You may know it as the Little Season
If you have spent time in the King James Version of the Bible, the phrase you likely know is "a little season" — drawn from Revelation 20:3, where Satan is bound and then released after a thousand years. That rendering has shaped the vocabulary of eschatology for centuries, and rightly so. The KJV is a monument of translation.
This site uses "short season" — not to depart from that tradition, but to draw out a meaning the Greek supports equally well: the brevity of the period, its limited duration, the urgency it conveys. Both translations arise from the same single Greek word.
The Greek Word
ὀλίγον — oligon
The word ὀλίγον (oligon) is an adjective in Greek that describes something small in degree or duration — a brief span, a limited amount, a restricted measure. It carries no theological weight in itself, only a description of scale. Both "little" and "short" are faithful to it. Neither is wrong. The choice is one of emphasis.
Revelation 12:12
The Devil Knows His Time Is Short
Here is what makes the translation choice particularly meaningful — and why the King James Version itself supplies the answer. In Revelation 12:12, John records these words:
"Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them. Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time."
Revelation 12:12 — King James VersionNotice that the KJV itself renders the Greek here as "short time" — not "little time." The underlying Greek word is the same family of expression describing brevity and limitation. The adversary's rage is directly connected to his awareness that his season is bounded. He knows. The clock is running.
This verse sits in the same prophetic sequence as Revelation 20:3. One describes the enemy's fury in knowing his time is short; the other describes the short season that follows his binding. They are two anchors of the same truth.
Revelation 20:3
Bound — and Released for a Short Season
"And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season."
Revelation 20:3 — King James VersionThe "little season" of Revelation 20:3 is the period this entire site is devoted to examining. It is the window after the millennium — a defined, limited, purposeful span of time in which the enemy is loosed, nations are tested, and history moves toward its culmination.
We call it the short season because that is precisely what the Greek insists it is: short. Not endless. Not open-ended. A season with boundaries — and one that the Scriptures foretold with remarkable precision.
Side by Side
One Word, Two Passages, One Message
| Passage | KJV Rendering | What It Describes |
|---|---|---|
| Revelation 12:12 | "a short time" | The devil's rage, knowing his remaining time is limited |
| Revelation 20:3 | "a little season" | The post-millennial period of his release — bounded and brief |
Both passages describe the same underlying reality: the adversary operates within a time that is deliberately short. Revelation 12 shows him knowing it. Revelation 20 shows it being enforced. The word "short season" honors both — and the KJV's own translation of Revelation 12:12 confirms the rendering is not novel, merely consistent.
About This Site
Layers of a Hidden Pattern
The Short Season is a study site devoted to understanding the prophetic, historical, and spiritual dimensions of this brief but consequential period. The content is organized into layers — each one examining a different angle of the same unfolding reality: from hidden historical patterns to spiritual warfare, from chronology to the identity of the beast.
The goal is not novelty but clarity — to take what the Scriptures plainly say and follow where they lead, across history, across disciplines, and across the boundaries of what is usually discussed.
Whatever name you knew it by before you arrived here — little season or short season — you are studying the same reality. Welcome.
"…for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time."
Revelation 12:12