He is in the news just about every day. He is talked about often on this forum. If you cannot recognize him, examine your conscience using a traditional list of sins, confess your sins with heartfelt contrition to a traditional Catholic priest, and pray that the Holy Spirit will reveal the Antichrist to you. Here is a description of him from Hildegard von Bingen (Doctor of the Church): Description of the Antichrist in St. Hildegard von Bingen (1173 AD) The Antichrist will indeed be infused by the devil when he opens his mouth to teach perversity, as described above. He will destroy all that God established with the ancient and the new law, and he will assert that sexual immorality and other like things are not sins at all. For he will claim that it is not a sin if flesh heats up flesh, just as it is not a sin if a person warms himself by the fire. He will also assert that all commandments concerning chastity were made in ignorance, for since one person may be hot but another cold, they ought to moderate one another with their heat and cold. And again he will say to the faithful, “Your law of sexual restraint was established contrary to the way of nature. Is a person not supposed to be hot, when his very breath is a fire that kindles his whole body? How could he keep his cool when it’s against his nature? Conversely, what reason could a person have to refuse to offer warmth to another’s flesh? For that man who you say is your master gave you a law that goes beyond measure when he bid you to live in such a way. But I say, embrace these two paths of hot and cold, and keep each other in your warm embrace? Consider that the man just mentioned gave you unjust commands, for despite his order that people not embrace one another with such warmth, they still maintained the nature of their flesh. So see here and do not be misled any longer by an unjust teaching, for with me you get to do whatever you want or not. Your master did not set before you correct propositions; he wanted you to be like a spirit that is unbound by the flesh and cannot physically do anything. But that’s not how naturally-born human flesh was created; rather its flooded and formed by fire, because if human children weren’t created in that way, they wouldn’t be capable of physical action. So know then what you really are! For your first teacher deceived you and didn’t help you in anything. But I inspire you really to learn about yourselves and to know what you are, for I created you, and I am completely in all things. In assigning all his works to another, meanwhile, that one spoke nothing on his own because he couldn’t do anything on his own. But I speak for myself, and I can do all things by myself.” With these words and others like them, that wretched son of perdition will mislead people, teaching them to live according to the flesh’s fiery appetite and to achieve their flesh’s every want--despite the fact that both the old and the new law encourage humans to chastity in such a way that chastity does not surpass its proper measure. The Fathers of the Church, Mediaeval Continuation, Volume 18. St. Hildegard Von Bingen, The Book of Divine Works. Pages 466-467, Part III, Vision 5, Chapter 30 (in part). An alternative translation can be found online here: https://sufipathoflove.files.wordpress.com/2019/12/liber-divinorum-operum-.pdf, page 236.
I believe there are many, many anti-Christs in this period of history of the lesser tribulation. But the anti-Christ comes towards the end of time. Watch that you do not be deceived.
Here is a breakdown of Desmond Birch's timeline (His book Trial & Tribulation & Triumph was first published 1997 I think). To put it simply we are in the Minor or Lesser Triblation, which will be followed by an era of peace and then comes the Great Tribulation with the rise of the anti-christ and the end of the world. Minor Chastisement or Tribulation (conditional, and mostly part of approved private revelations, such as Fatima, Lourdes, Betania, and Sallette) Western Church scourged with heresy Civil wars in Italy and France, then England Famine, pestilence, natural disasters Muslim ascendency Russia invades Europe Pope flees Rome, is murdered Great saint elected Pope, helps bring great military leader to ascendancy Military leader defeats all enemies, including Russians and Muslims Interior illumination from Jesus (Betania) Age of Peace (Age of the Holy Spirit & Mary, details from public and private revelation) Time of normalcy for repentance (2 Thess 2:7; Matt. 24:37-39; Luke 17:26-30) Establishment of New Roman Empire, new Pax Romana (Dan. 2) Restoration of Catholic faith and practice over whole earth (2 Thess 2:3, 7; Matt 24:37-39; Luke 17:26-30 – the great apostasy presupposes a great generalization) Reunion of Christians and fullness of the Gentiles Pope calls Ecumenical Council that settles Scripture People prosper, Church prospers, faith prospers People grow lax Universal apostasy (2 Thess. 