Who Is the “Synagogue of Satan”?

Professing Christians throughout church history have wrongly weaponized Scripture to persecute the Jewish people. We discussed this phenomenon in our previous two-part article series, “Are the Jewish People Responsible for Killing Jesus?”: In part one, we detailed how some Gentile Christians accused Jewish people of deicide (killing God) throughout history and used that accusation to justify their antisemitism and murder of Jewish people; in part two, we explained how the New Testament affirms the continued chosenness of the Jewish people and God’s promises to Israel, as well as how passages of rebuke toward fellow Jewish people or leaders should be read as inner-family disputes since the New Testament is about Jewish people.

In this article series, we will address specific New Testament passages that have been misused and misinterpreted to justify antisemitism and persecution. We will begin with two passages found in the book of Revelation that have been misconstrued by antisemites to label Jewish people as belonging to the “synagogue of Satan.” We will show how a careful examination of the historical and textual context reveals a very different meaning.

“Synagogue of Satan”

The phrase “synagogue of Satan” is found twice in the New Testament—in Revelation 2:9 and Revelation 3:9. The first three chapters of Revelation contain a series of letters revealed by Jesus through an angel to the apostle John to deliver to the believers in Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey). In Revelation 2:9–10, Jesus tells persecuted believers in Smyrna:

I know your tribulation and your poverty (but you are rich), and the blasphemy by those who say they are Jews and are not, but are a synagogue of Satan. Do not fear what you are about to suffer. Behold, the devil is about to cast some of you into prison, so that you will be tested, and you will have tribulation for ten days. Be faithful until death, and I will give you the crown of life.

Similarly, in Revelation 3:9, Jesus addresses believers in Philadelphia: “Behold, I will cause those of the synagogue of Satan, who say that they are Jews and are not, but lie—I will make them come and bow down at your feet, and make them know that I have loved you.”

Understanding “Synagogues” in the First Century

To properly interpret these passages, we must first understand what “synagogue” meant in the first century. While the New Testament and other texts from the period widely used the Greek word synagōgē to refer to Jewish houses of prayer and worship, the term sometimes referred to non-religious gatherings for discussion or for settling local community disputes, and assemblies of early Christians.¹ For example, the apostle James used the Greek word synagōgē to refer to an assembly of believers (emphasis added):

For if a man comes into your assembly [synagōgē] with a gold ring and dressed in fine clothes, and there also comes in a poor man in dirty clothes, and you pay special attention to the one who is wearing the fine clothes, . . . have you not made distinctions among yourselves, and become judges with evil motives? (James 2:2–4)

Likewise, when referring to assemblies of Gentile Christians, Ignatius of Antioch (c. 30–110 CE), in chapter four of his letter to Polycarp, the Christian bishop of Smyrna, wrote, “Let the meetings [synagogues] be more numerous. Seek all by their name.”² The Shepherd of Hermas, a Christian literary work written around 140 CE, also uses the term “synagogue” in Mandate 11 to refer to an assembly of Christians: “Therefore, when the man who has the Divine Spirit comes into a meeting [synagōgē] of righteous men.”³ Similarly, the early Christian philosopher Justin Martyr (c. 100–165 CE), in his Dialogue with Trypho, a Jew, wrote, “The word of God speaks to those who believe in Him as being one soul, and one synagogue, and one church.”⁴

Later, after the “parting of the ways”⁵ between Judaism and Christianity, the term synagogue became synonymous with gatherings of Jewish people who did not follow Jesus. But before the fourth century CE, even before the New Testament was written, synagogue also referred to places of worship for Jewish and Gentile followers of Jesus, as we have shown. Therefore, the phrase “synagogue of Satan,” found in Revelation 2:9 and 3:9, could just as easily be translated as “congregation of Satan,” “assembly of Satan,” or “church of Satan.”

Who Was Being Referenced?

The most compelling interpretation is that these passages are not referring to ethnic Jewish people at all, but rather to Gentile “God-fearers” who claimed Jewish identity. Both passages add a specific qualification to this “synagogue of Satan”: “Those who say they are Jews and are not” (Revelation 2:9; 3:9).

