Jesus's Olivet Discourse and the Antichrist

        Reminder: If you're new to my blog, I recommend starting here with my initial post listing the many links between Donald Trump and the scriptural figure known as the Antichrist.        

        One of the most important sources for end times prophecy is what’s called Jesus’s Olivet Discourse (discourse on the Mount of Olives). In this post, I am going to carefully review what Jesus tells us in three chapters of the synoptic gospels – Matthew 24, Mark 13 and Luke 21 – and analyze how they might relate to what we know about Donald Trump and the beast government system he appears to be steadily implementing day by day.

                Bible scholars believe that the Gospel of Mark was a source for the other two synoptic gospels, Matthew and Luke. The Olivet Discourse is reflected in similar language in each of the three chapters I’ll be covering here. However, there are also slight differences introduced by the authors of Matthew and Luke that will be relevant for us to consider as well.

                Let’s start with Mark 13, likely the original source for the expansions found in the language of Matthew 24 and Luke 21. Mark’s gospel is a sparer, more laconic text, with more of a focus on Jesus’s miracles and itinerant travels than on his didactic teachings (the latter are exemplified in Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount). Mark 13 is a mysterious chapter in many ways. One aspect that scholars have noted is that this chapter seems to reflect what many refer to as the Bible’s penchant for double fulfillment of prophecy. As I briefly mentioned in my post on Revelation 13:3, double fulfillment refers to the fact that, as in Mark 13, the prophecies seem to refer both to an ancient time *and* to the end times.

                With its immediate focus on the destruction of Herod’s temple during the Jewish-Roman war, which began in 66 CE under the emperor Nero, we can infer that it would be incorrect to limit our interpretation of the chapter to a Preterist interpretation. Preterism is the hermeneutic which views biblical end times prophecies as wholly referring to past fulfillments, and not to a future end times period (the latter view is known as Futurism). In common with many other biblical researchers, I view double fulfillment as a way to thread the needle between pure Preterism and pure Futurism. In my view, Mark 13 is a lens through which we can see both the events of the Jewish-Roman War *and* their reflection in what we should expect during the Tribulation.

                Let’s begin with a look at Mark 13:5-13. Here, I will place in bold certain sections that I’ll focus on in more depth below:

“5 Jesus said to them: “Watch out that no one deceives you. 6 Many will come in my name, claiming, ‘I am he,’ and will deceive many. 7 When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, do not be alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. 8 Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. There will be earthquakes in various places, and famines. These are the beginning of birth pains.

9 “You must be on your guard. You will be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogues. On account of me you will stand before governors and kings as witnesses to them. 10 And the gospel must first be preached to all nations. 11 Whenever you are arrested and brought to trial, do not worry beforehand about what to say. Just say whatever is given you at the time, for it is not you speaking, but the Holy Spirit.

12 “Brother will betray brother to death, and a father his child. Children will rebel against their parents and have them put to death. 13 Everyone will hate you because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.”

                The statement that the disciples (Jesus’s immediate audience here) would be handed over to the local councils and flogged in the synagogue represents an example of double fulfillment at work. We know that most of Jesus’s most ardent early adherents – including Peter, Paul, James, Stephen and others – were martyred for their bold witnessing. The principle of double fulfillment, then, means that Jesus isn’t just talking about the sufferings that his immediate disciples would face – he is also describing the sufferings and trials that his end times followers would face. History comes full circle during the Tribulation. Just like Peter and Paul, who were apparently martyred in Rome under Nero’s rule, Tribulation saints (described in many places in the Book of Revelation) will be arrested, imprisoned and at times martyred for being witnesses of Christ during the rule of the Antichrist, who I describe in other places on this blog as Nero Redivivus.

                We know that pure Preterism is an untenable interpretative framework, because the author of Mark follows the above statement with the statement: “the gospel must first be preached to all nations” before Jesus’s second coming. We know that hadn’t yet come even close to happening in the first century CE. Now, in the twenty-first century, we can say that it has indeed occurred.

