Antichrist

==Christian views==

===Roman Catholicism===
From the [[Fifth Council of the Lateran]], the Catholic Church teaches that priests may not "preach or declare a fixed time for...the coming of antichrist..."<ref>[http://www.papalencyclicals.net/councils/ecum18.htm PapalEncyclicals: Lateran Council V, Session 11] They are in no way to presume to preach or declare a fixed time for future evils, the coming of antichrist or the precise day of judgment; for Truth says, it is not for us to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by his own authority. Let it be known that those who have hitherto dared to declare such things are liars, and that because of them not a little authority has been taken away from those who preach the truth .</ref> The church also teaches that it must undergo trials before the [[Second Coming]],<ref>[https://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p123a9p1.htm#769 Catechism of the Catholic Church 769]</ref> and that the church's ultimate trial will be the mystery of iniquity.<ref name="vatican.va">[https://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s2c2a7.htm#675 Catechism of the Catholic Church 675]</ref> In Judaism, iniquity is a sin done out of moral failing.<ref>{{Cite web |title=SIN – JewishEncyclopedia.com |url=https://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/articles/13761-sin |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.jewishencyclopedia.com}}</ref> The mystery of iniquity, according to the church, will be a religious deception: Christians receiving alleged solutions to their problems at the cost of [[apostasy]].<ref name="vatican.va"/> The supreme religious deception, according to the church, will be the Antichrist's [[messianism]]: mankind glorifying himself rather than God and Jesus.<ref name="vatican.va"/> The church teaches that this supreme deception is committed by people who claim to fulfill Israel's [[messiah in Judaism|messianic hopes]], such as [[millenarianism]] and secular messianicism.<ref name="vatican.va"/>

====Popes====
[[Pope Pius IX]] in the encyclical ''Quartus Supra'', quoting [[Cyprian]], said Satan disguises the Antichrist with the title of Christ.<ref>{{Cite web |last=IX |first=Pope BI Pius |date=1873-01-06 |title=Quartus Supra |url=https://www.papalencyclicals.net/pius09/p9quartu.htm |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=Papal Encyclicals |language=en}}</ref> [[Pope Pius X]] in the encyclical ''E Supremi'' said that the distinguishing mark of the Antichrist is claiming to be God and taking his place.<ref>{{Cite web |title=E Supremi (October 4, 1903) {{!}} PIUS X |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/pius-x/en/encyclicals/documents/hf_p-x_enc_04101903_e-supremi.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref> [[Pope John Paul II]], in his August 18, 1985 address on his apostolic journey to Africa, said 1 John 4:3 ("Every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus does not belong to God. This is the spirit of antichrist") evokes the danger of theology divorced from holiness and theological culture divorced from serving Christ.<ref>[https://w2.vatican.va/content/john-paul-ii/en/speeches/1985/august/documents/hf_jp-ii_spe_19850818_inaugurazione.pdf Vatican.Va: John Paul II, August 18, 1985 Address]</ref> [[Pope Benedict XVI]] said in the Sunday Angelus of March 11, 2012 that violence is the tool of the Antichrist.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Angelus, 11 March 2012 {{!}} BENEDICT XVI |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/angelus/2012/documents/hf_ben-xvi_ang_20120311.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref> In the General Audience of November 12, 2008, Benedict XVI said Christian tradition had come to identify the son of perdition as the Antichrist.<ref>[https://w2.vatican.va/content/benedict-xvi/en/audiences/2008/documents/hf_ben-xvi_aud_20081112.pdf Vatican.Va: Benedict XVI, General Audience of March 11, 2012]</ref> [[Pope Francis]], in his morning meditation of February 2, 2014, said that Christian faith is not an ideology, but that "the [[James the Great|Apostle James]] says that ideologues of the faith are the Antichrist."<ref>{{Cite web |title=Faith is not casuistry (21 February 2014) {{!}} Francis |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/cotidie/2014/documents/papa-francesco-cotidie_20140221_faith-not-casuistry.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref> In his morning meditation of September 19, 2014, Francis said the Antichrist must come before the final resurrection.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Fear of resurrection (19 September 2014) {{!}} Francis |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/cotidie/2014/documents/papa-francesco-cotidie_20140919_fear-of-resurrection.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref> In his morning meditation of January 7, 2016, he said the evil spirit spoken of in 1 John 4:6 is the Antichrist.<ref>{{Cite web |title=The only criterion (7 January 2016) {{!}} Francis |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/cotidie/2016/documents/papa-francesco-cotidie_20160107_the-only-criterion.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref> In his morning meditation on November 11, 2016, Francis said whoever says the criteria of Christian love is not the Incarnation is the Antichrist.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Letter of Love (11 November 2016) {{!}} Francis |url=https://www.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/cotidie/2016/documents/papa-francesco-cotidie_20161111_letter-of-love.html |access-date=2023-11-05 |website=www.vatican.va}}</ref>