2:2-3) which facilitates rise of final Antichrist Major Chastisement or Great Tribulation (mostly public revelation) Ten kingdoms of new HRE dismantled, three are crushed (Dan. 7-8) False prophet comes to power, prepares way for supreme and final Antichrist (Rev. 13) 3 ½ year reign of supreme Antichrist, severe persecution of Christians, many say he will be Jewish from tribe of Dan (Gen 49:17, Jer 8:16) – his entire visibility will be seven years (Dan 7:25, Rev 13:5) “Two Witnesses,” possibly Enoch and Elijah, preach Gospel throughout earth (Rev. 11) Mass conversion of Jews after conversion of nations (Rom. 11) Antichrist murders two witnesses who are resurrected (Rev 11) Antichrist attempts “ascension” (Dan 8:25, Is 14) Death of Antichrist by St. Michael the Archangel (Is 14, Rev 12) “Immediately after” (Matt 24:29), three days of darkness and the Parousia! Antichrist shall be destroyed by the brightness of Christ’s coming (2 Thess 2:8). CCC 568-573, Resurrection of the Dead and Judgment, New Heaven and New Earth (Rev. 20-21)
I have a feeling that the Antichrist will appear as a "higher" form of human, such as an alien, to enthrall the whole world and as such he will teach the world what he says are the true origens of life, and with his extreme knowledge and powers, of course the whole world will believe him, except of course the few faithful who believe in Jesus Christ, who was born to testify to the Truth and who died a horrible death to prove He loves us, and of course was raised to Eternal Glory. But how many will still believe in our Lord in the face of this beautiful, enthralling new being of "light" who appears....? I know many Catholics myself who would drop the Lord in the face of this kind of new evidence.... I think the demons have been "preparing" us for years for the possibility of aliens and a higher form of life that will help the world understand ourselves better and bring "peace"
Yes, agree. This is just a feeling, but I can see it is possible. The demons have truly been "preparing" us.
Well, it matters little which scenario is correct; I have lived 6 decades and I know of only 2 relatives (1 on each side of the family) who have lived to see 80. Sometimes it is all in the genes! Life is short.
Yes. And eternity is long. In the end I think it boils down to this. Keep your eyes on Jesus and stay faithful. Pray for the light to remain in Christ no matter what the times are.
someone considers that this character from Islamic traditions could be the second beast of the apocalypse (which has 2 horns of a lamb)?
Dhu al-Qarnayn, (Arabic: ذُو ٱلْقَرْنَيْن, romanized: Ḏū l-Qarnayn, IPA: [ðuː‿l.qarnajn]; lit. "He of the Two Horns") appears in the Quran, Surah Al-Kahf (18), Ayahs 83–101 as one who travels to east and west and sets up a barrier between a certain people and Gog and Magog (called Ya'juj and Ma'juj).[1] Elsewhere the Quran tells how the end of the world will be signaled by the release of Gog and Magog from behind the barrier. Other apocalyptic writings predict that their destruction by God in a single night will usher in the Day of Resurrection (Yawm al-Qiyāmah).[2] Dhu al-Qarnayn building a wall with the help of Jinn to keep away Gog and Magog. Persian miniature from a book of Falnama copied for the Safavid Shah Tahmasp I (r. 1524–1576), currently preserved in the Chester Beatty Library, Dublin. Early Muslim commentators and historians variously identified Dhu al-Qarnayn,[3] most notably as Alexander the Great and as the South-Arabian Himyarite king al-Ṣaʿb bin Dhī Marāthid.[4] Some modern scholars have argued that the origin of the Quranic story may be found in the Syriac Alexander Legend,[5] but others disagree.[6][7] Although some favor identification of Dhu al-Qarnayn with Cyrus the Great,[8] the majority of modern scholars and Islamic commentators still identify him with Alexander the Great.[9]
