2 Thessalonians 2:3Meaning & Commentary from the Church Fathers

Yet whether this is a temporary temptation, bear it, good athletes of Christ. For if all creation will be subjected to dissolution and the form of this world will pass away, is it astonishing that we, who are part of creation, should suffer in the common suffering and be handed over to afflictions? Martyr's crowns await us, brethren. The choirs of confessors are ready to stretch out their hands to you and receive you into their number.

He will come as a man, not from the nations, but from the people of Israel itself and from the tribe of Judah. He will come not in uncircumcision, but in circumcision, so that under the pretext of his origin and circumcision he may capture the people of Israel. For they are expecting his coming in precisely this form. Moreover, he called him son of perdition, naming the man himself son of perdition, that is, son of the devil, the destroyer.

He called him the son of perdition because he himself will perish and will become for others a cause of perdition. For the destroyer of men imitates the becoming man of our God and Savior. As the Lord, having taken human nature, accomplished our salvation, so he, choosing a man able to receive all his activity, will attempt through him to deceive all men. He will call himself Christ and God, exposing the falsehood of the so-called gods whom he himself supported in past ages. By the church of God the Apostle means the temple in which the antichrist will seize the chief seat, attempting to present himself as God. This also the divine Daniel foretold, for he said: He will not understand the gods of his fathers, and he will glorify the god of Ma'ozim in his place (Dan 11:37-38). That is, he will call himself the mighty God. Then the Apostle, showing that he is not offering them a new teaching, adds: Verse 5. Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things?

Therefore guard yourself, O man, and strengthen your soul. The Church now bears witness to you before the living God and warns you of the antichrist before he appears. Whether this will happen during your life, we do not know. Whether it will happen after you, we do not know. Yet it will be good if, knowing this, you are on your guard.

“For that day will not come, unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition.” This expression is Hellenistic.

That is, that day will not arrive until the apostasy comes, and so forth. Here two events are clearly distinguished: the apostasy, ή α̉ποστασία, and the revelation, or manifestation, of the man of lawlessness.

Some, including Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Augustine, take the abstract concept α̉ποστασία as a person, α̉ποστάτης, “the apostate.” By it they understand the Antichrist himself, of whom he speaks further on.

Others, including Tertullian, Jerome, and Ambrose, refer this word to apostasy from the Roman monarchy, namely, to rebellion against Roman rule.

Yet nowhere in Holy Scripture is this word used for civil or political defection from someone’s authority. It is much more correct to understand here apostasy from the faith (Acts 21:21; 1 Tim 4:1), or complete unbelief in God.

The Savior also foretold that when He came to earth, He would scarcely find faith in Himself (Lk 18:8).

The decline of faith and love will precede the appearance of a particular person. The Apostle calls him the man of lawlessness, or more correctly in Russian, the man of sin, ο̉ α̉́νθρ. τ. α̉μαρτίας, and the son of perdition.

The man of sin is not merely a sinner. He is a man who above all serves sin, personifying sin in himself, and therefore doomed to certain eternal destruction (Jn 17:12).

His sinful qualities and actions are chiefly signified by the fact that he will be the adversary of Christ, ο άντικείμετος. The Apostle John calls him Antichrist (1 Jn 2:18, 22; 1 Jn 4:3; 2 Jn 7).

This is because he will not only strive to oppose Christ and the spread of Christianity. He will represent in himself the complete opposite of Christ in qualities and actions.

Thus, first of all, he will exalt himself “above every so-called god or object of worship,” έπι πάντα λεγόμενον Θεόν ή σέβασμα.

That is, he will treat with contempt everything that people regard as divine, holy, and worthy of reverence. In this both his audacious pride and his coarsest unbelief will be displayed.

The son of perdition will be the enemy not only of the true God, but also of the gods of the pagans (1 Cor 8:5).

His extraordinary pride will be revealed still more in that “he sits in the temple of God as God, presenting himself as God” (2 Thess 2:4).

This, however, is natural. Whoever recognizes no god, and whoever considers himself higher than every deity, directly or indirectly shows that he recognizes only himself as god.

For greater proof of his imaginary height and superiority over other gods, he himself will sit in the temple of God.

That is, he will either place his statues and images in the temples of God, or he will appropriate divine authority to himself and sit on the throne. For sitting on a throne signifies precisely the authority of rule.

“In the temple of God,” είς τὸν ναόν του Θεού, where ναόν means the inner part of the temple, the sanctuary.

The use of the two articles apparently indicates that the Jerusalem temple is meant here. According to the prophecies, it must be rebuilt before the Coming of Christ.

This God-opposing inclination of the stiff-necked Jewish people has acquired sad fame throughout the whole known history of mankind.

It will be manifested especially vividly in their expectation of their earthly messiah, who will be the Antichrist.

