Reformational Commentary on Ezekiel 38:4

The Lord will Turn Gog back and Put Hooks into his Jaws

Gog, is the near-future leader of the land of Magog (Russia - see the commentary on Ezekiel 38:2) at the time this prophecy is to be fulfilled and is therefore alive, as of writing, and may be the current President of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin.

Therefore, if a very near-term peace treaty is negotiated in the Middle East by Russia, to replace October 2025's very limited and already wobbly deal between Israel and Gaza's Hamas arranged by US President, Donald Trump (a deal that has many futurist interpreters excitedly connecting it, in their standard misguided way, to Daniel 9's "covenant with many"), then whoever is leader of Russia at that moment will almost certainly be Gog, for reasons explained in my commentary on Ezekiel 38:14.

But what can this mean, that the Lord will turn Gog back, and put hooks in his jaws, to draw him like a fish being reeled in, irresistibly, to the evil enterprise of invading a land of Israel that believes itself to be dwelling in complete peace and safety?

John Gill writes:

"And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws"

...Or, "I will put hooks in thy jaws, and with them turn thee back"; or rather, "turn thee about"; and lead thee where and as I please; for this is not to be understood of God's putting hooks into his jaws, and leading him back from his enterprise of invading the land of Judea; as he put a hook in the nose and a bridle in the lips of the king of Assyria, and brought him back from Jerusalem, (Isaiah 37:29) [here Gill refers to Sennacherib, and note that Isaiah 37:29 is a verbatim facsimile of 2 Kings 19:28] , but of his using him thus in his providence to draw him to the land of Israel, out of his own land, as fishes are drawn with the hook out of the water.

The sense is, that he would so work upon and influence the heart of Gog, that he should be inclined to come out of his own land and invade Judea; just as the Lord is said to draw Sisera and his army (Judges 4:7), as Kimchi and Ben Melech observe. So the Targum, "I will persuade thee, and put hooks in thy jaws;" that is, incline his heart to take such a step, which should be to his destruction”. (John Gill on Ezekiel 38:4).¹

Gill is, of course, fundamentally correct in saying that God will irresistibly draw Gog and his allies to this enterprise; and hereby the Lord will draw Gog into a trap in Palestine, just as He drew Sisera and Sennacherib of old to the same kind of expedition, for the purposes of:

• Bringing on their progressively more (as each case unfolds in history) spectacular destruction.
• Delivering the nation of Israel in each instance.
• Vindicating the Messianic faith and the gospel of sovereign grace as the one true religion (which, as we shall see, will be the religion of Israel at the point of Gog's demise).
• Being in all things thereby glorified as God of all the earth in the sight of the ungodly nations.

The case of this man Gog will be the thus-far superlative example of the Lord delivering His elect from Satanic attack and wreaking horrific destruction upon those wicked ones sent to attack them, and shall remain as superlative example until the event of Revelation 20:8, in which a "second Gog-Magog" assault, after the resurrection of the damned, will occur - see John Gill's commentary on Revelation 20:8 for more details; but suffice it to say for now that as each of these assaults becomes greater, they become headed up by ever more powerful leaders, culminating in Satan himself in the case of Revelation 20:8, the ultimate "Gog".

That, of course, implies that the man Gog is himself a type of Satan, i.e., extraordinarily proud and narcissistic, constantly seeking attention, honour, glory and admiration (which could be said of many individuals at the head of modern nations, notably the current, as of 2026, US President), but also unfathomably devious, subtle, calculating, deceitful, two-faced, etc.

But above all, Gog is Russian (as deduced from Ezekiel 38:2) and the leader of that nation at the time of the fulfilment of this prophecy, which is nigh.

Will Gog be reluctantly Drawn to Attack Israel?

Returning to the "turn thee back" aspect of the prophecy, some have asserted an inference that Gog will, against his better judgment or his other wishes, find himself with "no choice" but to embark on this mission.

Such a consideration has been, I think, cleared up by Gill's commentary cited above, and certainly any notion that Gog would be engaging Israel despite a sense of respect for that country or any other ostensibly noble sentiment is obviated by the inferred vileness of his character described above.

Gog is an exceptionally wicked man, one who, as a type of Satan, murders with impunity of conscience any who dare oppose his schemes or threaten to steal his thunder, so to speak; Gog will likely neither tolerate rivals nor share his glory with his generals et al, so far as it is within his power so to do.

Certainly such a man, therefore, cannot be expected to have any moral compunctions about the assault against Israel he will lead; that leaves just pragmatic considerations, i.e., it might be argued that he will commence the attack with, in his mind, the thought that it would be logistically and operationally risky, as well as provocative to the powerfully armed United States of America.

But again, the scene set in Ezekiel 38 tells a different story, one in which Gog is "doubly prepared" for the endeavour, and one in which the major western nations are unable or unwilling to come to Israel's aid, as Ezekiel 38:13 demonstrates.

And so we should conclude that Gog is a willing initiator of this assault and, in human terms at least, its author as well as supreme leader which, as ruler of Russia and thereby informal leader of all the nations of the "barbarian sea" (the East)², is entirely as expected.

"...I will draw thee back..."

There are numerous online sources alleging that the Scythians (the historical proto-Russians - see the commentary on Ezekiel 38:2) invaded Judea during the days of king Josiah, but no such record is presented in the Bible, and it seems therefore that a liberty is being taken, or an assumption made, that the Assyrians were one and the same as the Scythians.

