"ANTICHRIST": OBSESSION AND SUPERSTITION

Copyright 1998 by Love Ministries, Inc.

Worthville, Kentucky

Antichrist. The word conjures unspeakable horrors, and visions of the end of the world. Fundamentalists generally place the word in the context of the Revelation (often mis-named "Revelations"), which is the last book of the Bible. Revelation is a symbolic allegory that discusses the development of human consciousness from a state of division from the Mind of God to a state of perfect union through love. But fundamentalists have never interpreted Revelation as an allegory. Instead, they insist that some aspect of the symbolic narrative are actually literal.

Strangely, although the character of "antichrist" is often mixed up with the symbols of Revelation, the word does not occur a single time in that book. Instead, the word itself is ripped out of its natural context, where it appears in two minor epistles, First and Second John-- smaller books of the Bible, completely unrelated to Revelation. In these books, in context, the word is used in its most literal meaning as a clear description of anyone who is "against Christ." Nowhere in the Bible does it refer to the imaginary and fabulous "ultimate enemy of Christ," who is supposed to appear in the "last days" of civilization.

This "cut and paste" use of the word is designed to support the creative imaginations of fundamentalists, who use antichrist as a kind of "common enemy," a fear-trigger designed to excite and to unify modern "Christians." Nowhere does the text of the Scriptures support the superimposition of this word upon the ultimate forces of satan in opposition to the forces of God. Nowhere is the term used to describe a kind of incarnation of ultimate evil; that arises only from the over-active imagination of commentators.

Apparently the way that the Bible itself uses the word is too "boring" for the wild-eyed, fear-filled preachers of the "apocalypse" as the final battle between God and satan.

To make matters much worse, more complex and more confusing, not only has this word been lifted from its context and forced into an unnatural position in the apocalyptic scenario, but texts from Daniel and Ezekiel-- books written centuries before the Revelation-- have been randomly superimposed upon and forced into the Revelation-story of "Armageddon"-- the imaginary final battle between good and evil.

In an utterly astonishing paradox, some "Christians" have always looked forward to the appearance of this mythological antichrist, since his coming indicates that the "end of the world" is at hand. These confused minds go so far as to welcome and celebrate the end of civilization and most of humanity, since this means the end of their personal problems. (See "Terror, Fanaticism, and Paranoia: A Look at Christian 'End of the World' Theories, "Armageddon: History of the Nightmare Theology, the Christian Shame", and "Bizarre Visions, Nightmare-Fantasies: Views of the 'End of the World'", also in this series.)

These people believe that God is similar to a Middle Eastern potentate, a kind of Saddam Hussein in the sky, whose will it is to slaughter all human beings who do not agree with them. After his hideous massacre and bloody slaughter, the "Prince of peace" will ride out of heaven on a white horse, his sword still dripping with blood, and establish a "kingdom" that will, once and for all, prove that the fundamentalists had always been "right." In fact, this ghastly battle, which transforms the gentle Jesus into a mad tyrant, a lord of darkness and vengeance, will leave only the fundamentalists; everyone else will be dead. They see this as a good thing.

For nearly two thousand years, "Christians" have been trying to identify the antichrist as a historical person. Even as early as the second century, some had already identified Caligula or Nero, Roman emperors, as the nefarious representatives of satan in the political world. Later, Protestants were, predictably, to identify various popes as the antichrist. In more modern times, other candidates of which commentators were absolute certain were a Napoleon, Hitler, Mussolini, Henry Kissenger, Michael Gorbachev, and Saddam Hussein. But, as these have died, or faded from historic significance, they have, one by one, all been dropped and abandoned as candidates. As we now approach the second millennium, some circles of minority groups are once again beginning to whip themselves into frenzies of superstitions and predictions, ranging from the hilarious to the hair-raising.

Why have people needed a major "bad guy" such as antichrist? For one thing, it makes them feel as if they were a part of a cosmic drama. They often assume absurd stands in order to "protect" God, as if he could not live without that protection. By standing up against the antichrist, it is as though they believe that they are doing God a great favor, and giving their lives a cosmic rather than simply comic significance.

