Hi Wormwood, I wrote the following a while ago in response to some claiming that the a/c must be moslem but it also offers my take on the a/c in general.
I don’t believe that Islam will be the vehicle of the antichrist. They will, in fact, ultimately go to war against each other. The
anti in antichrist does not mean
against Christ, it means
instead of Christ. The antichrist’s goal will not be to destroy Israel but to take the praise and worship due to God and have the Jews worship him instead as foretold by Christ in
John 5:43 - I have come in my Father's name, and you do not accept me; but if someone else comes in his own name, you will accept him. Israel will believe the a/c is their prophesied Messiah since they did not accept Christ and are still looking for another.
Satan is not a creator but he does copy or mimic the things of God to deceive people. Much of his and the a/c’s time on earth will be spent duplicating as closely as possible Jesus Christ in order to convince the world that he
is Christ and to convince the jews, he is their messiah. We christians have our Holy Trinity consisting of God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit. Satan has his
unholy trinity. In this unholy trinity, Satan wants to replace God, the a/c will be the acting god the son (
even mimicking his death and resurrection in Rev. 13:3) and exercising the power of the Holy Spirit will be the false prophet, (
compare Acts 1: 8 with Rev. 13:14). Satan will even have an equivalent archangel to Michael, his name is Abaddon or Apollyon as given in
Rev. 9:11. They will excel at deceit as
Matt. 24:24 points out. Only the elect, those who are born again with a knowledge of what to look for in the latter days, will be able to see through this deception.
Now in
Rev. 6, we have the starting point of the seven year covenant that the Anti-Christ (a/c) will sign or agree to; that begins the 70
th week as mentioned in
Dan. 9:27. The gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke parallel
Rev. 6 with amazing accuracy. Compare these scriptures:
False christs
Matt. 24:4-5,
Mark 13:5-6,
Luke 21:8,
Rev. 6:1-2
This is the first seal. The rider on the white horse signifies the false religion personified by the Anti-Christ who conquers by deception.
Dan. 7:20 in various trans-lations describe him as one "
whose look was more stout" and possessing a "
fierce countenance".
Dan. 8:23 calls him a “
stern-faced king and a master of intrigue“. 2 Thess, Cp.2 speaks of him as the “Man of Sin, Wicked One, Son of Perdition” and is described as “working wonders, opposing God and lawless.” In all he will be an imposing figure. There is one area in which he will differ from Christ. His spokesman, the false prophet, will come
after him and will build him up, much like an athlete’s or an actor’s agent does. A
type of John the Baptist but after the fact and not before. Here's something else to consider. The verse in question is
Rev. 6:2 -
I looked, and there before me was a white horse! Its rider held a bow, and he was given a crown, and he rode out as a conqueror bent on conquest. (NIV)
I have absolutely no idea where the thought that this is the weapon called a "bow" that shoots arrows is derived from but
it is not that kind of bow!!!!
From the Strong's Concordance, "5115 -
toxon, from the base of 5088. a bow (
appar. as the simplest fabric):-bow - 5088,
tikto a strengthened form of a prim. teko, (
which is used only as alt. in certain tenses) to
produce (from seed, as a mother, a plant, the earth, etc., lit. or fig.:- bear, be born,
bring forth, be delivered, be in travail.
As you can see, nothing in either of these definitions comes close to describing a weapon such as a bow. I think the problem comes from the way the old English used it in times past. Here is a better and I think more accurate definition.
I believe the rider is carrying a
multi-colored fabric banner and John was using the word
bow as a shortened version of the word
rainbow. According to the Strong’s Exhaustive Concordance, Greek, 2463 -
iris, as a symb. of the female
messenger of the pagan deities, a rainbow. Now after God destroyed the earth with a flood He put His
"bow" in the sky as a promise that He would never destroy the earth by water again. The word "bow" in the Strong's, Hebrew, 7198, as well as referencing a literal bow, the weapon, also uses
iris. 7198 takes us to a root word in 7185 and one of the definitions is
to be cruel or be fiercer, make grievous. Another modern day definition could also des-cribe a rainbow as "an illusory hope", as in "chasing rainbows". In my dictionary there are two interesting definitions of the word "iris". One is "
a rainbow or rainbow like display of colors" and the other is "
the goddess of the rainbow and messenger of the gods".
Now, starting with this more realistic look at this passage let me show you how I interpret it. The first rider is Anti-Christ and he comes carrying the banner of "peace and safety" (
temporary and illusory) and the multi-colored fabric or "bow" represents the unity he brings to the world, and the peace he will bring to Israel, probably at a time when they are facing certain annihilation. The crown represents his leadership and he comes conquering by deception, not war.
For the Jews to accept him as their Messiah, there are some things that will need to fall into place. He will need to prove himself as coming from the line of David and thus will be of Jewish descent. He will likely come from the tribe of Dan as suggested in
Jer. 8:16, and that is why Dan is not listed as one of the tribes in
Rev. 7. Israel would never accept an Islamic as Messiah. He will probably be Turkish in nationality via
Rev. 2:13 as that is the area where Pergamum was.
When he comes against the woman in
Rev. 12, he is not coming against
all of Israel but
only those whose eyes are opened at the abomination of desolation and have now become believing Israel and reject him as Messiah and turn to Christ per
Zech. 12:10. They will most likely include the 144,000 of
Rev. 7.
Some confusion undoubtedly arises from misinterpreting the sequence of
Ez. 37 &
38. As Daniel does in chapter 9 where he goes from speaking of the Messiah and then immediately leaps ahead thousands of years to speak of the a/c, Ezekiel does the same thing. Chapter 37 has pre-millennial significance but chapter 38 has post millennial significance and is the same prophecy that is repeated in
Rev. 20:8. These are the only two places where Gog and Magog are mentioned together.
In
Rev. 16:13-14 -
Then I saw three evil spirits that looked like frogs; they came out of the mouth of the dragon, out of the mouth of the beast and out of the mouth of the false prophet. 14They are spirits of demons performing miraculous signs, and they go out to the kings of the whole world, to gather them for the battle on the great day of God Almighty. The three frogs go to the kings of the East
(China and her allies), North (
Russia and her allies) and South (
the Moslem nations). The a/c is more than likely allied with an American/European confederation.
Another point I’d like to mention is that some people give more credence to a Quran type document then is deserved. The fact is, regardless of how similar any other religious “prophetic” document is, if it is not scripture it shouldn’t be given any consideration whatsoever. If one is going to do that then you might as well consider the prophecies of Nostradamus to be a “lost” part of the bible.
So to sum up, the a/c will be Jewish, not Islamic.
He will fight against the Moslems as protector of Israel, not with them against Israel. His cohort, the false prophet could possibly be a pope and the a/c’s goal is not to destroy the church or Israel but to steal the worship that should be God’s; unto himself and thus in a manner of speaking, spit in God’s eye.
