The special group of “sealed” saints mentioned in Rev. 7:4 and 14:1 , described as consisting of 12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel. They are identified as “the first fruits unto God and to the Lamb,” “redeemed from among men.” The sealing of the 144,000 is described after the delineation of the events under the “sixth seal” ( Rev. 6:12–17 ; cf. Rev. 8:1 ), which include the second coming of Christ and “the great day of his wrath.” John saw “four angels . . . holding the four winds of the earth, that the wind should not blow on the earth, nor on the sea, nor on any tree” until the “servants” of God have been “sealed . . . in their foreheads” ( Rev. 7:1–3 ). In the context of the sixth seal, wind would represent strife, turmoil, and natural calamity, which in the Revelation are associated with the great day of God’s wrath, and particularly with the seven last plagues ( Rev. 15:1 ). Accordingly, the sealing work here presented takes place at the close of the present age, but prior to the great climactic scenes that precede Christ’s second advent.
In Rev. 7:3 the 144,000 are said to be “sealed . . . in their foreheads,” while in Revelation 14:1 they have the “Father’s name written in their foreheads,” which fact attests divine approval, acceptance, and ownership. They are “not defiled with women,” but are “virgins” ( v. 4 )—they have refused the false teachings of “Babylon the great, the mother of harlots and abominations of the earth” ( Rev. 17:5 ; cf. Rev. 12:17 ; 14:8 , 12 ). In their mouth is “no guile,” that is, they are what they appear to be, they are “without fault before the throne of God” ( Rev. 14:5 ).
The 144,000 sing “a new song before the throne” ( v. 3 ), which only they can learn. In a similar setting in Rev. 15:1–3 John listens as what appears to be the same group of people “stand on the sea of glass,” which is “before the throne of God” ( Rev. 4:6 ; cf. Rev. 14:3 ; 15:2 ), singing “the song of Moses the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb.” (The Song of Moses was a song of divine deliverance from foes bent upon the destruction of God’s people at the Red Sea [ Ex. 15:1–19 ; Deut. 31:30 ; 32:1–43 ].) The foes over whom the victory has been gained are designated in Rev. 15:2 as “the beast” and “his image.”
Significantly, the Rev. 14:1–5 passage on the 144,000 immediately follows the beast-image-mark-name-number sequence of Rev. 13 , implying that this group refuses to comply with the demand of Rev. 13:15 , 16 to worship the beast and its image and to receive its mark or the number of its name. Instead, they receive the seal and name of God.
Furthermore, the three angels’ messages ( Rev. 14:6–12 ), immediately following vs. 1–5 , focus on the worship of the true God ( vs. 6 , 7 ) in contrast with that of the beast and its image ( vs. 9–11 ), which constitutes an apostate religion ( v. 8 ).
By implication the “saints” who accept the three messages and are characterized in v. 12 as “they that keep the commandments of God” instead of worshiping the beast and its image, and who have “the faith of Jesus,” are the saints of vs. 1–5 .
According to J. N. Loughborough ( Review and Herald 83:8, 9, June 14, 1906; 83:8, 9, June 21, 1906) Seventh-day Adventist interest in the sealing message and the 144,000 began in 1848 when some non-Sabbatarian Adventists hailed the epidemic of revolutions in Europe as the opening phase of the battle of the great day of God, and the spirit rappings in Hydesville, New York—also in 1848—as the arrival of the spirits foretold in Rev. 16:13 , 14 , which were to go forth to gather the nations to Armageddon. Seventh-day Adventists denied this and contended that the 144,000 must be sealed first: “There is a message to go forth bearing the seal, and we have discovered that message in the seventh chapter of Revelation, and are going forth to give that message.” The Sabbath was identified with the sealing message of Rev. 7 , and as a result, the Sabbath came to be seen as God’s seal. “The position of our people then,” said Loughborough, “was that the sealing work at that time was going on, and that some of the 144,000 were then being sealed.” During the next few years, Ellen White repeatedly spoke of the sealing work currently in progress ( EW 36–38, 44, etc.).
Corollary to the belief that those who accepted the third angel’s message and the Sabbath were being sealed was the belief that any who died would not in that way forfeit membership in the 144,000, but would come forth in a special resurrection to join their brethren who remained alive to the coming of the Lord ( cf. 1 Thess. 4:13 , 16 ). Loughborough went on to explain that those who accepted “the original faith on the subject of the one hundred and forty-four thousand believed that some were then being sealed, and that they were to be of those resurrected in the time of trouble, and be of the one hundred and forty-four thousand. . . . The faith of the Sabbathkeepers from that time until some of the modern ‘lights’came in [1906] was that those who died in the faith were among the sealed ones, and would constitute part of the one hundred and forty-four thousand.”
Loughborough then proceeded to reconcile the seeming discrepancy between the idea that the 144,000 are all living saints (see below) and the belief that those who have died in the faith of the third angel’s message will also be numbered among that privileged group. He explained this on the basis that following the third message of Rev. 14:9–11 , a special blessing is pronounced upon those ( v. 13 ) who accept that message (as applied to the Sabbath), and he identified this blessing as the privilege of coming forth in a special resurrection at the beginning of the seventh plague. Those who do so, he explained, will live through the crisis of the seventh plague, or “great tribulation,” and will, in fact, be among the living saints at the time of the general resurrection of the righteous.
