The Antichrist Through the Ages
Tim Appelo
Published on December 08, 2004

Dec. 8, 187 B.C. Syrian/Greek invader despot Antiochus IV butchers a pig on an altar to Zeus in the Temple. He calls himself "Epiphanes," or God/Zeus Made Flesh; Jewish comics dub him "Epimanes," or the Crazy Bastard. He inspires the proto-Antichrist in the Bible's book of Daniel.

Circa 64 A.D. Roman Emperor Nero...plays God, blames Christians for Rome's fire, and has them covered with beast skins and devoured by dogs. He inspires the Beast in Revelation. Possibly, Christians got blamed because they believed Rome's burning would herald Christ's return—some may have rejoiced, arousing suspicion. [Nothing new under the sun indeed!! --kc]

Third Century Church father Origen interprets Revelation, and perhaps prophesies Bush press conferences by defining the Antichrist as "every word that pretends to be the truth when it is not."

Circa 950 Millennium fever propels the first Apocalypse best seller, Adso of Montier-En-Der 's Letter on the Origin and Time of the Antichrist, popularizing the idea of the Beast as the Final Tyrant who seizes Jerusalem, tortures and desecrates holy places, and dies on the very spot where Christ ascended to heaven.

1200s Pope Innocent III calls for a Crusade, and thinks maybe Muhammad is the Antichrist.

1520 At first, Luther pooh-poohs Revelation: "Christ is not known or taught in it." Then he decides it reveals the pope as "the true Antichrist."

Late 1500s Luther's followers insist there are two Antichrists: the pope and the Turk.

1869 Philadelphia pastor Joseph Seiss says Napoleon III is the Antichrist.

1840s John Nelson Darby creates "dispensational premillennialism," recasting biblical apocalypse literature as a secret code now revealed to us by him. Bush fundamentalists—and very possibly Bush himself—base their whole lives on this unholy scripture. [this was labelled as heresy and condemned by churches at the time. Guess those 19th century preachers/followers were better educated in the Bible and/or critical thinking than many of todays' preachers/follwers.-kc]

1970s to '80s Hal Lindsey, author of the Revelation best seller The Late Great Planet Earth, proposes Khomeini, Sadat, and Arafat as Antichrist candidates.

1982 Prophecy teacher Mary Steart Relfe nominates Kissinger, Sadat, Pope John Paul II, and Juan Carlos of Spain, but decides Sadat is the real Antichrist.

1988 Robert Faid notes that his funny forehead obviously reveals Gorbachev has the Mark of the Beast.

1999 Jerry Falwell says the Antichrist is a Jewish male alive today.

In two millennia of playing "Pin-the-Tail-on-the-Antichrist" (as author Jonathan Kirsch characterizes it in A History of the End of the World), no one has ever won the prize. Either the game is rigged, or those playing it don't have a clue.

If it [Obama=AC] wasn't intended as a political smear -- and we have no way of knowing, admittedly, what the true motivation of its author was -- we are entitled at the very least to conclude that this whisper campaign identifying Obama with the Antichrist is based in ignorance and fear. Ignorance, because the author knows next to nothing about the Biblical underpinnings of his or her claims (including the proper title of the Book of Revelation). Fear, because the author willingly foregoes reason for superstitious terror.

So Hitler was born exactly on 13 degrees East. It is Revelation 13 that is about the Antichrist. So 13 (as in Friday the 13th), and 666 are numbers connected with the Antichrist. And if you take the cosine of Hitler's birthplace coordinate of 48.25 N you have .666. This means that if the earth's radius is assumed to be 1, then at Hitler's birthplace the distance to the polar axis is .666. Also, note that Hitler was born on Easter, a fact that he saw as a sign of his destiny.

Beginning with World War 1's beginning, about August 1, 1914, if you advance in intervals of 666 days:

3 x 666 days Jan., 1920. On January 10, 1920, the League of Nations was formed.
5 x 666: Sept. 1923. On September 1, 1923, an 8.9 earthquake struck Japan, devastating the Tokyo area.
On November 8, 1923, Hitler's attempt to overthrow the Republican government was unsuccessful, but turned out to be a critical event in his rise to power in Germany. His trial and nine month imprisonment gained him fame, and he used this time to write his book. Note that five is a number associated with Satan-- the pentagon being a Satanic symbol, which certainly fits here.
10 x 666: Oct. 1932. In October 1932, Stalin was consolidating his hold on power in the Soviet Union by purging the competition, and the world was sliding into the Great Depression.
11 x 666: Aug. 1934. On August 2, 1934, with the death of Hindenburg, Hitler assumed the title of "Fuhrer", making himself absolute dictator of Germany.
12 x 666: June 1936. On July 31, 1936, Civil War began in Spain.
13 x 666: Apr., 1938. In March 1938, Austria was annexed by Hitler's Germany. Thirteen is considered to be an unlucky number, and Revelation 13 is about the Beast, the Antichrist. This was certainly an unlucky time in world history-- it was the year when Hitler's plans for expansion became clear, and it became obvious that Europe was headed for war, and indeed the red horsemen, war, was soon riding.

I think the scary stuff, Kevin, is when people in power take this stuff seriously and take it upon themselves to bring about the conditions which might herald the end of the world as interpreted through an unsound (not to mention unscholarly) doctrine. People precipitating a cataclysm because they believe it is predicted and a sign of the end of the world?? That is the scary part.

My word, Ken - that is some scary stuff you've turned up! I'm just amazed at how baffling all this pin-the-tail-on-the-Anti-Christ stuff is to me, even though these folks and I call ourselves Christians. Predicting the end of the world is just not a part of my experience.