                Also, we know that under the Antichrist’s rule, ‘Everyone will hate [Christian martyrs] because of [Jesus], but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved.’ Under the Antichrist, the world will experience a tremendous optical illusion: What looks like earthly salvation and future prosperity will align with the Antichrist’s worldly temptations, and what looks like apocalyptic pessimism and stubbornness will align with Jesus’s salvation. We know from Revelation 11 that the two witnesses will be so loathed by the world’s inhabitants that they will clap and cheer on the deaths of these two powerful prophets. The commandment in Mark 13:13 to stand firm aligns with Paul’s guidance stating that Christians should stand firm against the delusions and temptations associated with the Man of Sin, and it also aligns with the repeated exhortations to ‘conquer’ in the seven letters to the seven churches in Revelation. To ‘conquer’ or ‘stand firm’ would equate with not giving in to the temptation to take the Antichrist’s mark of the beast. This might involve accepting poverty or homelessness, and potentially even arrest or execution. Additionally, note that this mention of ‘standing firm to the end’ effectively rebukes the faulty notion of a ‘pre-tribulation rapture’ of the saints. Christians will be here on earth during the Antichrist’s reign, and he will treat us very shabbily indeed.

                Mark 13:14-19 goes on to state:

“14 When you see ‘the abomination that causes desolation’[a] standing where it [or he] does not belong—let the reader understand—then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains. 15 Let no one on the housetop go down or enter the house to take anything out. 16 Let no one in the field go back to get their cloak. 17 How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! 18 Pray that this will not take place in winter, 19 because those will be days of distress unequaled from the beginning, when God created the world, until now—and never to be equaled again.”

                We can again see that pure Preterism is an erroneous doctrine, because the Jewish-Roman war and the destruction of the Second Temple, while violent and chaotic, were not equivalent to ‘days of distress unequaled from the beginning…until now – and never to be equaled again’. Such tribulation simply hasn’t occurred yet – but it is something we could very well envision right now, with multiple nations possessing nuclear weapons and powerful militaries.

                Let’s look closely at this mysterious mention of ‘the abomination that causes desolation’. This term has been quite tricky for biblical researchers to figure out for a very long time. The ‘abomination of desolation’ is a term used in the Book of Daniel to refer to Antiochus IV Epiphanes’ erecting of a statue of Zeus (the Greek father god) within the temple in Jerusalem. However, we know from other Bible passages that the idol/image/eikon that the Antichrist sets up won’t be devoted to any god within the nations’ pantheon of gods – rather, it will be of himself. Remember, the Antichrist sets himself up as being God, and he does so within the temple of God (2 Thess. 2). Therefore, Mark 13:14 should be read to say, I believe, that the ‘abomination of desolation’ is either the Antichrist himself, or the representation/idol/eikon that he and the False Prophet set up ‘in the temple of God’. I happen to also believe that it is unclear whether a literal Third Temple will be rebuilt in Jerusalem, or whether, instead, the language of the ‘temple of God’ and ‘the holy place’ refers to Christian churches (since, according to 1 Peter, the Body of Christ constitutes the new temple of God). I will leave this issue unresolved for now, because I frankly admit that I’m unsure about how to handle it.

                Now let’s backtrack to look at Matthew 24, which is clearly based to a large extent on Mark 13. In Matthew 24, however, we find some interesting additional details – I’ve put in bold the additions added by the author of Matthew to what we found in Mark 13:

“9 Then you will be handed over to be persecuted and put to death, and you will be hated by all nations because of me. 10 At that time many will turn away from the faith and will betray and hate each other, 11 and many false prophets will appear and deceive many people. 12 Because of the increase of wickedness, the love of most will grow cold, 13 but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. 14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.”