But another, perhaps secondary, reason is simply that their personal lives are boring. It is well-known that the more bored a person is, the more likely he/she is to engage in "soap-opera" dramas on tv. So, the antichrist is like a metaphysical or religious "soap-opera," in which the "faithful" can lose their little lives and, in their imaginations, become personally involved in something not only of ultimate importance, but of ultimate excitement. After all, it is much more exciting to see oneself as a "white knight defending God" or as a "master of hidden secrets" than to see oneself as a factory-worker, farmer, house-manager, school-bus driver, or waitress. "Christians" often smugly identify themselves as the faithful "remnant" that is to be saved, surviving the most abominable and gruesome event in human history, because they were smarter than others.

The superstition of the "end of the world," of which the "antichrist" is just a subsystem, has taken on a kind of life of its own, motivated by horror, and, in some ages, panic. It has developed a wide literature, generally written by non-scholarly, non-academic speculators who have little or no objective training in theology. These religious enthusiasts stir up emotional terrors and frenzies in their readers, and make millions doing so. To do this, as indicated, they draw upon the most confused and confusing amalgamations of Hebrew and Christian Scriptures, using a "cut and paste" approach in which any symbol can be interpreted to mean almost anything at all. Through the years, their ideas have thus often contradicted one another, and few have found any agreement or consensus whatsoever.

In the history of antichrist-targets, America has always assumed that it was the "chosen nation" of God, and that therefore its enemies were God's enemies, or the antichrist. So, countries which have adopted anti-American policies have been mis-labelled as parts of the antichrist's "great conspiracy" against God and God's people.

For example, in the Puritan period, colonialists were absolutely certain that antichrist was represented by the native American peoples. Later Americans identified "antichrist" as the orthodox Anglican church, and some taught that it was "clearly and obviously" King George III.

It seems that it was never enough to hypothesize what person the antichrist might be; so, many turned away from frustrating and futile efforts to identify a single man, and instead began to identify certain movements as either antichrist or his agents. This group included modernism, Roman Catholics, Jews, socialism, and the Soviet Union. Today, it is re-identified as the Muslim world, rock music, feminism, secular humanism, or virtually any other movement which the preacher hates, despises, or fears.

Until very recently, there was something very close to unanimity in the illusion that the antichrist was the Soviet Union; then it collapsed. Most "true believers" seemed completely, almost nonchalantly, unperturbed by the wild "flip-flops" that antichrist-identification has manifested during the past centuries. They just swallow, "hook, line and sinker," the latest "bad guy," and go on their complacent way, convinced fully that this time, they are right. They blithely, often blindly, accept whatever their leaders tell them.

The latest target is the formation of the European Economic Community. Because they largely feel "left out" of, and ignored by, the mainstream of the world, they often seek to latch onto major political movements, seeing the "deception" of the "devil" everywhere. Superstitions have proliferated and run rampant during recent time-periods, as is common in times of social upheaval; these have included visions of satanic "deception" and "conspiracy" that included everything from the minting of the Susan B. Anthony dollar through fiber-optic technologies and computers, to produce-bar-codes on groceries. These absurdities have been discussed with serious faces by the committed. For they are most desperate to believe that the most ordinary and harmless events represent the secret intrusion of supernatural powers in their lives, but only they are "smart" enough to have detected this subtlety.

So, they believe that no major human problem can ever have purely "human" or political or economic solutions. Any attempt to solve human problems, therefore, is of utter futility. Only a miraculous act of divine intervention will solve the "enormous" problems of the world. These people have been overwhelmed, and have simply given up on any real hope for human growth, constructivity, creativity, or peace. In fact, they have talked themselves into the belief that world-peace is actually satanic, as is the effort to save the ecology; and they also believe that nuclear war would be a great and wonderful development, to be celebrated.

Of course, this interventionistic fantasy reflects belief in a "big daddy" Jehovah in the sky, who solves human problems by murdering his enemies, and rejects a God of love and peace who solves problems by educating his children.

Such speculations drove David Koresh and his cult literally mad; in fact, the Book of Revelation has driven many people quite insane, and more than one criminal has been drawn ever more deeply into personal psychosis by believing that he was himself the antichrist.

Not surprisingly, the idea of an antichrist becomes most powerful when a group feels that its doctrines or orthodoxy is being questioned. For antichrist serves the valuable organizational goal of giving all in the congregation or church a common enemy, thus making them feel, in a sick way, more united.

