The Antichrist 0: Introduction

For most of Christian history, Christians have been optimistic about the future here on earth. In his book The City of God, Augustine (400's) suggests that while the (political) kingdom of this world will more and more diminish, the reign of God will steadily take over the earth more and more. Most Christians up until the 1800's were what we today might call "postmillennial," taking an image from Revelation 20. Now is the reign of Christ in the world, and the final judgment is what is left to come.

In the early 1800's, an Irishman named John Darby gave rise to a movement that has had an immense impact on popular American Christian thought ever since. Countless little Christian groups have sprung up as they have pursued his approach to the Bible, helped along by the immensely popular Scofield Reference Bible of the early twentieth century. The movement is known as "dispensationalism," and it sees history as a series of eras leading up to the "end times" and the fulfilment of biblical prophecy.

Darby's scheme was ingenious. Daniel 9 speaks of a number of "weeks" until the anointed one comes. But then there is a "week" of great persecution mentioned as well. Darby dubbs this week the "Tribulation," and understands it to be a 7 year period during the end times, the "Great Tribulation" of Revelation 7:14.

He then merges together a figure from Revelation 13 and 17, the Beast, and calls this person the "Antichrist," using a term from 1 John. A major figure of evil will thus arise in the end times to oppose the people of God, the Antichrist. But Christians, he believed, would be snatched from the earth in a "secret rapture" just before the seven year Tribulation begins.

Darby's interpretation was a major force within the Zionism of the late 1800's and early 1900's. He believed that the nation of Israel would be restored as a nation in fulfilment of prophecy, and the Jerusalem temple would be rebuilt. Whether he was inspired or it became a self-fulfilling prophecy, Israel was restored as a nation in 1948, which fueled and reinforced the dispensationalist interpretation even more.

People believed that the last generation had arrived, in keeping with Mark 13:30. Understanding the restoration of Israel to be the budding of the fig tree, many believed that "this generation," the one living at that time, would "not pass away until all these things are fulfilled." Since a generation is traditionally understood to be 40 years, it is no surprise that a little booklet came out in 1988 entitled, "Eighty-Eight Reasons Why the Lord is Coming Back in 1988."

The way in which Darby and the later dispensationalists have woven Scripture together is amazing. The concrete impact of this one man's thinking is staggering. Millions of dollars have flowed to Israel. It is astounding just to think of the way in which this line of thought has probably impacted U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East on a subconscious level.

Christian denominations, colleges, and seminaries with major influence were founded in its train, places like Dallas Theological Seminary. Television shows, newsletters, best selling Christian novels have generated millions and millions of dollars following this train of thought. If you want to know what is going on in the world, watch one of these shows in the never-ending attempt to see whether something going on in the world might hint that the end is near.

Hal Lindsey's Late Great Planet Earth in the 1970's did it in the time of the Cold War with the Soviet Union. A slate of films like A Thief in the Night and A Distant Thunder followed. Tim LaHaye and Jerry Jenkins have written a series of best selling novels in more recent times. Each generation takes the current enemy number one and makes it the Antichrist or one of the players on his team. Is the Pope the Antichrist or Barack Obama? Will it be the Soviet Union or Iran that attacks Israel?

The next few posts (or rather, the previous ones :-) explore and unpack the key elements of the dispensationalist view, looking at the relevant Scriptures in their original contexts.