Antichrist (theology)

"The coming of the lawless one will be accompanied by the working of Satan, with every kind of power, sign, and false wonder, and with every wicked deception directed against those who are perishing"

- 2 Thessalonians 2:9-10 The Antichrist (erroneously spelled as Anti-Christ), is an end times false messiah who, as the name suggests, is the complete opposite and ultimate enemy of Jesus Christ.

He is part of the Unholy Trinity, which consists of himself, Satan and the False Prophet and makes a prominent appearance in the Book of Revelation in the Bible. The identity of the Antichrist (so far) is mysterious. However, he's often depicted as a charismatic dictator wielding powers of darkness and destruction in the end times.

He is considered to be the second most evil character in the Bible after Satan. However, considering that he was able to unleash havoc and horrendous persecution upon humanity much more freely than Satan, he may be on par in terms of evilness, if not, even worse.

Rule of the Antichrist
It is not known whether the Antichrist will make himself known to everyone before or after the Rapture, an event where millions of Christians worldwide will suddenly be raised into the air to meet with God, but the Scripture indicates that he shall rise to power after the Rapture, initiating a 7 year period known as the Tribulation.

The Antichrist will use his charisma to convince humanity that he will bring world peace and later signs a 7 year covenant with Israel, promising to defend the nation at all costs. He will also establish a powerful one world empire through military force (a.k.a. the Mystery Babylon) which is the revived Roman Empire. From this place, a harlot church is created and is led by the False Prophet, the leader of the ecumenical and apostate one world religious system and the right hand of the Antichrist. The harlot church will persecute those who have placed their faith in Jesus Christ and behead them for their testimony.

In the midpoint of the Tribulation, a Jewish temple will be established on Temple Mount, Israel and many Jews will make sacrifices in this temple but the Antichrist will later ban these sacrifices. The Antichrist later betrays Israel, breaking the 7 year covenant and invades the nation. The invasion will lead the citizens of Israel to repent to God. After that, he will be assassinated but is resurrected a couple of days later and unsatisifed with his empire, he burns the harlot church down and seeks to demand worship from all of humanity. Meanwhile, two witnesses will prophesy on the streets of Jerusalem, calling for humanity to repent, but after 1260 days, the Antichrist will kill them and leave their bloodied bodies on the street. However, they are revived 3 and a half days later and are taken to Heaven, much to everyone's shock. In the heavens, Satan and his demons wage war against the archangel Michael and his angels and after the defeat, Satan falls down onto the Earth and realisiing the limited amount of time he has left, he seeks to cause as much damge on Earth and achieve something which he always wanted since the beginning- humanity to worship him as god.

Satan possesses the Antichrist, where he will set images of himself on the temple of Temple Mount and demand the entire world to worship as a god. The False Prophet will perform many satanic miracles and wonders such as bringing fire down from Heaven to convince everyone that he is the messiah. The Antichrist will command everyone that in order to worship him, they must take the mark of the Beast on their foreheads or hands or otherwise, they won't be able to buy and sell goods. Those who do not the take the mark of the Beast are horribly persecuted in a worldwide genocide committed by the Antichrist and Jews will also be the targets of this genocide, which will possibly be worse than the Holocaust. As a result, the people of Israel will cry out for Jesus Christ to return.

During the final years of the Tribulation, the Antichrist and the False Prophet will lead many nations to wage a global war in the Battle of the Armageddon, which coincides with the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. As soon as Jesus Christ and His heavenly armies appear in the heavens, which consist of angels, saved Christians and those who were raptured, the Antichrist and his armies immediately fire at them and attack them. Jesus proceeds to send fire from His mouth in time, destroying the majority of the Antichrist's armies. The Antichrist and the False Prophet are thrown into the Lake of Fire, where they are tormented by the fires for eternity and Satan is locked up in a bottomless pit for 1000 years as Jesus establishes His Millennial Kingdom on Earth, where the world will be free of corruption and sin for 1000 years.