                It is astonishing to find that these end times events will be accompanied by ‘many turning away from the faith and betraying and hating each other’. Now, to turn away from the faith – you must at one time have been a Christian. This is why I write elsewhere on my blog (such as here) that it is crucial to remember that the Antichrist will arise from within Christian churches themselves. He won’t be an openly avowed atheist, a Muslim, a Buddhist or an adherent of some other religion. Satan’s greatest accomplishment during this period will be to slither into the pulpit itself and mislead Christians with a false gospel. That’s what Trump has done – he has portrayed himself as a ‘messiah’ (or ‘anointed one,’ which is what moshiach means) who will protect Christians from their leftist cultural enemies – yet Trump himself is clearly nowhere near to being an actual Christian himself. Someone who starts out as a Christian won’t ‘turn away from the faith’ to follow a Muslim or an openly avowed atheist. God will be using this as a time of testing (see Revelation 3) – the wheat will be separated from the chaff within the pews of churches themselves. False Christians will be spit out, and true Christians will be refined as silver is refined.

                The ‘false prophets’ deceiving ‘many people’ will be Christian – or “Christian” – false prophets, of which American churches are, unfortunately, full to the brim, as I noted in this post. Just think about how many people were popping up all across social media to declare that September 23^rd would be the date of the pre-tribulation rapture. Then it never happened. This served to portray Christians as uneducated and gullible amongst the liberals and secular ideologues out there. It also served to dishearten people and discredit the very notion that we should be watching current events with an eye on Bible prophecy. This failed ‘date-setting’ attempt was a clear example of end times ‘false prophets’ arising and deceiving many people, turning Christians away from the truth. And that’s just one example. Do some sample searches on YouTube related to Bible prophecy, and you’ll encounter literally hundreds of false prophets claiming to have received revelations through dreams and visions, claiming to analyze gematria and numerical correlations to set precise time-tables for the rapture and the Tribulation period, and claiming to be fighting against evil within the church by attacking enemies with their own hateful and bigoted takes.

                Moving on, we see these words in Matthew 24:15:

“15 So when you see standing in the holy place ‘the abomination that causes desolation,’[a] spoken of through the prophet Daniel—let the reader understand— 16 then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains.”

                The Greek for ‘holy place’, here, is hagios topos. Hagios is found to be used in reference to sacredness or holiness. This is why I posit that ‘the holy place’ – or as Paul puts it in 2 Thess. 2, the ‘temple of God’ – may not be a literally rebuilt third temple at all. This is because a rebuilt third temple would not be a holy place. Rather, it would be a mockery, because it would stand for the false impression that animal sacrifices and temple worship are needed any longer now that Jesus served as our final sacrificial lamb, whose blood cleansed us from sin. So we need to be awake to the possibility that the ‘abomination of desolation’ will essentially be the Antichrist standing up within Christian churches (which *are* holy places) to be idolized as himself an ‘anointed one’ sent by God to save America and defend Christians from their leftist and secular cultural enemies. This, I posit, is the likeliest explanation for what we should interpret the ‘abomination of desolation’ to mean. However, I fully admit that I could be wrong in this hypothesis.

                Finally, let’s take a look at Luke 21, where relevant additions (which we didn’t find in Matthew 24 or Mark 13) are placed below in bold by me:

“20 When you see Jerusalem being surrounded by armies, you will know that its desolation is near. 21 Then let those who are in Judea flee to the mountains, let those in the city get out, and let those in the country not enter the city. 22 For this is the time of punishment in fulfillment of all that has been written. 23 How dreadful it will be in those days for pregnant women and nursing mothers! There will be great distress in the land and wrath against this people. 24 They will fall by the sword and will be taken as prisoners to all the nations. Jerusalem will be trampled on by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.

25 There will be signs in the sun, moon and stars. On the earth, nations will be in anguish and perplexity at the roaring and tossing of the sea. 26 People will faint from terror, apprehensive of what is coming on the world, for the heavenly bodies will be shaken. 27 At that time they will see the Son of Man coming in a cloud with power and great glory. 28 When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near.”

