I am still inquiring as to Antichrist, but I had not overlooked the difficulties. It has been taken for granted among those who expect a personal Antichrist, that he is the civil head of the Roman empire. This I question. Without doubting in the least that there will be such a blasphemous Gentile power, it seems to me that the Antichrist is another power, of which the scriptures are even more full; the vessel of evil, religious energy, rather than that of evil public government. At least, two such manifestations of power we find in Rev. 13, for the second is a beast, as well as the first; that is, there is a second temporal power co-existent with the public imperial power, which has the throne of Satan. The first beast had risen, like previous beasts, out of the sea, that is, out of the tumultuous floating mass of population-the Gentile world. But the second beast came out of the earth, that is, out of the formed arrangement of God's moral providence-the sphere where the dragon and the beast were worshipped, and all heavenly association was blasphemed. In form of power, this second beast was like the Lamb; but his speech was like the dragon, or great hostile power of Satan: a religious, though blasphemous, character of evil at work within he sphere where Satan rules. Such a relationship will be found to be Jewish. It is the religion of the earth, not of the dwellers in heaven, and is Jewish in character-a power in the earth ostensibly connected with divine things, falsely, and verified in the sight of men by the exhibition of judicial power as of God. Rev. 19 speaks of the second beast, as the false prophet.
The Antichrist is not spoken of by name, save in the Epistles of John, where his character is religious, not secular-apostate and heretical activity against the person and glory of Christ and the essential doctrines of Christianity. He denies the Father and the Son. He does not confess Jesus Christ come in the flesh. He denies that Jesus is the Christ, which seems rather Jewish in its connection and evil, rather than the denial of the revelation which constitutes Christianity. Antichrist, in a word, is characterized by religious energies of evil in connection with Christianity and Judaism.
In 2 Thess. 2 it is a wicked religious, and not a mere secular power which is spoken of-its impious, then its seductive, character. Verse 4 is moral opposition and insult to God, rather than the object of deference, who was publicly on Satan's throne. It is the active personage, with Judas' title, who opposes all divine authority-the man of sin showing himself as though he were God; the contrast of Christ, who was God, and yet was the man of obedience. His presence too is according to the energy of Satan; and as Christ in truth of righteousness to such as should be saved, so he in deceit of unrighteousness to such as should be lost.
In Dan. 11:3636And the king shall do according to his will; and he shall exalt himself, and magnify himself above every god, and shall speak marvellous things against the God of gods, and shall prosper till the indignation be accomplished: for that that is determined shall be done. (Daniel 11:36), etc., is the king, and he shall exalt himself and magnify himself above every god, etc.; that is, we have the same qualities and acts, and yet he honors the God of forces, and honors and increases with joy a strange god. So that it would seem that the haughty rejection of the true God and self-exaltation is not inconsistent with being servant of a false one, really slave to the enemy-an old lesson learned all through human nature, and never learned. Self-exaltation is not supremacy. I apprehend, or am inclined to think, that this self-exaltation will be, specially in result, in Judea against God; but my difficulty lies just there, because in Dan. 7 the little horn seeks to change times and laws (that is, I apprehend, the Jewish order), and this looks like the power of the Antichrist, while the little horn there is uncommonly like the first beast (that is, its last head). The difficulty is in apportioning the parts where both work together. The process seems natural, painful to say, the apostasy denying the Father and the Son, and that Jesus is the Christ. This throws them on Judaism (which was always the mystery of iniquity in principle), and thus on Antichrist, who at last throws off all in self-exaltation, and makes them, during the last half-week, worship a strange god, and the tribulation takes place. It seems to me that the deepest troubles in the Psalms (I do not speak of the cross) come from what has a Jewish character, not an open enemy, but a companion or familiar friend, ungodliness and strife in the city. The self-exaltation is moral character, not public power unless in his own sphere. This self-exaltation would be his own apostate setting up in Judea; but, finding it convenient for himself, and it being the work of Satan, he forces all to recognize the Roman Emperor, which for Jews is apostasy. It would be the old Josephus' question, save that saints who flee or bow take the place of sicarii. It is a kind of suzeraineté. This false Christ in the east making head in the interest of the western emperor against all, and deceiving the Jews by satanic power in the east, he wields all the power of the empire; he joins the recognition of the western emperor to the satanic deception of the Jews, his own people probably. The little horn of Dan. 7 certainly seems the more general power, which, while local (like Bonaparte, in France), governs the whole beast.