Trivia

 * The harlot church is symbolised as the Whore of Babylon, a demonic creature which consists of a prostitute, whose full title is Babylon the Great, the Mother of Prostitutes and Abominations of the Earth, riding on top of a seven headed beast whilst drinking the blood of martyred saints in a golden cup. The name suggests the spiritual adultery committed by the nations in league with the Antichrist or possibly the overall pervesion and moral and sexual degenerancy in the Antichrist's empire.
 * Many historical figures have been accused of being the Antichrist such as Nero, Adolf Hitler, Joseph Stalin and more recently, Barack Obama and Kim Jong Un.
 * Some conspiracy theories predict that the Antichrist will be an Illuminati member and the leader of the New World Order, the one world empire of the Antichrist.
 * The Mark of the Beast is often thought to be an RFID chip or a "special" barcode that is tattooed on an individual's body, allowing them to buy and sell goods with convenience.
 * If the Antichrist were to rule the world today, he would wage a war that'll claim about 1.5 billion lives, about 1/4 of the current population. Even so, the body count might be even higher as he additionally persecuted and killed other people during his reign, mostly believers.

In Popular Culture

 * The Antichrist is also a popular figure in fiction, undoubtably the most famous of all Antichrists in fiction is Damien Thorn - the antagonist of The Omen and its sequels: The idea of the Antichrist as a real figure continues to both terrify and fascinate many people around the world though some people have begun to question whether or not the Antichrist is a threat that awaits humanity, a threat that has already passed or even a metaphor rather than a literal being.
 * Anthony Horowitz said in interviews that Chaos, the King of the Old Ones in Power of Five is the Antichrist, and that Chaos is based on the Antichrist from The Book of Revelation, as is nearly the whole series of Power of Five.
 * Sauron is quite simply a literal Antichrist. Morgoth is Satan. Sauron performs many of the acts of the Antichrist, that he opposes and murders many Elves, God's chosen people, which provokes God to send the Istari wizards to Earth to defeat him. Sauron is very deceptive like the Antichrist and he is also a political figure because he was in Morgoth's government in his rule.
 * Palpatine from Star Wars is the Antichrist of the fictional sci fi franchise. Born from the Dark Side, he became the political leader of the galaxy and staged one of its deadliest conflicts to keep himself in power.
 * Lord Voldemort also serves as the Antichrist throughout the Harry Potter series. He also takes over the English government, becoming a key political figure in the wizarding world and he corrupts many politicians to follow his rule.
 * Earl Gundy is the Antichrist in the 2014 comedy film Rapture Palooza, who has possessed a governor in the United States by the name of Earl. Quickly Earl begins proclaiming himself to be the Beast and will only answer to this name. He seeks vengeance on God and he is prepared for Jesus' arrival by the laser cannon he dubs the "You Know Who Buster." This version of the Antichrist is unusual in that the Antichrist and Satan are the same being, just more advanced versions of the same.
 * Satan is attempting to conceive the Antichrist by the Antichrist's destined mother, Christine, in the Schwarzenegger film End of Days. He possesses a banker to use as his vessel to conceive Christine's Antichrist child and uses him to carry out his destiny on Earth and converts followers. A prophecy says that Satan can only be unleashed from Hell every millennium. In the end he is defeated when he possesses Jericho Cane and fails to conceive the Antichrist and is sent back to Hell.
 * One of the best versions in Japanese animation is Isaac Ray Peram Westcott from Date A Live - he is the real enemy of mankind and the true enemy of God, the desire to Westcott is use the power of Spirits ("the Divine Creations of God") in their Inverse Form of the Qliphoth Tree to plunge the whole world in endless chaos, despair, panic, destruction, fear and drown the entire world in blood.
 * And another of the most popular multi-media franchises is Makuta Teridax from BIONICLE. Teridax himself was a cybernetic version of Lucifer himself, he is also considered as an enemy of God as he seeks to rain the entire universe in darkness and chaos.
 * Wilhelm from Xenosaga is the Antichrist in video game history. His goal is to brainwash and deceive all humanity with false Christianity and religion in general. He even has many alias that describe him like Cardinal Heinlein, head of Hyams, and Ormus Patriarch.
 * Nicolae Carpathia is the Antichrist in the Left Behind series. After 3 days when he is mortally wounded, he is risen by Satan, who immediately indwells him. His false prophet, Leon Forunato, eventually makes people who are loyal to them, take the infamous Mark of the Beast.