We have sufficient historical and contextual evidence to believe that those Jesus referenced were in reality Gentile (non-Jewish) “God-fearers” in Asia Minor. Gentile God-fearers during this period were those who worshipped in the Jewish synagogues and observed Jewish customs but had not fully converted to Judaism via circumcision.⁶ Jewish proselytism (evangelism) of Gentiles was common during this time, before political pressure in the fourth century later caused it to stop.⁷

Archaeological evidence from Asia Minor, the region of the two churches whom Jesus addressed in Revelation 2:9 and 3:9, reveals there were many Gentile God-fearers who worshiped in the synagogues there. Archaeologists have found an inscription at Aphrodisias, only a few miles from the churches of Philadelphia and Smyrna, containing a list of fifty-four Gentile God-fearers who donated to the local Jewish community.⁸

These Gentile God-fearers of Asia Minor who worshipped in the Jewish synagogues but were not Jewish and did not believe in Jesus were likely those whom Jesus described as “those who say they are Jews and are not” and as belonging to a “synagogue of Satan” because of their opposition to Jewish and Gentile followers of Jesus. Since adherents to Judaism had legal protection under Roman law at that time, these Gentile converts and God-fearers were likely bragging that they were following true Judaism and slandering followers of Jesus who did not yet have legal protection.

Why did Jesus refer to these God-fearers as part of the congregation of Satan? The New Testament makes clear that everyone, whether Jewish or Gentile, who does not believe in Jesus is deceived by Satan and are “children of the devil” (1 John 3:10, cf. 5:19). All have sinned and need atonement through Messiah Jesus’ sacrificial death to become children of God (Romans 3:23; cf. Isaiah 53:1–12).

Alternative Explanations

The language Jesus used in Revelation 2:9 and 3:9, if referring to actual Jewish people, could be understood as a stern prophetic rebuke to those Jewish people who were actively opposing followers of Jesus, similar to how God occasionally spoke to ancient Israelites in the Hebrew Bible when they opposed the prophets. For example, in Hosea 1:9, God told His chosen people “You are not My people and I am not your God,” only to immediately promise restoration in the following verses.

Some scholars suggest these passages could refer to groups similar to modern-day cults like the Black Hebrew Israelites who are not Jewish yet claim to be the “true Israel” while opposing both mainstream Jewish people and Christians.⁹

But we believe the best explanation, in accordance with the evidence, is that the groups Jesus referred to as belonging to the “synagogue of Satan” in these two passages were Gentile God-fearers in Asia Minor who claimed to be Jewish, but were not, and actively opposed the gospel message, revealing they were following the devil rather than God.

Throughout the entire Bible—both Old and New Testaments—“Israel” always refers to ethnic Israel, and “Jews” always refers to ethnic Jewish people. God never rescinded His promises to the Jewish people, despite a rejection of the prophets in the Hebrew Scriptures and despite a current, temporary rejection of the Messiah (Romans 9:4–5; cf. Jeremiah 31:35–37; Psalm 105:8–11; Zechariah 12:9–10; Matthew 23:39; Romans 11:1–2.) Even now, a Jewish remnant believes and follows Yeshua as Messiah (Romans 11:1–5). We look forward to the future day when “all Israel will be saved” (Romans 11:25–27).

by Jennifer Miles

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¹ Douglas J. Moo, The Letter of James, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: Eerdmans; Apollos, 2000), 102–103.

² Ignatius of Antioch, “The Epistle of Ignatius to Polycarp,” 4.2, in Pope Clement I et al., The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Kirsopp Lake, vol. 1, The Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge MA; London: Harvard University Press, 1912–1913), 273.

³ Shepherd of Hermas, Mandate 11:9 in Pope Clement I et al., The Apostolic Fathers, ed. Kirsopp Lake, vol. 2, Loeb Classical Library (Cambridge MA; London: Harvard University Press, 1912–1913), 121.

⁴ Justin Martyr, “Dialogue of Justin with Trypho, a Jew,” in The Apostolic Fathers with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, ed. Alexander Roberts, James Donaldson, and A. Cleveland Coxe, vol. 1, The Ante-Nicene Fathers (Buffalo, NY: Christian Literature Company, 1885), 229.

⁵ The “parting of the ways” refers to the gradual separation of Judaism and Christianity that became more pronounced in the fourth century CE.

⁶ Cornelius in Acts 10 was an example of a Gentile God-fearer. David G. Peterson, The Acts of the Apostles, The Pillar New Testament Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI; Nottingham, England: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2009), 323–324.

⁷ A. F. Segal, “Conversion and Messianism: Outline for a New Approach,” in The Messiah: Developments in Earliest Judaism and Christianity, ed. James H. Charlesworth et al. (Minneapolis, MN: Fortress Press, 2010), 313.

⁸ Everett Ferguson, Encyclopedia of Early Christianity, 2nd ed. 2 vols. (New York: Garland, 1997) and Joyce Reynolds and Robert Tannenbaum, Jews and Godfearers at Aphrodisias: Greek Inscriptions with Commentary, vol. 12 of Proceedings of the Cambridge Philological Society (Cambridge: Cambridge Philological Society, 1987), 19–24.

⁹ Michael L. Brown, Answering Jewish Objections to Jesus: General and Historical Objections., vol. 1 (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2000), 173–174.