====Speculation====

The ''[[Prophecy of the Popes]]'' (identified as a 16th century forgery by historians<ref>{{Cite book |last=O'Brien |first=M. J. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qIZVuIhz06cC |title=An Historical and Critical Account of the So-called Prophecy of St. Malachy Regarding the Succession of Popes |date=1880 |publisher=M.H. Gill and Son |language=en}}</ref>) claims Rome will be destroyed during the pontificate of the last Pope, implying a connection to the Antichrist.

[[Fulton J. Sheen]], a Catholic [[bishop]], wrote in 1951:<ref name="Sheen1951">{{cite book|last=Sheen|first=Fulton J.|title=Communism and the Conscience of the West|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ysKEnQEACAAJ|access-date=October 24, 2015|year=1951|publisher=Country Life Press|page=17}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|first=Joseph|last=Pronechen|title=Fulton Sheen's Clear Warning About the Anti-Christ|url=http://www.ncregister.com/blog/joseph-pronechen/fulton-sheens-view-of-the-anti-christ|newspaper=[[National Catholic Register]]|publisher=[[EWTN]]|location=Irondale, Alabama|date=February 10, 2019|access-date=October 7, 2019}}</ref>
{{blockquote|The Antichrist will not be so called; otherwise he would have no followers... he will come disguised as the Great Humanitarian; he will talk peace, prosperity and plenty not as means to lead us to God, but as ends in themselves... He will tempt Christians with the same three temptations with which he tempted Christ... He will have one great secret which he will tell to no one: he will not believe in God. Because his religion will be brotherhood without the fatherhood of God, he will deceive even the elect. He will set up a counterchurch... It will have all the notes and characteristics of the Church, but in reverse and emptied of its divine content. It will be a mystical body of the Antichrist that will in all externals resemble the mystical body of Christ.}}

====Catechism of the Catholic Church====

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, which John Paul II said is a "sure norm for teaching the faith," puts the doctrine on the Antichrist under a subsection entitled "The Church's Ultimate Trial," equating it with "the supreme religious deception" and "pseudo-messianism" of human "self-glorification":

{{blockquote|Before Christ's second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the "mystery of iniquity" in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh. (CCC 675)}}

{{blockquote|The Antichrist's deception already begins to take shape in the world every time the claim is made to realize within history that messianic hope which can only be realized beyond history through the eschatological judgment. The Church has rejected even modified forms of this falsification of the kingdom to come under the name of millenarianism, especially the "intrinsically perverse" political form of a secular messianism. (CCC 676)}}

===Eastern Orthodox===
Throughout history, various ecclesiastics of the Eastern Orthodox Church have identified the office of the Roman Catholic papacy with the antichrist.<ref name="auto">{{Cite web|url=https://orthodoxethos.com/post/does-the-russian-orthodox-church-accept-the-mysteries-of-the-heretics|title=Does the Russian Orthodox Church Accept the "Mysteries" of the Heretics?|website=Orthodox Ethos|date=April 22, 2016|access-date=March 9, 2022}}</ref> [[Russian Orthodox Church|Russian Orthodox]] Metropolitan [[Anthony Khrapovitsky]], in explaining the necessity of rebaptism for Roman Catholics, Protestants and [[Nestorianism|Nestorians]], declared:<ref name="auto"/>
{{Cquote|It is clear that by this regulation the Church does not recognize in heretics and schismatics either the priesthood or the other mysteries, and considers them subject to ecclesiastical baptism in the nature of things ... the Church by receiving Latins into communion in the same way as Nestorians (Council of Trullo, 95) does not make any distinction between old heresies and the Latin one. I think that the Latins are considerably further from the Church and they are worse than Monophysites and Monophelites, because they created a second Christ, i.e., the antichrist in the person of the Pope, who is supposedly infallible...<ref name="auto"/>}}

