The Naming of the Antichrist

Aside from the moral evil of the calumny involved in naming people as the Antichrist when they are indeed not the Antichrist -- especially when the person named is an innocent successor of Peter, an accusation that keeps people away from the Sacraments of the Catholic Church -- attempts to determine who is the Antichrist are almost funny, a parlor game run amok: "Reagan's name adds up to 666! No, it's Gorbachev! It's every Pope that's ever lived!" It's an old game, one that Irenaeus of Lyons wrote about 1,800 years ago in Book 5, Chapter 30 of his Adversus haereses:

"It is therefore more certain, and less hazardous, to await the fulfilment of the prophecy, than to be making surmises, and casting about for any names that may present themselves, inasmuch as many names can be found possessing the number mentioned; and the same question will, after all, remain unsolved. For if there are many names found possessing this number, it will be asked which among them shall the coming man bear."

He then goes on to show how the numerical values of three different contemporary names, Latin and Greek, all added up to 666 and how it proved nothing.

One of the worst things to come out of this "Name That Antichrist" fun are the accusations against the Pope. But let's see what Scripture says about Antichrist and the papacy:

Now, has any Pope ever denied that Christ has come in the flesh? Ever? Is the Church that has proclaimed the Gospel for two millennia; the Church that gave us Sacred Scripture; the Church that defined the dogma of the Trinity; the Church that defeated the heresies of Arianism, Pelagianism, Gnosticism, Marcionism, Sabellianism, and Manichæanism; the Church that has produced thousands and thousands of Saints -- from St. Francis to Maximillian Kolbe to Thérèse de Lisieux; the Church that is the greatest caregiver of the poor in the world; the Church that has built hospitals, orphanages, schools, and soup kitchens all over this planet; the Church that cares for one out of four of the world's AIDS patients; the Church that is the single greatest defender of life -- all life -- in the entire world -- is this the Church of Antichrist? Come on! The Church of The Bells of St. Mary and Angels with Dirty Faces -- the Antichrist? The Church that proclaims not only did Messiah come in the first century, but that He comes at each and every Catholic Mass -- in the flesh (it is Protestants who deny this!) -- and will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead? People who spew venom at the Catholic Church need to think long and hard about what they are doing, because to slander the Catholic Church is to blaspheme the Body of Christ. If you are one of these people, pray about it, ask yourself why you believe what you believe, and find out for sure whether or not things you believe about the Catholic Church are true, using unbiased resources (including true Catholic ones). Please.

And one other thing before I move on: if the Catholic Church has been headed by the Antichrist, and since the Catholic Church decided the Canon of the New Testament, then why would it leave the Book of Revelation and those relevant Gospel verses in there to warn the world of Herself? Now does that make any sense to you? (hey, there are some who think we "added books" to the canon in the 16th century, the period of time Luther was calling the Pope "Antichrist"; if that's so -- which it isn't, actually -- we could just have easily removed some like the Protestants did)

Mystery Babylon the Great, the Mother of Harlots

Now, what does Revelation say about the Great Whore? Look at the following verses:

"How is the faithful city become an harlot! it was full of judgment; righteousness lodged in it; but now murderers."

"For of old time I have broken thy yoke, and burst thy bands; and thou saidst, I will not transgress; when upon every high hill and under every green tree thou wanderest, playing the harlot."

"They say, If a man put away his wife, and she go from him, and become another man's, shall he return unto her again? shall not that land be greatly polluted? but thou hast played the harlot with many lovers; yet return again to me, saith the LORD. Lift up thine eyes unto the high places, and see where thou hast not been lien with. In the ways hast thou sat for them, as the Arabian in the wilderness; and thou hast polluted the land with thy whoredoms and with thy wickedness. Therefore the showers have been withholden, and there hath been no latter rain; and thou hadst a whore's forehead, thou refusedst to be ashamed."

"But thou didst trust in thine own beauty, and playedst the harlot because of thy renown, and pouredst out thy fornications on every one that passed by; his it was. And of thy garments thou didst take, and deckedst thy high places with divers colours, and playedst the harlot thereupon: the like things shall not come, neither shall it be so. Thou hast also taken thy fair jewels of my gold and of my silver, which I had given thee, and madest to thyself images of men, and didst commit whoredom with them, And tookest thy broidered garments, and coveredst them: and thou hast set mine oil and mine incense before them."

OK, so I tricked you. Those verses aren't from Revelation; they are Isaiah 1:21, Jeremiah 2:20, Jeremiah 3:1-3, and Ezekiel 16:15-18 respectively. And the identity of the harlot? It is Jerusalem.

And this is really what Revelation says about the Whore:

Revelation 17:15-18
And he saith unto me, The waters which thou sawest, where the whore sitteth, are peoples, and multitudes, and nations, and tongues. And the ten horns which thou sawest upon the beast, these shall hate the whore, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her flesh, and burn her with fire. For God hath put in their hearts to fulfil his will, and to agree, and give their kingdom unto the beast, until the words of God shall be fulfilled. and the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.