The holy Apostle Paul also regarded Judaism as the sphere where the most terrible satanic hatred against the true God must manifest itself.

See 1 Thess 2:14-16: “the Jews, who killed both the Lord Jesus and His prophets, and drove us out, and do not please God, and oppose all men; they hinder us from speaking to the Gentiles that they may be saved, and thus fill up the measure of their sins.”

Given the apostasy from faith that will precede the appearance of the Antichrist, such exaltation of one person above all deities becomes very understandable.

So also does such a profanation of the holy place, represented here by the Antichrist’s sitting in the temples of God.

Not only in ancient times, in the ages of Nebuchadnezzar, Antiochus Epiphanes, Gaius Caligula, and Nero, were statues of kings set in the place of deities, and divine honors demanded for them.

In modern times also, as the French Revolution of the eighteenth century and the Paris Commune of the nineteenth century showed, blasphemy against holy things can appear in monstrous proportions.

So can the rejection of everything worthy of human reverence and the trampling down of all rights.

The coming of the Antichrist had been foretold by the Apostle even earlier, during his stay in Thessalonica. It constituted one of the dogmas of the Christian faith.

The reader must supply it himself, and it is supplied by itself: if the apostasy does not come first, the day of the Lord will not come either. Oecumenius writes: After these words one must understand: neither will the coming of the Lord take place. Why did the Apostle omit such words? Not because, having begun to speak of the properties of the antichrist, he forgot. Rather, because he judged it fitting to use the usual figure of silence or passing over, as is clear from the fifth verse. Do you not remember? The Apostle said: unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness, such and such a one. Perhaps something more of this kind would still have had to be added. But he cuts off the discourse and says, as it were: why write much about this? Recall what was said. Having recalled what was said, they had to bring to mind also that, until this man of lawlessness appears, the Lord will not come. Here he reveals to them, and through them to us, the greatest sign of the Lord's coming (Theodoret). The apostasy will not come. The word apostasy, by itself and without explanation of from what and of what kind, does not give a definite concept. Therefore the question arises of itself: what does the Apostle mean here? The ancient commentators all suppose that apostasy is used here instead of apostate, and signifies the antichrist himself. Saint Chrysostom writes: Here he speaks of the antichrist and reveals great mysteries. What is apostasy? He calls the antichrist himself apostasy, since he will destroy many and lead them into apostasy. As it is said, so as to deceive, if possible, even the elect (Mt 24:24). Theodoret says the same: The Apostle called the antichrist himself apostasy, giving him this name from his deeds, because he will attempt to bring all to apostasy from the truth. So say all the others. Only Oecumenius, after this, adds conjecturally: Or he calls apostasy the departure from God, the thing itself, and not the person. Non-Orthodox Western commentators understand not a person, but a special phenomenon in the life of mankind, though not all understand the same thing. Those who, like Oecumenius, understand apostasy from God, from faith, and from truth are of course nearer the truth. It is mentioned also in other places of Scripture. Since this word is not explained here by any additional word, its meaning must be determined by the flow of the discourse. The words that follow it, the man of lawlessness, who exalts himself above every god, and so forth, make it understood that the apostasy also will be of the same kind. That is, it will take place in the religious and moral sphere. Therefore to see in this apostasy something political, for example the uprising of the Jews or the fall of the Western Roman Empire, is to depart from what Saint Paul wished to say. The pope's falling away with his own from the true Church, and afterward Luther's and Calvin's still deeper falling away from the truth through falling away from the papal fallen church, did take place in the religious sphere. But since in the Apostle the apostasy is closely connected with the appearance of the antichrist, and he is not present, these events should not be understood under it. The Apostle is clearly speaking of that apostasy which will take place in the last days, before the second coming of the Lord. He mentions this in other epistles. In the first epistle to Saint Timothy he writes: The Spirit expressly says that in the latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons (1 Tim 4:1). Something similar appears in 2 Tim 3:1 and in Saint Peter, 2 Pet 3:3. Saint Jude testifies that all the Apostles spoke of this in the same way: Remember the words spoken beforehand by the Apostles of our Lord Jesus Christ. For they told you that in the last time there would be mockers, walking after their own ungodly lusts. These are they who separate themselves from the unity of the faith (Jude 1:17-19). The Lord Himself also foretold that at the end of the world many false prophets would arise and deceive many. Because lawlessness would abound, the love of many would grow cold (Mt 24:11-12). Thus, when He comes, will He find faith on the earth? (Lk 18:8). According to these assurances, a very distressing picture is formed in the mind of the moral and religious condition of men in the last time. The Gospel will be known to all. But one part will remain in unbelief toward it. Another part, the largest, will fall into heresy, following not the teaching delivered by God, but constructing for itself its own faith by its own invention, though on the basis of the