In a [[Christmas in Russia|Christmas]] 2018 interview on Russian state television, [[Patriarch Kirill of Moscow]] warned that "The Antichrist is the person that will be at the head of the world wide web controlling all of humanity. That means that the structure itself poses a danger. There shouldn't be a single centre, at least not in the foreseeable future, if we don't want to bring on the apocalypse." He exhorted listeners not to "fall into slavery to what's in your hands"..."You should remain free inside and not fall under any addiction, not to alcohol, not to narcotics, not to gadgets."<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/01/08/smartphones-paving-way-antichrist-says-russian-church-leader/ |archive-url=https://ghostarchive.org/archive/20220111/https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/01/08/smartphones-paving-way-antichrist-says-russian-church-leader/ |archive-date=2022-01-11 |url-access=subscription |url-status=live|title=Smartphones are paving way for the Antichrist, says head of Russian church|website=The Telegraph|date=8 January 2019}}{{cbignore}}</ref>

===Old Believers===
After [[Patriarch Nikon of Moscow]] reformed the [[Russian Orthodox Church]] during the second half of the 17th century, a large number of [[Old Believers]] held that [[Peter the Great]], the [[Tsar]] of the [[Russian Empire]] until his death in 1725, was the Antichrist because of his treatment of the Orthodox Church, namely subordinating the church to the state, requiring clergymen to conform to the standards of all Russian civilians (shaved beards, being fluent in French), and requiring them to pay state taxes.<ref>{{cite encyclopedia|url=http://www.bartleby.com/65/pe/Peter1-Rus.html|title=Peter I, czar of Russia|encyclopedia=[[The Columbia Encyclopedia]]|publisher=[[Columbia University]]|location=New York City|date=1935|archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20080212044338/http://www.bartleby.com/65/pe/Peter1-Rus.html| archive-date= February 12, 2008 | url-status= live}}</ref>

There are two conceptions of the Antichrist among the Old Believers: the spiritual Antichrist and the sensual Antichrist. The sensual means a particular person who will rule at the end of times for literal 3.5 years. The priested Old believers mostly adhere to this conception. The spiritual Antichrist is said to rule in the heretical church and state as a spirit through many people – since the year 1000 in the West and since 1666 in Russia. The true priesthood is considered to be lacking in the world due to 'abomination of desolation', which is synonymous with the rule of Antichrist. Most non-priested Old believers adhere to this conception (except the so called "Chasovennye").<ref>{{cite web |date=25 March 2021 |title=О чувственном и духовном антихристе |url=https://ruvera.ru/articles/o_duhovnom_antihriste |language=ru}}</ref>

===Age of Enlightenment===
Bernard McGinn noted that complete denial of the Antichrist was rare until the [[Age of Enlightenment]]. Following frequent use of "Antichrist" laden rhetoric during religious controversies in the 17th century, the use of the concept declined during the 18th century due to the rule of [[Enlightened absolutism|enlightened absolutists]], who as European rulers of the time wielded significant influence over official state churches. These efforts{{explain|date=June 2018|reason= why?}} to cleanse Christianity of "legendary" or "folk" accretions effectively removed the Antichrist from discussion in mainstream Western churches.{{sfn|Cabinet|2001}}

===Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints===
In [[the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints]], the "Antichrist" is anyone or anything that counterfeits the true gospel or [[Plan of salvation (Latter Day Saints)|plan of salvation]] and that openly or secretly is set up in opposition to Christ. The great antichrist is [[Lucifer]], but he has many assistants<ref>Korihor is directly referred to in ''The Book of Mormon'' as an anti-Christ ([[Book of Alma|Alma]] 30:6)</ref> both as spirit beings and as mortals."<ref>{{cite web|last=LDS|first=Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints|title=Bible Dictionary: Antichrist|url=https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/study/scriptures/bd/antichrist?lang=eng|publisher=[[Intellectual Reserve]], Inc}}</ref> [[Latter-day Saint]]s use the New Testament scriptures: 1 John 2:18, 22; 1 John 4:3–6; 2 John 1:7, and the [[Book of Mormon]]: [[Book of Jacob|Jacob]] 7:1–23, [[Book of Alma|Alma]] 1:2–16, Alma 30:6–60, in their [[exegesis]] or interpretation of the Antichrist.