Quran 18:83-101Edit The Caspian Gates in Derbent, Russia, part of the defence systems built by the Sassanid Persians, often identified with the Gates of Alexander. 5:46 Recitation of al-Kahf, verses 83-101 The story of Dhu al-Qarnayn is related in Surah 18 of the Quran, al-Kahf ("The Cave") revealed to Muhammad when his tribe, Quraysh, sent two men to discover whether the Jews, with their superior knowledge of the scriptures, could advise them on whether Muhammad was a true prophet of God. The rabbis told them to ask Muhammad about three things, one of them "about a man who travelled and reached the east and the west of the earth, what was his story". "If he tells you about these things, then he is a prophet, so follow him, but if he does not tell you, then he is a man who is making things up, so deal with him as you see fit." (Verses 18:83-98). The verses of the chapter reproduced below show Dhu al-Qarnayn traveling first to the Western edge of the world where he sees the sun set in a muddy spring, then to the furthest East where he sees it rise from the ocean, and finally northward to a place in the mountains where he finds a people oppressed by Gog and Magog: (...). Gog and MagogEdit Cyril Glassé writes the following with regard to the name "He of the two horns": [...] it also has a symbolical interpretation: “He of the two Ages”, which reflects the eschatological shadow that Alexander casts from his time, which preceded Islam by many centuries, until the end of the world. The Arabian word qarn means both “horn” and “period” or “century”.[10] Modern Islamic apocalyptic writers put forward various explanations for the absence of the wall from the modern world, some saying that the Mongols were Gog and Magog and that the barrier has now disappeared, others that Gog and Magog are still present but invisible to human eyes :[11] ...[T]he geography of the world is known, but despite this advance this "Barrier" [Quran 18:94] is not heard of ... The answer is that not everything in existence can be seen.(Abd al-Azim al-Khilfa, 1996) Later literatureEdit Dhu al-Qarnayn the traveller was a favourite subject for later writers. In one of many Arabic and Persian versions of the meeting of Alexander with the Indian sages. The Persian Sunni mystic and theologian Al-Ghazali (Abū Ḥāmid Muḥammad ibn Muḥammad al-Ghazālī, 1058–1111) wrote of how Dhu al-Qarnayn came across a people who had no possessions but dug graves at the doors of their houses; their king explained that they did this because the only certainty in life is death. Ghazali's version later made its way into the Thousand and One Nights.[12] The Sufi poet Rumi (Jalāl ad-Dīn Muhammad Rūmī, 1207-1273), perhaps the most famous of medieval Persian poets, described Dhu al-Qarnayn's eastern journey. The hero ascends Mount Qaf, the "mother" of all other mountains, which is made of emerald and forms a ring encircling the entire Earth with veins under every land. At Dhu al-Qarnayn's request the mountain explains the origin of earthquakes: when God wills, the mountain causes one of its veins to throb, and thus an earthquake results. Elsewhere on the great mountain Dhu al-Qarnayn meets Israfil (the archangel Raphael), standing ready to blow the trumpet on the Day of Judgement.[13] The Malay-language Hikayat Iskandar Zulkarnain traces the ancestry of several Southeast Asian royal families, such as the Sumatra Minangkabau royalty,[14] from Iskandar Zulkarnain,[15] through Raja Rajendra Chola (Raja Suran, Raja Chola) in the Malay Annals.[16][17][18]
People identified as Dhu al-QarnaynEdit Alexander the GreatEdit Silver tetradrachm of Alexander the Great shown wearing the horns of the ram-god Zeus-Ammon. Main article: Theories about Alexander the Great in the Quran According to some historians, the story of Dhu al-Qarnayn has its origins in legends of Alexander the Great current in the Middle East, namely the Syriac Alexander Legend.[5] The Scythians, the descendants of Magog, once defeated one of Alexander's generals, upon which Alexander built a wall in the Caucasus mountains to keep them out of civilised lands (the basic elements are found in Flavius Josephus). The legend went through much further elaboration in subsequent centuries before eventually finding its way into the Quran through a Syrian version.[19] However, the supposed influence of the Syriac Legend on the Quran has been questioned based on dating inconsistencies and missing key motifs.