From the beginning of written records, amusing attempts have been made, and then scrapped, to determine a "time-table" for God's dealings with the human race. What gives these a special air of tragicomedy is the eccentricities of the people who often embraced them. In 1844, the Millerites expected the end of the world, and gathered together to welcome Christ and to be saved, having sold all their worldly goods. After them, the Wilberites and Campbellites came up with their own chronologies. In 1874, the Russelites calculated, Christ would return to rule the world.

And so it has gone throughout human history, especially since the first century AD. Year after year, decade after decade, century after century, people have really expected the coming of a time of major earth-problems, a time-period that they call the "great tribulation." Before that time occurs, however, the dogma says, true believers will be drawn up into heaven for their "rapture." (This word does not occur in the Christian Scriptures.) This "great tribulation" is predicted to last for seven years, and will begin with the rise of the antichrist, who will rule a ten-nation federation. During this time, in the midst of hideous natural disasters, every person will be commanded to receive a special "mark" on his/her body, in order to partake of the economy. The catch is, anyone who receives this "mark" will also get eternal "damnation."

During this mess, Christ is supposed to appear in heaven, and during the major battle, called "Armageddon," antichrist will be thrown into a "lake of fire." If this all sounds vaguely like "Star Wars," it really does represent a kind of fascinating study in "fundamentalist science-fiction."

Christ, presented as a kind of super-soldier, grabs satan and binds him for a thousand years. Then, for some odd reason, he is freed again to wreak havoc. But, at least during the thousand years that satan is bound, the "righteous" will enjoy a perfect, peaceful life on earth, in ageless, disease-free bodies. Presumably, they will spend all this time in Bible-study, or in singing hymns around a campfire. Or, perhaps, the time will be used wisely to clean up the debris of the billions of corpses with which Jesus has littered the world, which are stinking and rotting. Perhaps the children and old women will be picked up in wheel-barrows and stashed into dumpsters. (Jeffrey Dahmer would love this scenario.)

Anyway, at the end of the thousand years, after he has had time to tease and tempt "God's people," satan is then grabbed and thrown into the lake of fire, where he burns with the antichrist for all eternity, in a kind of combination marshmallow-roast/sex-orgy/sadist nightmare. The earth is then wastefully burned up and replaced with a "new earth." Exactly why God does this has always been unclear.

This supernaturalist, interventionist, nightmarish vision is based upon the clumsy liberalization of texts that were written to be understood allegorical.

As indicated, this brand of fundamentalist interpretation makes one extremely sensitive, or paranoid, about satan's attempts to control oneself, or the world. Those who are most loyal to this ludicrosity see "secularism" and "humanism" as the devils' devious tactics designed to mislead them. Further the idea that the devil himself, the very lord of darkness, is interested in them personally gives them a big boost in their flagging self-esteem.

Thus, by extension, all science also becomes the "enemy." This community, as well as the entire rest of the world, then becomes the "bad guys," while the "good guys" are that small minority who truly understand the "mysteries" of God-- or who embrace stupid, anti-human, egocentric, paranoid views of history.

The problem is, the "Christian" right have no clear-cut, ferocious, horrible, demonic enemies. So, they have to create them; thus the entire world is populated in their imagination by those who oppose the elite. Since the "isms" whom they see as so horrible are not actually interested in attacking them directly, they project their collective need for an enemy into the invisible realm; thus, antichrist is born. This enemy is one of hyperbole, continuously dramatized, mythologized, and diabolicized. This tends to create among them a "crisis mentality," which stimulates them to proselytize their neighbors, who often find them to be either boring or just plain silly.

This crisis mind-state is also used to justify their extremism; for they come to see themselves as the "soldiers of Jehovah," just on the very verge of the most hideous, grisly war in history. In an unhealthy way, these people use this mind-set to deal with a sense of economic deprivation or ethnic alienation or political disenfranchisement. Seeing powerful and successful people as the "enemy," who are bad in a terrible, irredeemable sense, gives them some false comfort; so does the idea that soon, the "tables" will be "turned," and everyone in the world will know that the fundamentalists have been the only ones who were "right" all along. These complex and convoluted views of the cosmic drama, then, are used to create a sense of order in their chaotic lives, which are seen as out-of-control.

The view of this history also tends to support a view of oneself as unfairly "persecuted"-- in part a guilt-response for living lives of comfort and luxury in a world filled with poverty and starvation.