===Seventh-day Adventists===
[[Seventh-day Adventist Church|Seventh-day Adventists]] teach that the "Little Horn Power", which (as predicted in the [[Book of Daniel]]) rose after the break-up of the Roman Empire, is the [[Papacy]]. The [[Western Roman Empire]] collapsed in the late 5th century. In 533, [[Justinian I]], the emperor of the [[Eastern Roman Empire]] (which historians have labelled the Byzantine Empire), legally recognized the bishop (pope) of Rome as the head of all the Christian churches.<ref>
{{cite book
| last1                 = Levillain
| first1                = Philippe
| title                 = The Papacy: An Encyclopedia
| url                   = https://books.google.com/books?id=7VDcmDeLuV4C
| volume                = 2 
| publisher             = Psychology Press
| date      = 2002
| page                  = 832
| isbn                  = 978-0415922302
| access-date            = July 17, 2015
| quote                 = [Pope John II] received from Justinian a letter dated June 6, 533 [...]. In his letter, Justinian proclaimed that the Holy See is the leader of all the holy churches and confirmed the need for all churches to join together with Rome [...].
}}
</ref>
Because of the [[Arianism|Arian]] domination of some of the Roman Empire by barbarian tribes, the bishop of Rome could not fully exercise such authority. In 538, [[Belisarius]], one of Justinian's generals, [[Siege of Rome (537–38)|succeeded in withstanding a siege of the city of Rome]] by Arian [[Ostrogoths|Ostrogoth]] besiegers, and the bishop of Rome could begin establishing universal civil authority. So, by the military intervention of the Eastern Roman Empire, the bishop of Rome became all-powerful throughout the area of the old Roman Empire.<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://adventist.org.uk/__data/assets/text_file/0011/10910/1260days.txt |title=The 1260 days of Daniel 7 |access-date=2018-12-07 |archive-date=2018-12-03 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20181203230201/http://adventist.org.uk/__data/assets/text_file/0011/10910/1260days.txt |url-status=dead }}</ref> The [[Ostrogoths]] promptly [[Sack of Rome (546)|re-captured the city of Rome eight years later in 546]], and [[Siege of Rome (549–550)|again in 550]].

Seventh-day Adventists understand the 1260 years as lasting AD 538 to 1798 as the (supposed) duration of the papacy's domination over Rome.<ref>''The Great Controversy'' by Ellen White, p. 266. "[http://egwdatabase.whiteestate.org/nxt/gateway.dll/egw-comp/section00000.htm/book01953.htm/chapter01971.htm Chap. 15 – The Bible and the French Revolution]".</ref><ref>{{Cite book
|title=Seventh-day Adventists Believe (2nd ed)
|publisher=Ministerial Association, [[General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists]]
|year=2005
|isbn=1-57847-041-2
|pages=184–185
}}</ref> This period is seen as starting from one of the [[Gothic War (535–554)|defeats]] of the Ostrogoths by the general [[Belisarius]] and as ending with the successes of French general [[Napoleon I of France|Napoleon Bonaparte]], specifically, with the capture of [[Pope Pius VI]] by general [[Louis Alexandre Berthier]] in 1798.

Like many [[Reformation Era|Reformation-era]] Protestant leaders, the Adventist pioneer [[Ellen G. White]] (1827–1915) spoke of the [[Catholic Church]] as a fallen church in preparation for its nefarious eschatological role as the antagonist against God's true church; she saw the pope as the Antichrist. Protestant reformers such as Martin Luther, John Knox, John Calvin, William Tyndale and others held similar beliefs about the Catholic Church and the papacy when they broke away from the Catholic Church during the Reformation.<ref name="whitehorsemedia.com">{{cite web|url= http://www.whitehorsemedia.com/articles/?d=44|title= Articles – White Horse Media|work= White Horse Media}}</ref>

Ellen White writes,
{{blockquote|His word has given warning of the impending danger; let this be unheeded, and the Protestant world will learn what the purposes of Rome really are, only when it is too late to escape the snare. She is silently growing into power. Her doctrines are exerting their influence in legislative halls, in the churches, and in the hearts of men. She is piling up her lofty and massive structures in the secret recesses of which her former persecutions will be repeated. Stealthily and unsuspectedly she is strengthening her forces to further her own ends when the time shall come for her to strike. All that she desires is vantage ground, and this is already being given her. We shall soon see and shall feel what the purpose of the Roman element is. Whoever shall believe and obey the word of God will thereby incur reproach and persecution.<ref name=autogenerated1>{{cite book
 |last= White 
 |first= Ellen G. 
 |title= The Great Controversy: Between Christ and Satan 
 |orig-year= 1888 
 |url= http://www.whiteestate.org/books/gc/gc.asp 
 |access-date= June 6, 2006 
 |year= 1999 
 |publisher= The Ellen G. White Estate 
 |isbn= 0-8163-1923-5 
 |chapter= Enmity Between Man and Satan 
 |chapter-url= http://www.whiteestate.org/books/gc/gc30.html 
 |page= 581 
 |url-status= dead 
 |archive-url= https://web.archive.org/web/20070531225517/http://www.whiteestate.org/books/gc/gc.asp 
 |archive-date= May 31, 2007 
}}</ref>}}