Even if that were true, Assyria itself did not invade Judea in Josiah's time at all; the only major regional conflict in his day was between Egypt to the south-west and the Babylonian empire to the north and north-east, which led to Josiah's demise when he attempted to prevent an Egyptian force passing by his land from joining with the Assyrians to fight against the Babylonians.

All of this is presented here to oppose any hint or suggestion that the Russians of today are the descendants of any tribe that was involved in attacking Israel before, in the distant past, such notions being advanced as arguments for misinterpreting the phrase, "I will draw thee back".

However, it is my position that the term Assyria is admissible as a spiritual name or synonym for any abstraction of a proud, blaspheming, haughty invader of Israel in the modern era, and that indeed Russia, when it and its allies of the East finally attack Israel, can be construed as a metaphorical Assyria, just as Egypt (with Sodom) is the spiritual name of the modern West in Revelation 11:8³.

Horses, Horsemen, Armour, Bucklers and Shields

Now that we have established this as a still-future prophecy, anchored to history at a time (a) when the Jews would be restored to their historical homeland (fulfilled), (b) when the West would have ceased to be Israel's main military ally (a process underway - see On Schedule: The West Begins to Forsake Israel), and, (c) Israel would be dwelling under an unprecedented peace as set out in Ezekiel 38:8 (not yet fulfilled), how can we reconcile the timing with the description of the military equipment in this verse, all of which sounds very archaic?

Does it mean literal horses and horsemen with shields and bucklers?

No, just as Gog is not going to be literally hooked and reeled in by the jaws, so this is a not a literal description of the weaponry he will deploy; and yes, Ezekiel 38-39 is one of the least hieroglyphically presented of all the Apocalyptic prophecies, but it still uses metaphors (and I submit that the reason for this passage's accessibility is to make it a gateway into the rest of the "end-times" prophecies).

Therefore, just as “the sword” is an enduring metaphor for any kind of slaying weapon, including modern assault rifles, so we should take the horses, etc., in this verse to be a reasonable metaphor for modern cavalry, that is, armoured divisions (tanks, in plainest terms) and all other forms of modern military vehicles accompanying them.

Likewise the armour, shields, bucklers symbolism is designed to tell that this Russian-led advance on Israel will feature a comprehensive suite of defensive munitions, for the protection of the invading force against enemy weapons systems.

Russia leads the nations of the East in surface-to-air missile defence systems, electronic jamming, cyber defences (including crippling enemy weapons systems), and so on, and is rightly presented in this passage, as it is in all the defector literature, as leader and main protector of the nations of the East (China tries to copy both Russian and western military equipment but, famously, is very limited at innovation).

Though some analysts in the West tend to belittle Russian capabilities, perhaps for propaganda reasons, I can recall from my own personal experience living in Latvia that, during a "Zapad" (literally, "west") exercise in Belarus and the Baltic Sea, the Russian military somehow managed to jam or shut down satellite navigation systems in Scandinavia; that said, Russia has suffered many embarassing strikes on its homeland during the present war with Ukraine, so by the time it attacks Israel, one must presume it will have made strident advances in its defensive capabilities and indeed, it may be argued that the reason why its defences will be so much improved by that time will be due to lessons learned from the Ukraine war.

And if Russia, in the meantime, were to use any of its low yield tactical nuclear weapons in the Ukraine campaign, that might serve as a very strong deterrent from nuclear-armed Israel deploying its own weaponry against the Russian-led invasion force of Ezekiel 38, because Russia's nuclear might is vast compared to Israel's.

Finally, there is also a strong hint that the defensive measures will also include proactive diversions performed by the three parties named in Ezekiel 38:5.

The Much-Denied and Much-Hated Doctrine of the Sovereignty of God

“The king's heart is in the hand of the LORD, as the rivers of water: he turneth it whithersoever he will.” (Proverbs 21:1).

"For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled." (Revelation 17:17)

In closing, it would be very remiss of me as a Reformed commentator to not take the opportunity this verse presents to remind the reader of the historical Protestant doctrine of the sovereignty of God, a doctrine that today is despised by many or even most professing Christians as being a violation of man's supposed "free will".

In this passage we do not see Gog nebulously influenced by God, nudged by Him, or otherwise enticed into this mission or coerced by Him in any fashion as to leave the ultimate decision up to Gog's "free will".

Rather, we see language descriptive of a man totally steered by the Almighty, as a horse by its rider, or a fish being hooked and forcibly reeled in.

Hereby we observe the sovereignty of God over the hearts of men; just as He hardened the spirit of Sihon king of Heshbon against Israel in Deuteronomy 2:30, and just as He has put it in the hearts of the ten horns that are the western governments to give their power and strength unto the Scarlet Beast (as per Revelation 17:17), so He will send a compulsion to Gog to be irresistibly drawn, against any logical counterarguments or reservations, feelings or residual wisdom itself, to lobby for, and raise a vast military force for, an expedition to the south of his homeland, into northern Israel.

But that is only the start of what will be history's grandest demonstration of the sovereignty of God in the hearts of men, because what follows amidst the Israelites will confirm the Reformed doctrines of irresistible grace and the unconditional election of the saints.

That is to say, when God moves to deliver Israel, it will be an evangelically Christian Israel, converted en masse, "in a day", as alluded to in Isaiah 66:8.

And the entirety of apostate Christendom will see that and know that those awful Calvinists... they were right all along.