Like the followers of that Nazi and other propagandists, they often see strength in, or even define "truth" in terms of, great numbers who agree with them. But if a thousand, or fifty thousand, people suffer from paranoia, they are not in the least less paranoid because of their numbers. Thus, the great audiences that these people boast about in their assemblies only confirms their basic insecurity.

It is unhealthy enough to see history as a kind of conspiracy; but to believe that evil spirits lie behind these conspiracies adds an element of superstition to the paranoia. Thus, the apolyptic style of future predictions aids and abets a paranoid view of the world.

The great, horrible, evil antichrist might also be seen as an unconscious projection of the less desirable aspects of the self. For every "Christian" believes him/herself to have been born "damned" and evil. So, no matter how they rationalize and justify, they will hold to the unconscious belief that a part of their mental make-up is purely evil. Since they cannot stand to live with this self-image, they take that evil within and project it onto an outside figure. Could it be that people need to believe in the antichrist because, deep down, they hold antichristian attitudes in their hearts? Could it be just coincidence that many who accept the theory of antichrist hold many antichristian attitudes, such as anti-semitism, anti-catholicism, and anti-African attitudes?

Only those who repress such "demonic forces" in their own unconscious minds can seriously attempt to populate the world with evil "spirits," and then blame these spirits for human evil. An unhealthier world-view would be difficult to imagine.

HISTORY. Nearly two thousand years ago, the writer of First John in the Bible identified his time as the "last hour," and said that already "antichrists have come." (2:18) It could not be more contextually clear that this word, in plural, had nothing to do with the distant future, but was applied to that ancient time. Also, note that the writer was not referring to a single person, but to "antichrists," or more than one. Also, this word is clearly defined as "the one who denies the father and the son." (2:22) The reference had absolutely nothing to do with some supernatural being in the future. Instead, it clearly referred to human beings who were the victims of religious or spiritual alienation from the love of God. It is possible even that this writer, so long ago, expected that, at any moment, Christ would return to institute the "kingdom of God" on earth, although most Christians understood the deeper, allegorical use of the word "kingdom."

Still today, every day that the dreaded Armageddon does not come, that the prophecies fail to be fulfilled as they "should" be, is a slap in the face of the fundamentalist. Every day, the world continues its normal, non-supernatural existence, without any divine intervention by an angry, frustrated Jehovah, with murder on his mind. In time, this creates a condition in the mind of the believer that in psychology is called "cognitive dissonance." That is, at some very deep level, he/she realizes that it is possible that the apocalyptic interpretation of history is a wrong one. But in order to avoid facing this most uncomfortable truth, he/she then attempt to reduce dissonance by complex and convoluted attempts to interpret every world event, no matter how mundane and boring, in terms of cosmic/apocalyptic terms. So, apocalypticists see "secret" meanings in the most ordinary of events, to which only they, with their special "understanding," have access. This gives them yet another ego-boost: For only they are intelligent, alert, and wise enough to know what is "really" going on, while even "experts" are deluded and wrong.

What they usually do not want to realize is the historical fact that a flood of apocalyptic literature has been with us since three hundred years before Christ! (Among these ancient speculative texts were First and Second Enoch, Second Esdras, and First and Second Baruch. These books are part of the Apocrypha, and never technically became a part of the Protestant Bible.)

These ancient writings shared a number of concepts that still affect apocalyptic literalists: 1) the world is sharply divided into good and evil, and so, if we are good, and the rest of the world is not like us, then it must be evil; 2) very soon, at any time now, the good will overcome the evil, and 3) the good-- that is, we-- will inherit all the material goods of the world. (One can hardly help the suspicion of materialism in this final note.)

Centuries ago, people also bought into the real paradox still embraced by these extremists: "The worse things appear, the better they really are." Increases in anti-Christian activity, over-population, injustice, war, hatred, murder, crime, starvation, etc., are to be celebrated by those who really "know." For all these things are proof that the "kingdom of God" as a real political entity, is approaching. (This has also been said for centuries.)

Fundamentalists go so far as to dredge up minor references in the Hebrew book of Daniel, where the Hebrew record discusses Antiochus IV, the king of Syria, and try to apply these words to the twenty-first century! This is, in fact, the source of the myth of the ten-nation confederacy to be ruled by the antichrist.