Seventh-day Adventists view the length of time the apostate church's unbridled power was permitted to rule as shown in Daniel 7:25: "The little horn would rule a time and times and half a time" – or 1,260 years. They regard papal rule as supreme in Europe from 538 (when the Arian Ostrogoths retreated from Rome into temporary oblivion) until 1798 (when the French general [[Louis-Alexandre Berthier]] took [[Pope Pius VI]] captive){{snd}}a period of 1,260 years<ref>Paulien, John (2006) "[https://www.adventistbiblicalresearch.org/sites/default/files/pdf/1260%20Days%20in%20Revelation.pdf The 1260 Days in the Book of Revelation] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20151027234546/https://adventistbiblicalresearch.org/sites/default/files/pdf/1260%20Days%20in%20Revelation.pdf |date=2015-10-27 }}"</ref> – including the 67 years of the [[Avignon Captivity]] (1309–1376).

===Other Christian interpretations===
====Martin Wight====
The devout Christian and political theorist [[Martin Wight]], writing immediately after [[World War II]], favoured the revival of the Antichrist doctrine not as a person, but as a recurrent situation featuring "demonic concentrations of power."<ref>{{cite book|first=Ian|last=Hall|title=The International Thought of Martin Wight|publisher=[[Palgrave Macmillan]]|location=London, England|date=2006|isbn=978-1403969279|page=37}}</ref>

====As "man of lawlessness"====
{{main|Man of sin}}
The Antichrist has been equated with the "man of lawlessness" or "lawless one" of 2 Thessalonians 2:3, though commentaries on the identity of the "man of lawlessness" greatly vary.<ref>{{cite book |last=Schink |first=W. F. |title=Our Great Heritage: Vol. 3 |date=1991 |publisher=[[Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod#Publishing|Northwestern Publishing House]] |isbn=978-0810003798 |editor1=Lange |editor1-first=Lyle |location=Milwaukee, Wisconsin |page=572 |chapter=The Scriptural Doctrine of the Antichrist |editor2-last=Albrecht |editor2-first=Jerome G.}}</ref> The "man of lawlessness" has been identified with [[Caligula]],<ref name="netbible"/> Nero,<ref>St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on II Thess., Nicene-Post Nicene Fathers</ref> and the end times Antichrist. Some scholars believe that the passage contains no genuine prediction, but represents a speculation of the apostle's own, based on contemporary ideas of the Antichrist.<ref name="netbible">[http://net.bible.org/dictionary.php?word=MAN%20OF%20SIN Net Bible: Man of sin] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090707075356/http://net.bible.org/dictionary.php?word=MAN%20OF%20SIN |date=July 7, 2009 }}</ref>

====As "being in league with other figures"====
Several American [[evangelical]] and [[fundamentalist]] theologians, including [[C. I. Scofield|Cyrus Scofield]], have identified the Antichrist as being in league with (or the same as) several figures in the Book of Revelation including the Dragon (or [[Serpent (Bible)|Serpent]]), the Beast, the False Prophet, and the Whore of Babylon.<ref>See footnotes in [http://www.studylight.org/com/srn/view.cgi?book=re Revelation 7 and 13] in the ''Scofield Reference Bible'', 1917</ref>

====As Satan====
[[Bernard McGinn (theologian)|Bernard McGinn]] described multiple traditions detailing the relationship between the Antichrist and [[Satan#Christianity|Satan]]. In the dualist approach, Satan will become incarnate in the Antichrist, just as [[Incarnation (Christianity)|God became incarnate in Jesus]]. However, in [[Eastern Orthodox Church|orthodox Christian]] thought, this view was problematic because it was too similar to Christ's incarnation and suggested [[Dualism in cosmology|dualism]]. Instead, the "indwelling" view became more accepted. It stipulates that the Antichrist is a human figure inhabited by Satan, since the latter's power is not to be seen as equivalent to God's.{{sfn|Cabinet|2001}} [[Luca Signorelli]]'s fresco, ''The Sermon and Deeds of the Antichrist'' (see above), depicts the indwelling view. Satan whispers in the ear of this Christlike figure and his left arm is slipped through the Antichrist's garment as if he is manipulating him.

====As Jesus himself====
Creciendo en Gracia (Growing in Grace) was a sect led by [[José Luis de Jesús]], who claimed to be both the returned phase of Jesus Christ and the Antichrist. He claimed that the term Antichrist had nothing to do with Satan (who according to him was destroyed); rather, it referred to his assertion that the old "Jewish" laws, which Jesus had taught during his first coming, were now abrogated during his second coming as de Jesús. Followers of the sect had themselves tattooed with the number 666, referencing this belief.