks of the horsemen who beat many of them, and pushed them into the current.” The imagery of the blood reaching to the horses’ bridles is also a picture of the Roman horsemen treading through the Jordan while bloodying the water of the river with the victims of Gadara.
These verses are strikingly similar to the second coming as it is described in Revelation 19:11-15. In these verses Jesus again
strides on horseback with garments stained red with blood. His garments are red because He
“treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty” in Revelation 19:15 as He had also done in Isaiah 63:3. He does this alone according to Isaiah 63:3 which explains why only Jesus’ garments are stained red in Revelation 19:13-14. The fact that blood reaches His horses’ bridle in Revelation 14:20 explains how Jesus’ garments had become stained red with blood in Revelation 19:13 while He sat atop his white horse. Therefore, far from depicting a literal flood of blood over Israel in the first century, Revelation 14:20 ultimately portrays Jesus coming in judgment on Israel as He rides on His white horse shedding blood up to His horse’s bridle as He
“treads the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God Almighty.” Remember that 1,600 stadia is the exact length of the Jordan River and as such is an estimate of the length of Israel “from one end to another.”