"Great city"? Which city is "the great city"?

Revelation 11:8
And their dead bodies shall lie in the street of the great city, which spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt, where also our Lord was crucified..

But -- but -- it says stuff like "jewels" and "golden cup" and "scarlet" and "purple" -- that's just gotta be the "Romish Church"! Well, considering that Catholicism is the Old Covenant fulfilled, it shouldn't be too surprising to find in it liturgical colors, vestments, and implements that are partly rooted in the Old Testament (see Exodus 28). But the Jerusalem Temple is undoubtedly what Revelation is referring to, and Flavius Josephus left us writings that tell us what the Jerusalem Temple looked like at the time of its destruction by pagan Rome in A.D. 70. Here are a few tidbits:

The holiest part of the Temple:
"Its front was covered with gold all over... But that gate which was at this end of the first part of the house was, as we have already observed, all over covered with gold, as was its whole wall about it; it had also golden vines above it, from which clusters of grapes hung as tall as a man's height. But then this house... had golden doors of fifty-five cubits altitude, and sixteen in breadth; but before these doors there was a veil of equal largeness with the doors. It was a Babylonian curtain, embroidered with blue, and fine linen, and scarlet, and purple, and of a contexture that was truly wonderful."

The exterior of the Temple:
"...the outward face of the temple in its front wanted nothing that was likely to surprise either men's minds or their eyes; for it was covered all over with plates of gold of great weight, and, at the first rising of the sun, reflected back a very fiery splendor, and made those who forced themselves to look upon it to turn their eyes away, just as they would have done at the sun's own rays."

The priests' vestments:
"But that girdle that tied the garment to the breast was embroidered with five rows of various colors, of gold, and purple, and scarlet, as also of fine linen and blue, with which colors we told you before the veils of the temple were embroidered also. The like embroidery was upon the ephod; but the quantity of gold therein was greater. Its figure was that of a stomacher for the breast. There were upon it two golden buttons like small shields, which buttoned the ephod to the garment; in these buttons were enclosed two very large and very excellent sardonyxes, having the names of the tribes of that nation engraved upon them: on the other part there hung twelve stones, three in a row one way, and four in the other; a sardius, a topaz, and an emerald; a carbuncle, a jasper, and a sapphire; an agate, an amethyst, and a ligure; an onyx, a beryl, and a chrysolite; upon every one of which was again engraved one of the forementioned names of the tribes."

You can read the entire 5th Chapter of the 5th Book of Josephus' War here.

Exodus 28:36-38 tells us that the Temple High Priest was to have worn on his forehead an insignia:

"And thou shalt make a plate of pure gold, and grave upon it, like the engravings of a signet, HOLINESS TO THE LORD. And thou shalt put it on a blue lace, that it may be upon the mitre; upon the forefront of the mitre it shall be. And it shall be upon Aaron's forehead, that Aaron may bear the iniquity of the holy things, which the children of Israel shall hallow in all their holy gifts; and it shall be always upon his forehead, that they may be accepted before the LORD."

But Jerusalem apostasized and failed to recognize and then killed (with Roman power) the Messiah of prophecy. St. John the Divine tells us what "the woman," Jerusalem, came to have upon her forehead:

"And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH." (Revelation 17:5)

But -- but -- it says something about seven mountains! Glad you noticed. Because:

• even if "the Seven Mountains" are a reference to Rome (see "The Beasts" below) -- which some of the Church Fathers, thinking of the then pagan, godless Rome, thought -- that city, with its Caesar-gods, was thoroughly pagan at the time and certainly part of a cruel, evil empire. The Jews of Jerusalem (the Mother of Harlots) used Rome ("rides the beast") all throughout the New Testament, using Roman power to kill the Messiah and try to destroy the People of God, the Church (see the entire Book of Acts).  
  

• even though they're usually lumped together and "Rome" is used as shorthand for the Roman Catholic Church, even by Catholics, Vatican City is its own city state and isn't "Rome";  
  

• Rome isn't built on seven mountains, anyway; it's built on seven hills, as are Constaninople, Edinburgh, San Francisco, and Cincinnati, for that matter. Mountains are big, hills are small. There are two separate words for them and Scripture is familiar with both (see Luke 3:5 and Luke 23:30). Rome's seven hills are Palatine, Aventine, Capitoline, Quarinal, Viminal, Esquiline and Caelian (hey, how come Vatican Hill is never listed?).
   