[20][7] While the Syriac Legend references the horns of Alexander, it consistently refers to the hero by his Greek name, not using a variant epithet.[21] The use of the Islamic epithet Dhu al-Qarnayn, the "two-horned", first occurred in the Quran.[22] The reasons behind the name "Two-Horned" are somewhat obscure: the scholar al-Tabari (839-923 CE) held it was because he went from one extremity ("horn") of the world to the other,[23] but it may ultimately derive from the image of Alexander wearing the horns of the ram-god Zeus-Ammon, as popularised on coins throughout the Hellenistic Near East.[24] The wall Dhu al-Qarnayn builds on his northern journey may have reflected a distant knowledge of the Great Wall of China (the 12th century scholar al-Idrisi drew a map for Roger of Sicily showing the "Land of Gog and Magog" in Mongolia), or of various Sassanid Persian walls built in the Caspian area against the northern barbarians, or a conflation of the two.[25] Dhu al-Qarnayn also journeys to the western and eastern extremities ("qarns", tips) of the Earth.[26] Ernst claims that Dhu al-Qarnayn finding the sun setting in a "muddy spring" in the West is equivalent to the "poisonous sea" found by Alexander in the Syriac legend. In the Syriac story Alexander tested the sea by sending condemned prisoners into it, but the Quran allegedly changes this into a general administration of justice. In the East both the Syrian legend and the Quran, according to Ernst, have Alexander/Dhu al-Qarnayn find a people who live so close to the rising sun that they have no protection from its heat.[27] Since Dhu al-Qarnayn is said to have lived near the time of Abraham, several medieval exegetes and historians did not identify him with Alexander to avoid the chronological discrepancy.[28] Other notable Muslim commentators, including Ibn Kathir,[29]:100-101 Ibn Taymiyyah[29]:101[30] and Naser Makarem Shirazi,[31] have also used theological arguments to reject the Alexander identification: that Alexander lived only a short time, whereas Dhu al-Qarnayn (according to some) lived for 700 years as a sign of God's blessing, though this is not mentioned in the Quran; Dhu al-Qarnayn worshipped only one God, while Alexander according to them was a polytheist, a view however rejected by some traditional Muslim scholars who identify him as Dhu al-Qarnayn.[32]
King Ṣaʿb Dhu-MarāthidEdit The various campaigns of Dhu al-Qarnayn mentioned in Q:18:83-101 have also been attributed to the South Arabian Himyarite King Ṣaʿb Dhu-Marāthid (also known as al-Rāʾid).[33][34] According to Wahb ibn Munabbih, as quoted by Ibn Hisham,[35] King Ṣaʿb was a conqueror who was given the epithet Dhu al-Qarnayn after meeting al-Khidr in Jerusalem. He then travels to the ends of the earth, conquering or converting people until being led by al-Khidr through the land of darkness.[36] According to Wheeler, it is possible that some elements of these accounts that were originally associated with Sa'b have been incorporated into stories which identify Dhu al-Qarnayn with Alexander.[37] Cyrus the GreatEdit The relief of a winged genie, or according to some scholars, Cyrus the Great, in Pasargadae. The two horns of the Hemhem crown have been related to the name "Dhu al-Qarnayn". In modern times, some Muslim scholars have argued in favour of Dhu al-Qarnayn being actually Cyrus the Great, the founder of the Achaemenid Empire and conqueror of Persia and Babylon. Proponents of this view cite Daniel's vision in the Old Testament where he saw a two-horned ram that represents "the kings of Media and Persia" (Daniel 8:20).[36] Archeological evidence cited includes the Cyrus Cylinder, which portrays Cyrus as a worshipper of the Babylonian god Marduk, who ordered him to rule the world and establish justice in Babylon. The cylinder states that idols that Nabonidus had brought to Babylon from various other Babylonian cities were reinstalled by Cyrus in their former sanctuaries and ruined temples reconstructed. Supported with other texts and inscriptions, Cyrus appears to have initiated a general policy of permitting religious freedom throughout his domains.[38][39][40] A famous relief on a palace doorway pillar in Pasagardae depicts a winged figure wearing a Hemhem crown (a type of ancient Egyptian crown mounted on a pair of long spiral ram's horns). Some scholars take this to be a depiction of Cyrus due to an inscription that was once located above it,[41][42] though most see it as a tutelary genie, or protective figure and note that the same inscription was also written on other palaces in the complex.