This kind of extreme apocalypticism reached a kind of zenith at just about the time that Jesus came to earth. But he not only did not write books about the subject; he virtually ignored it altogether, focusing instead on the practical aspects of love and forgiveness, kindness and peace, as the essentials of the Christian Way. In Jesus' day, communities such as the one at Qumram withdrew from the society of the world in order eagerly to await the return of the "Messiah." In many ways, then, apocalypticism represents a Christianizing of pre-existent Jewish ideas, rather than a new perspective created by the Christians. In fact, a scan of the Greek Christian Scriptures demonstrates that the "apocalypse," in the modern sense of the end of civilization, was not even mentioned in the earliest Christian records; so it must have been negligible or unimportant to them.

In the historical evolution of the "end of the world" concept, it is noteworthy that the first commentators identified the antichrist with satan; only much later did writers say that satan was the invisible spirit of evil, and the antichrist his human expression. In the fifth century, for Augustine, apocalyptic symbolism was to be understood in terms of a "continuing struggle between good and evil in the heart of every Christian," according to Fuller. So, the earlier interpretations of Revelation had nothing to do with history or calendars, but spoke instead of the symbols of the book as representing components of the human heart, mind, and soul. Thus, Augustine also identified all sinners as "antichrists," much as had the writer of First John.

In the seventh century, the Muslims were identified as the "armies of antichrist." A book written about 950 was called, "Letter on the Origin and Life of the Antichrist," suggesting that "the antichrist" would be born as a Jew. Yet then, the book proceeds to attack fellow clergy and lay-people who resist their orders as "antichrists."

Most attacks on antichrists in Medieval times involved or represented attacks on despised minorities or political enemies. A "prophet" named Joachim or Fiore predicted that the antichrist would appear, and the end of the world arrive, definitely in the year 1260. By the fourteenth century, naming the antichrist became not only a fashionable fad, but something of an obsession. And during the Reformation, naming the antichrist became a tool of hate-mongering, which it has remained ever since. Both Popes Gregory IX and Innocent IV said that the emperor Frederick II was the antichrist. Frederick, in turn, identified the Pope as the "beast" (a symbol in Revelation that has nothing to do with an antichrist, but which has traditionally been paired with him).

The priest John Wycliffe (died 1384) charged that the Pope was the antichrist, and priest and friars his agents. John Huss (1369-1415) agreed. And so did Martin Luther. (To Luther, there could be no such thing as fair disagreement in matters of religion. The one who was "right" dogmatically and theologically was seen as the servant of God, the one "wrong" was satan's servant.)

Apocalyptic symbols continue to be appropriated throughout England in the seventeenth century for purposes that were purely political. Each side would accuse the other of being agents of satan or the antichrist. Even the Church of England came under fire from extreme separatists, who pointed out that it had never "really" distanced itself sufficiently from the Church of Rome.

At this time in history, the symbolism became so fluid, so malleable, that it could be applied, and was, to almost anyone. In 1656, the Quaker John Mailer went so far as to say that "antichrist is in every man until he be revealed by the light of Christ within." In time, the church became increasingly non-apocalyptic. This drove away a minority of extremists called the Puritans, who helped to settle America on the grounds that they were themselves establishing the kingdom of God on earth.

As early as 1548, the continuing battle between Catholics and Protestants was interpreted as representing the "final battle between good and evil," or "Armageddon." Each church saw the other as the "antichrist." In 1583, Fox's famous Book of Martyrs followed older traditions in identifying the Pope as the antichrist. Since those Christians saw Christianity as a matter of beliefs in or conformity to certain doctrines, they had to work hard to ward off those who did not believe as everyone else, and thus created the horrible idea of heresies in their midst, which culminated in the notorious witch-hunts. (Between 1450-1650, thousands of innocents, from young girls to old ladies, were hideously burned alive at the stake for being agents of "antichrist" or satan.) The Puritans, who taught salvation by "faith," spawned the sub-groups of the Baptists, Congregationalists, and Presbyterians. They wanted to polarize against both Catholicism and Anglicism, and set up a real "kingdom of God" in American against these groups.

They saw their mission as that of a creation of a "new Jerusalem," and mythologized their place in history; the coming of the colonialists to New England was for the very purpose of ushering in the "time of the end," and the kingdom of God.

For more information, see the book Naming the Antichrist: the History of an American Obsession, by Robert C. Fuller New York; Oxford University Press, 1995

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