  Jerusalem, however, is built on what are referred to in the Bible as seven mountains: Mt. Goath, Mt. Gareb, Mt. Acra, Mt. Bezetha, Mt. Zion, Mt. Ophel, and Mt. Moriah. There are even Psalms about them, "As the mountains are round about Jerusalem, so the LORD is round about his people from henceforth even for ever." {Psalms 125:2)

The Beasts

As said, the Beast from the waters, the one with the seven heads (Revelation 13:1) that represent seven kings (Revelation 17:10) is in all probability pagan Rome and seven of its emperors. Revelation 17:10 says, "And there are seven kings: five are fallen, and one is, and the other is not yet come; and when he cometh, he must continue a short space." That sixth "king," the "one that is," was the infamous Nero (part of the "beast from the land"), a man who killed his own parents, brother, and aunt, who kicked his pregnant wife to death, who delighted in torture and homosexual rape, who used the burning bodies of Christians as "torches" at his garden parties and who commanded complete obedience. Wrote Apollinius of Tyana who lived in Nero's time:

"In my travels, which have been wider than ever man yet accomplished, I have seen many, many wild beasts of Arabia and India; but this beast, that is commonly called a Tyrant, I know not how many heads it has, nor if it be crooked of claw, and armed with horrible fangs. . . . And of wild beasts you cannot say that they were ever known to eat their own mother, but Nero has gorged himself on this diet."

It was Nero who began the persecution of Christians (undoubtedly at the instigation of his Jewish wife, Poppea) ¹ because they refused to participate in the "cult of the Caesars"; it was under him that Peter, Paul and a legion of Christians were martyred in Rome. After Nero's reign came the "Year of the Four Emperors," a crisis of succession that was resolved when Vespasian finally took the throne. To understand the bit in Revelation 13:3 about the healed fatal wound, pick up a history book and read about the wars in Rome between the reigns of Nero and Galba -- wars that almost brought the empire to its knees, and from which it recovered.

Nero and the other Roman emperors are the beast from the land. It was Titus who led the destruction of the Jerusalem Temple (under his father, Vespasian). He is known for the catastrophes that struck during his reign: the eruption of Vesuvius in A.D. 79, fires that swept Rome for three days, one of the worst epidemics of plague on record... He reigned for two years.
 

The Mark of the Beast

The "mark of the beast" is easily understood if one understands the command given by God to His People in Deuteronomy 6:4-8:

"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes."

What Jesus said and how, of course, He was right

Jesus was very, very clear in saying that Jerusalem would suffer a judgement:

Matthew 23:34-24:2
"Wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets, and wise men, and scribes: and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them from city to city: That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of Zacharias son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the altar. Verily I say unto you, All these things shall come upon this generation. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not! Behold, your house is left unto you desolate. For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord. And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple: and his disciples came to him for to shew him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down."

Or as Luke puts it:

"...the blood of all the prophets, which was shed from the foundation of the world, may be required of this generation; From the blood of Abel unto the blood of Zacharias which perished between the altar and the temple: verily I say unto you, It shall be required of this generation."

And as the Jews rallied to send Christ to the Romans for execution, what did they say? They said, "His blood be on us, and on our children!" (Matthew 27:25). The judgement that they called down upon themselves, that Jesus warned them about, that the Old Testament Prophets warned them about, happened in A.D. 70, when the Temple was destroyed by the Beast (the pagan Roman empire and/or its emperors) and the Jews were scattered into the Diaspora. It was devastation, the end of Jerusalem, the "last day" of the Old Covenant! Josephus described it:

In The Jewish War he writes,

The countryside like the City was a pitiful sight; for where once there had been a lovely vista of woods and parks there was nothing but desert and stumps of trees. No one - not even a foreigner - who had seen the Old Judea and the glorious suburbs of the City, and now set eyes on her present desolation, could have helped sighing and groaning at so terrible a change; for every trace of beauty had been blotted out by war, and nobody who had known it in the past and came upon it suddenly would have recognized the place: when he was already there he would still have been looking for the City.

"Babylon, the great city, be thrown down with violence, and will not be found any longer" (Revelation 18:21). But "Jerusalem" is still there in eretz Israel now, right? Yes -- but it is no longer the great holy city. The New Jerusalem is the holy city, and its nature is spiritual. John 18:36 tells us that Jesus said:'

"My kingdom is not of this world: if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews: but now is my kingdom not from hence."

We're told the same in Revelation 21:2:

"And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband."

However...