                Here, instead of mentioning the ‘abomination of desolation,’ the author of Luke mentions the end times attack on Jerusalem being preceded by different evidence: Jerusalem ‘being surrounded by armies,’ who will ‘desolate’ it. We live in a time when these prophecies can now be envisioned as fulfilled, or soon-to-be-fulfilled. Hamas, Hezbollah, Houthis and other armies do indeed surround the tiny nation of Israel. So do troops aligned with currently non-hostile regimes, such as those of Egypt and Jordan. And, perhaps most significantly, the United States army is also active in the Middle East. With this author’s statement that the presence of these armies will denote Jerusalem’s future ‘desolation,’ we can conclude that the phrase ‘abomination of desolation’ can be interpreted as meaning, the ‘abomination’ that leads to ‘desolation’ (destruction) of Jerusalem. This is a ‘time of punishment,’ ‘distress’ and ‘wrath,’ not of happiness, love, peace and plenty. This should serve as a corrective to those who, influenced perhaps by the wrongheaded Left Behind series, portray the Antichrist as someone who will be ‘beloved’ by the globe’s inhabitants. The world’s people, instead, will recognize that this is going to be a fearful, terrifying time of ‘distress’ and ‘wrath,’ not of peace and prosperity. They will fear the Antichrist and ask ‘who can make war’ against him (Rev. 13). People will ‘faint from terror’ and apprehension. However, Christians are encouraged by Jesus to ‘lift up [our] heads, because [our] redemption’ will be ‘drawing near’.

                For us, it will be a time of persecution and martyrdom, but also a time of redemption and hope. We will know that we will stand by enduring persecution and winning our heavenly reward. The residents of the nations, however, will view things in precisely the opposite way. They will be bitter and hateful towards us, because in their view, we will be cheering on the destruction of the earth. They will be caught completely off-guard by the Antichrist, and will fail the ‘time of testing’ referred to in the letter to the church of Philadelphia in Revelation 3. We, however, as seen in John the Revelator's quote of Jesus's message to the church of Philadelphia, will be kept from the hour of trial in that we will have been fully prepared for how to respond to it.

                How would Trump fit into the Olivet Discourse’s prophecies?

                I’ve already alluded above to how we can merge our understanding of these three synoptic chapters with our broader understanding of Trump, the MAGA movement, and Mystery Babylon, but let’s sum up what we could potentially conclude by looking at these prophecies:

• ·         The Tribulation period won’t be a period of peace, plenty and kumbaya-style social harmony – it will be a fearful time marked by wars, famines, earthquakes and mutual hatred. Trump’s warlike rhetoric, his renaming of the Dept. of Defense as the Department of War, and his advocacy (along with Bobby Kennedy Jr.) of health misinformation, are, I believe, preliminary signs that Trump’s rapidly developing monarchical government will be the lead player in these occurrences.
• ·         The language about end times Christian witnesses (the word ‘martyr’ means ‘witness’) being imprisoned and executed lines up with the language in Daniel 7 and Revelation 13 about the Antichrist making war upon the saints. Trump’s evolving draconian government, which is shedding our constitutional rights to free speech, will likely be the engine for taking on Christians within the United States, a country where many Christians currently reside. Just this week Trump gave a speech to military leaders where he said lethal force will be used against protestors when troops are sent in to quell uprisings in urban areas. There is no reason to think that this federal takeover won’t also affect rural areas as well.
• ·         The language about people ‘turning away from the faith’ to follow the Antichrist and the False Prophet line up consistently with Paul’s description of a worldwide apostasia (the Greek for the ‘falling away’ or ‘rebellion’) in 2 Thess. 2. Again – this is a picture of Christians being misled by someone arising from within their own ranks – not a description of Christians defecting to Islam or open atheism.
• ·         As I mentioned earlier, the ‘abomination of desolation’ language is another example of double fulfillment – this happened once before during Antiochus IV Epiphanes’ erecting of an idol to Zeus within the second temple – and it will happen once again when, as I posit as being likely, the Antichrist will himself be the ‘abomination of desolation’ that will be idolized within Christian churches, as he serves as a wolf in sheep’s clothing, guarding the flock from its cultural perceived ‘enemies,’ such as those in mainstream media and in higher education.

In conclusion: Nothing in these crucial three chapters leads me to think it's any less likely that Trump is the probable Antichrist. In fact, they only lead me to think it more likely that he could be that scriptural figure.