Who were Gog and Magog?

Originally, in the Book of Ezekiel, Gog was the king of a mythical land name Magog, but Christian legend now portrays Gog and Magog as two enemies of Christianity.

Ezekiel 38 tells of an apocalyptic invasion of the reunited and prosperous land of Israel by Gog of Magog, when the fury of God shall be aroused against him (Ezekiel 38:18). Yet this invasion from the north will be instigated by God himself, so that all the nations will know him (Ezekiel 38:14-16). Having led the armies of Gog against Israel, God will then ensure their total defeat, such that it will take all the people of the land seven months to bury their carcasses (Ezekiel 39:11-12). William A. Tooman says, in Gog of Magog, that until the twentieth century most biblical scholars assumed that this passage was written by Ezekiel, but says this is no longer the consensus view. He says:

·                     On occasion, the author of GO [Gog Oracles] understood antecedent oracles, not as prophecies about the future, but as paradigms, as if future events would be patterned on past events. This technique was utilized by the author of GO whenever he wished to reuse elements from an oracle that did not obviously relate to the eschaton. In effect, the events of the “latter days” (GO) would imitate past events, and this imitation would be so close that they would correspond in many of their details. Thus, in Ezek 38:7–13 and 39:1–8, the author patterned Gog’s fate on that of the Assyrians and Babylonians before him, as was expressed in Isa 10.1–34 and 14.4b-21.