• "international Jewry's" support, along with that of the "Gentile" elite, of global Communism and usurious Capitalism -- i.e, as opposed to fair and free trade, "Capitalism" which allows usury and fiat money. Communism and usurious Capitalism are not at odds with each other under their apparently contradictory surfaces, as both lead to an unjust amount power and wealth in the hands of the few. Note that inequality is a fact of nature; it's not unequal distribution in se that's problematic; it's the unfair natures of fiat currencies, usury, fractional reserve banking, cronyism, corporatism, etc., that make for inequality not based on merit, but which is derived from unjust schemes. At this point in History, we have cultural Marxism in terms of ethics, and usurious Capitalism in terms of economics -- the worst of both worlds;  
  

• the very nature of the anti-Christian, Pharisaic Talmudic religion, which is what modern "Judaism" is and which not only denies Christ, but reviles Him; 
  

• the neo-Judaizing of Christianity among many sects and the "Christian Zionist" idolizing of Eretz Israel, most often coupled with ridiculous anti-Catholic ideas ("the Crusades were horrible, unjust wars that prove 'Christian' aggression, "the Church has been out to get the Jews since the beginning," -- quite the opposite! -- "the Inquisition was about the Jews and the Church killed hundreds of thousands of them," "the Jewish Holocaust happened because of Catholicism," etc. See this site's On Jewish-Catholic Relations)

• This neo-Judaizing is manifest in the increased willingness of "Christians" to put aside the Gospel of Grace and succumb to the Law -- not even "the Old Testament Law," but the Pharisaic Talmudic interpretation of it, which includes the Noahide Laws. The Lubavitch and "Hebrew Roots" movements to which some "Christians" are in thrall would make the worship of Christ punishable by death. See also "Who is the Son of G-d?" (offsite link. Will open in new browser window)

• Jewish power over various media, economies, and governments -- especially the United States and Great Britain, the most powerful countries in the world;  
  

• the return of the Jews to Palestine -- accomplished not by some miracle of God as a blessing on the people who deny His Son, but by sheer political manipulation of the United States and Britain by Jewish bankers and Zionists, resulting in the Balfour Declaration;  
  

• the Jewish and Masonic efforts, aided by Protestant funding and energy, to rebuild the Temple that Christ tore down;
  

• the fact that Jews await a "Messiah" who will have an earthly kingdom, while the Church awaits the return of the true Messiah Who already came and Who was, is, and forever will be, ages unto ages, The Second Person of the Trinity Who took on flesh and became Jesus the Christ, Whose Kingdom is not of this world but which is to be reflected in the world through obedience to His Church and in considering Natural Law;  
  

• the aforementioned attacks against the Church from every corner -- attacks which leave the first possibility unlikely -- coupled with an appalling ignorance of the truth of relations between Jews and non-Jews over the centuries (e.g., knowledge of: the reasons for the expulsions from about every country they've ever lived, be they pagan, Christian, or otherwise; the effects of usury; the contents of the Talmud; the reasons for and true nature of the Spanish Inquisition; Jewish leadership's role in anti-Christian revolutionary and liberal movements and in the development and promulgation of Communism which slaughtered millions and millions of Christians from Russia to Poland to Mexico to Spain, etc.).
  
  This ignorance combined with anti-Catholic propaganda, false history, true Christian empathy for the Jewish people for their sufferings during the Shoah, and Jewish leadership's almost absolute inability to withstand any criticism or historical Truth as evident by their constant cries of "anti-semite!" -- an accusation that, given Jewish power over the media, amounts to a censorship that ultimately manipulates public opinion -- these things lead to the increasingly common, never challenged "Jews are always the innocent victim and the Church is and always has been evil" attitude.

• speak ex cathedra, that is, he, as pastor of the entire Church (not as private theologian, political figure, amateur scientist, celebrity, sports fan, all around good guy)
  

• clearly intend to define and does define a doctrine of faith or morals to be held by the entire Church.

The Truth of Catholic doctrine is just as true now as it was 2,000 years ago, no matter how badly it may be presented in our confusing times. Hang on to the Faith and never let hierarchs or bad presentations of the Faith keep you from Truth and the Sacraments. To learn more about the differences between authentic, traditional Catholicism and what you're likely to find in far too many purportedly Catholic parishes, see the page Traditional Catholicism 101.

Footnotes:
¹ According to the Talmud, Nero himself converted to post-Temple Judaism. Gittin 56a reads: "He [God] sent against them [Israel] Nero the Caesar. As Nero was coming he shot an arrow towards the east, and it fell in Jerusalem. He then shot one towards the west, and it again fell in Jerusalem. He shot toward all four points of the compass, and each time it fell in Jerusalem. He said to a certain boy, 'Repeat to me the last verse of Scripture that you have learned.' He said, ' I will wreak My vengeance on Edom through My people Israel.' Nero said, 'The Kadosh Barukh Hu [the Holy One] desires to lay waste His Temple and to lay the blame on me. So he ran away and converted to Judaism, and Rabbi Meir was descended from him.'" 

Further Reading

Book Link: The End : a Study of the Book of Revelation, by Scott Hahn
Book Link: Lamb's Supper : The Mass As Heaven on Earth. by Scott Hahn. Covers the liturgical aspects of the Apocalypse
Zionists Made Deal With the Devil fascinating article written by a self-described "assimilated Jew" (check out his entire website!)