words of Scripture. There will be no number to these self-invented faiths. The pope laid their beginning. Luther and Calvin continued his work. The principle that these latter placed at the foundation, namely one's personal understanding of faith from Scripture alone, gave a strong impulse to the invention of faiths. There are already very many of them, and there will be still more. Wherever there is a kingdom, there will be its own confession. Then wherever there is a region, and further, wherever there is a city. In the end, perhaps, wherever there is a head, there will be its own confession. Where people build faith for themselves and do not receive the faith delivered by God, it cannot be otherwise. All such people will appropriate to themselves the name Christians. There will also be a part that holds the true faith as it was delivered by the holy Apostles and is preserved in the Orthodox Church. But even among these, no small part will be right-believing only in name. In the heart they will not have the constitution required by faith, having loved this present age. Behold what a broad field of apostasy is expected. Although the Christian name will be heard everywhere, and churches and ecclesiastical orders will be visible everywhere, all this will be only appearance. Within, there will be true apostasy. On this soil the antichrist will be born and will grow in the same spirit of appearance without the substance of the matter. Then, having given himself over to Satan, he will openly fall away from the faith. Armed with Satan's deceptive snares, he will draw all who do not hold Christianity in truth into open apostasy from Christ the Lord, forcing them to honor himself as god. The elect will not be carried away, but he will attempt to deceive even them, if possible. So that this may not happen, those evil days will be cut short. The Lord will appear and will destroy the antichrist and all his work by the manifestation of His coming. This, one must suppose, is the apostasy the Apostle means. It is indeed a deed, a fact, and not a person, but it stands in close connection with a person, with the man of lawlessness and the son of perdition. This will be the apostasy into which the chief apostate, the antichrist, will draw men. The apostasy of men into false faiths and into non-Christian dispositions of heart will prepare the soil for the antichrist's emergence and the arena for his activity. But this preparatory apostasy is not what is meant here. What is meant is the apostasy that the antichrist will produce. When he appears and grows strong, he will complete the inward apostasy by that visible apostasy. This will be a loud apostasy, the one fully worthy of such a name. For this reason it stands in the Apostle with the definite article. For the same reason, perhaps, he does not explain it with any additional word, just as later Julian was called the Apostate, without explanation of from what. Thus, in the Apostle's words, unless the apostasy comes first and the man of lawlessness is revealed, two periods are not indicated. Rather, one last time is indicated, in which both will take place. The holy Fathers expressed this by understanding under apostasy the apostate, the antichrist, who will produce the general apostasy. The Apostle Paul himself places the apostasy in dependence on him, as is clear from verse 9 and following. Saint John the Theologian does the same in Rev 13:4 and following. Non-Orthodox Western commentators departed from Saint Paul's thought by understanding here that preparatory apostasy. The man of lawlessness means one utterly lawless, saturated with lawlessness, whose essence is lawlessness. He will be born lawlessly, live lawlessly, himself practicing lawlessness and spreading lawlessness everywhere. In lawlessness he will also perish. He will be the full realization of lawlessness, and there will be nothing in him except lawlessness. Not only warfare against God will distinguish him, although this will be most evident, but every sin. He is called the man of lawlessness because he will commit thousands of lawless deeds and will lead others to commit them (Chrysostom). He himself will sin much, and he will lead many others into many sins (Oecumenius). But he will be a man like every other, composed of soul and body, only a complete instrument of Satan. He will not be Satan in the form of a man, nor an incarnation of Satan, but a man in whom Satan will live and through whom he will act as his wholly obedient instrument. Saint Chrysostom asks: Who then will he be? Surely not Satan? And he answers: No, but a certain man who will receive all his power, his energy. Oecumenius says the same: The antichrist will not be Satan, but a man possessed and acted upon by Satan, satanized. He will be some Jew skilled in magic and the compounding of spices. The son of perdition means one doomed to perdition, who has voluntarily given himself over to ruin and goes toward it with the consciousness that he will perish. Similar to this among us are the phrases: a lost man, or a desperate man. Such was Judas also (Jn 17:12). Such is this beast from the abyss, who after warfare against God will go into perdition (Rev 17:8, 11). The phrase son of perdition can also signify extreme corruption, but this has already been said of the antichrist in the expression man of lawlessness. Here his pitiable end is being indicated. Yet he alone will not perish. He will also bring many others into perdition. He will deceive them into following his will and teaching, and thereby destroy them, as is said below (verse 12). He will find pleasure in drawing others into his ruinous path. His whole concern will be how to destroy as many people as possible. He is called the son of perdition because he himself will perish (Chrysostom). He himself will perish and will cast others into perdition (Oecumenius). Or he will serve as the cause of perdition for them (Theodoret).