Others who identify the Antichrist

Daniel 7 identifies the Papacy as the Antichrist. Throughout history, others have also stated that papal Rome is the Antichrist.

The Apostle Paul said that the "mystery of iniquity" was already working in his day, and would grow to full revelation before the Second Coming of the Lord.

John Calvin (1509-1564).
Public Domain. https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Jean_Calvin.jpg...

The great French reformer, John Calvin, identified the Antichrist:

Daniel and Paul had predicted that Antichrist would sit in the temple of God...we affirm him to be the Pope…Some persons think us too severe and censorious when we call the Roman pontiff Antichrist. But those who are of this opinion do not consider that they bring the same charge of presumption against Paul himself, after whom we speak.ⁱ

I shall briefly show that (Paul's words in II Thess. 2) are not capable of any other interpretation than that which applies them to the Papacy.ⁱⁱ

Martin Luther also identified the Antichrist from his studies of Paul's epistle to the Thessalonians, and the prophetic books of Daniel and Revelation. In 1520, Luther wrote this:

I am practically cornered, and can hardly doubt any more, that the Pope is really the Antichrist... because everything so exactly corresponds to the way of his life, actions, words and commandments.ⁱⁱⁱ

We here are of the conviction that the papacy is the seat of the true and real Antichrist...personally I declare that I owe the Pope no other obedience than that to Antichrist.^iv

Already I feel greater liberty in my heart; for at last I know that the pope is antichrist, and that his throne is that of Satan himself.^v

We are not the first who interpret the Papacy as the kingdom of Antichrist...He (John Purvey in 1390 AD) rightly and truly pronounces the Pope "Antichrist" as he is...a witness indeed, foreordained by God to confirm our doctrine.^vi

Calvin and Luther were not the only church leaders to identify the Antichrist. A host of reformers identified the Antichrist as the Papacy, such as Thomas Cranmer ("Whereof it followeth Rome to be the seat of antichrist, and the pope to be very antichrist himself. I could prove the same by many other scriptures, old writers, and strong reasons"^vii), John Knox ("Hitherto the pope has been antichrist"^viii), John Wesley ("He is in an emphatical sense, the Man of Sin, as he increases all manner of sin above measure. And he is, too, properly styled the Son of Perdition, as he has caused the death of numberless multitudes, both of his opposers and followers"^ix), John Wycliffe, John Huss, Jerome, and John Melanchthon.

The same papal power will reveal itself again in the closing stages of this earth's history, we need to be grounded in Scripture so that we are not swept away by the subtle workings of this power.

i. L. Froom, Prophetic Faith of our Fathers Volume 2 (Washington D.C: Review and Herald, 1948): 437.

ii. John Calvin, Institutes of the Christian Religion (1536).

iii. Martin Luther, Schriften volume 21a, column 234, as translated in George Waddington, A History of the Reformation on the continent volume 1 (1841).

iv. L. Froom, Prophetic Faith of our Fathers Volume 2 (Washington D.C: Review and Herald, 1948): 121.

v. Martin Luther, as quoted in D'Aubigné, book 6 chapter 9.

vi. Martin Luther, Commentarius in Apocalypsin (reprint).

vii. Thomas Cranmer, The Works of Thomas Cranmer Volume 1: 6-7.

viii. John Knox, The Zurich Letters: 199.

ix. John Wesley, as quoted in Albert Close, Antichrist and His Ten Kingdoms (London: Thynne and Co, 1917): 110.