[43][44][45] This theory was proposed in 1855 by the German philologist G. M. Redslob, but it did not gain followers in the west.[46] Among Muslim commentators, it was first promoted by Sayyed Ahmad Khan (d. 1889),[40] then by Maulana Abul Kalam Azad,[31][47] and generated wider acceptance over the years.[8] Wheeler accepts the possibility but points out the absence of such a theory by classical Muslim commentators.[36] OthersEdit Other persons who either were identified with the Quranic figure or given the title Dhu al-Qarnayn: Afrīqish al-Ḥimyarī, king of Himyar. Al-Biruni in his book, The Remaining Signs of Past Centuries, listed a number of figures whom people thought to be Dhu al-Qarnayn. He favoured the opinion that Dhu al-Qarnayn was the Yamani prince Afrīqish, who conquered the Mediterranean and established a city called Afrīqiah. He was called Dhu al-Qarnayn because he ruled the lands of the rising and setting sun. To support his argument, al-Biruni cited Arabic onomastics, noting that compound names beginning with Dhū, such as Dhū Nuwās and Dhū Yazan, were common among the kings of Himyar.[48] Fereydun. According to al-Tabari's Tarikh, some say Dhu al-Qarnayn the Elder (al-akbar), who lived in the era of Abraham, was the mythical Persian king Fereydun, who al-Tabari rendered as Afrīdhūn ibn Athfiyān.[49] Imru'l-Qays (died 328 CE), a prince of the Lakhmids of southern Mesopotamia, an ally first of Persia and then of Rome, celebrated in romance for his exploits.[50] Messiah ben Joseph, a fabulous military saviour expected by Yemenite Jews.[51] Darius the Great.[52] Kisrounis, Parthian king.[53][3]
Luan, I agree with Fr Gobbi, when he said that there are three eras’s that have prepared mankind for the Antichrist of Revelations. The first era was with Mohammad, the second was during the Reformation (Protestantism), and the last one is the one we are living through today. The era of humanism (the denial of God).
Yes, I remember that he mentioned Islam as the precursor religion of the Antichrist, but this eschatological figure of Islam caught my attention because some Muslims identify him as King Cyrus the Great (who wore a crown with ram's horns), the second beast of apocalypse has 2 horns of a lamb (a ram is a lamb in the adult phase when it acquires the two horns), cyrus is a figure dear to the 4 monotheistic religions of the Middle East: he was of the religion of Zoroaster, but for the jews he abolished captivity Babylonian and allowed the rebuilding of the temple, some Islamists suggest that he is the Dhu al-Qarnayn, and according to the prophecies of the syncretist religion monotheistic Baha'i faith there will arise a righteous king in iran who will rule with peace and justice and will cease the persecution against them.
Cyrus the Great is remembered as a great humanist because he allowed the religious and cultural freedom of the conquered peoples. In addition, he is attributed with the first written declaration of human rights (cyrus cylinder), just as King Cyrus conquered Babylon and proclaimed himself King of her and the world, the Second Beast can rebuild ancient Babylon and make the seat of his reign fulfilling the prophecies of the apocalypse that speak of the rebuilding of the city.
Look forward. Babylon may not necessarily be THE Babylon. It may be China, USA, Israel, or Rome, etc. What man has a background that entails all 3 era’s today?
Luan, Fr Gobbi mentioned Islam only “as the first attack against Christ as a historical period. The second historical period that attacked the Church was the triumph of rationalism in the XIII century, by which reason took the place of faith - a reason which wants to interpret everything, even the word of God. From here stemmed the division of the Church, with all the Protestant sects which were formed. And lastly, the greatest attack takes place in this century - which has reached the point of denying God. Atheism which has spread throughout humanity.” At the end of this historical period, Fr Gobbi said, - “there will be also the manifestation of the Antichrist as a person. However, as a person, he will not come suddenly, but rather his coming will be the fruit made ripe by all this historical context which has prepared it.” So the Antichrist is a man who will be against Christ, the Church, and God. To me he sounds like a communist.