Two early articles on the subject of the 144,000 were written by James White ( Review and Herald 5:123, May 9, 1854) and Uriah Smith ( ibid. 8:76, July 3, 1856). Smith argued that the sealing work precedes the seven last plagues because these are included in the “winds” the four angels hold in check. In the issue for July 30, 1861 (18:68), he identified the 144,000 as “those who will be translated [without seeing death] at the coming of Christ.” White ( ibid. 25:162, Apr. 25, 1865) located the sealing time by the contextual location of the message between the sixth and the seventh seal. He dismissed the argument that the 144,000 are literal Jews on the basis that if so the names of the 12 tribes appearing on the gates of the city would, by a parity of reasoning, make it strictly a Jewish city with Jewish inhabitants.
Smith ( Thoughts on the Revelation [1865; i.e. , 1867], pp. 131–134) identifies the 144,000 as “the last generation of Christians, the Christians of our own day,” and the Sabbath as the seal of God. He explains the 144,000 being designated as belonging to “the twelve tribes of the children of Israel” on the basis that in the NT those who believe in Christ constitute “Abraham’s seed” ( Gal. 3:28 , 29 ), or spiritual Israel ( Rom. 2:28 , 29 , etc.).
As to who constitute the 144,000, White explained that “those who die under the third angel’s message are a part of the 144,000; there are not 144,000 in addition to these, but these help make up that number. They are raised to mortal life shortly before Christ comes, and . . . are changed to immortality when Christ appears” (James White, in Review and Herald 56:216, Sept. 23, 1880).
As to the number 144,000, Smith later wrote: “The number 144,000 must mean a definite number, composed of just so many individuals. It cannot stand for a larger but indefinite number; for in verse 9 another company is introduced which is indefinite in its proportions, and hence is spoken of as ‘a great multitude, which no man could number’” ( ibid. 74:504, Aug. 10, 1897).
Nevertheless, he thought the actual numerical count might be much greater than that: “The 144,000 may include only the adult males connected with the great Advent movement, while the women and children associated in the same movement would be so many additional ones to be saved from among the living in that day. The plausibility of this idea lies in the fact that the Hebrews were so numbered when delivered from Egyptian bondage, which was a figure of the deliverance of the remnant of the true Israel from the Egypt of this world at the coming of the Lord” ( ibid. 505).
On this basis he suggested that there might actually be more than 700,000 persons in the group, including women and children. But he does not see where so large a group can be found to qualify. As to whether those who have died in the faith of the third angel are to be raised to life to join the 144,000, he writes: “Do the 144,000 represent only those who have never passed through death? Not at all. The conditions of the prophecy make it necessary that many who are now in their graves should be included in the 144,000” ( ibid. ).
Smith apparently believed that many of those who die in the Lord must be numbered with them. The seal of God is the Sabbath, and those who accept it must therefore be included in the 144,000. He concludes: “Thus the evidence seems clear and conclusive that the 144,000 are gathered from the last generation before Christ comes; that they are brought out by the third angel’s message; that even those of them who die in the message are blessed, being restored to the number by a resurrection before Christ appears” ( ibid. 506; see also 74:568, Sept. 7, 1897).
The 144,000 figure prominently in Ellen White’s delineation of the great climactic events preceding the second coming of Christ. In The Great Controversy ( p. 649) their song is said to be “the song of their experience” in passing through “the time of trouble such as never was” and “the anguish of the time of Jacob’s trouble”; also, they have gone through the seven last plagues. According to her earliest description, about the end of 1844 ( EW 15, 16) “the living saints” are “144,000 in number” at the time God’s voice is heard announcing “the day and hour of Jesus’ coming.” As “the living saints,” in contrast with those saints who are raised to life at Christ’s coming ( cf. 1 Thess. 4:16 , 17 ), they recognize “their friends who had been torn from them by death.” In heaven they alone have the privilege of entering the holy temple. Their names are engraved in gold on tables of stone ( p. 19). They triumph over the decree to slay the saints ( cf. Rev. 13:15 ), which precipitates the time of Jacob’s trouble.
In summary, Seventh-day Adventists believe that the 144,000 are those saints who, in the providence of God, live through the great climactic events immediately preceding the return of Christ. Seventh-day Adventists do not find any clear indication as to whether precisely 144,000 individuals are involved, or whether the number is figurative.
Some think the evidence tends to favor a literal number, on the basis of Ellen White’s description of them as “the living saints” ( EW 15). Others, pointing to the symbolic nature of the prophecies of the Revelation, indicate that if the number sealed from each tribe is to be taken literally, then the people who are sealed must likewise be considered literal Jews, and the New Jerusalem, on whose gates the tribal names appear, must be strictly a Jewish city, for literal Jews only. They point out also that precisely 12,000 from each tribe would suggest arbitrary selection on the part of God, and that elsewhere in the NT Gentile Christians are commonly spoken of as constituting “Israel.”