This hits dead center on what the Reformers and those who came after them believed on this..
'The Antichrist According to the Protestant Reformers
The following quotations show what some of the most influential
Protestant Reformers and early Christian leaders believed about
Antichrist (“the little horn” (
Daniel 7:8), “the beast” (
Revelation 13:1), and “the man of
sin” (
2 Thessalonians 2:3).
Martin Luther (1483-1546) (Lutheran):
“Luther … proved, by the revelations of Daniel and St. John, by the epistles of St.
Paul, St. Peter, and St. Jude, that the reign of
Antichrist, predicted and described in the
Bible, was the Papacy … And all the people did say,
Amen! A holy terror siezed their
souls. It was Antichrist whom they beheld seated on the pontifical throne. This new idea, which derived greater strength from the prophetic descriptions launched forth by Luther into the midst of his contemporaries, inflicted the most terrible blow on Rome.”
History of the Reformation of the Sixteen Century, by J. H. Merle D’aubigne’s, book vi, chapter xii, p. 215.
Martin Luther declared, “We here are of the conviction that the papacy is the seat of the true and real Antichrist.” (Aug. 18, 1520).
The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, by Le Roy Froom. Vol. 2., pg. 121.
John Calvin (1509-1564) (Presbyterian):
“Some persons think us too severe and censorious when we call the Roman pontiff Antichrist. But those who are of this opinion do not consider that they bring the same charge of presumption against
Paul himself, after whom we speak and whose language we adopt… I shall briefly show that (
Paul’s words in II Thess. 2) are not capable of any other interpretation than that which applies them to the Papacy.”
Institutes of the Christian Religion, by John Calvin.
John Knox (1505-1572) (Scotch Presbyterian):
John Knox sought to counteract “that tyranny which the pope himself has for so many ages exercised over the
church.” As with Luther, he finally concluded that the Papacy was “the very antichrist, and
son of perdition, of whom Paul speaks.”
The Zurich Letters, by John Knox, pg. 199.
Thomas Cranmer (1489-1556) (Anglican):
“Whereof it followeth Rome to be the seat of antichrist, and the pope to be very antichrist himself. I could prove the same by many other scriptures, old writers, and strong reasons.” (Referring to prophecies in Revelation and Daniel.)
Works by Cranmer, Vol. 1, pp. 6-7.
Roger Williams (1603-1683) (First Baptist Pastor in America):
Pastor Williams spoke of the Pope as “the pretended Vicar of
Christ on
earth, who sits as
God over the
Temple of
God, exalting himself not only above all that is called
God, but over the
souls and consciences of all his vassals, yea over the Spirit of
Christ, over the
Holy Spirit, yea, and God himself…speaking against the God of
heaven, thinking to change times and laws; but he is the
son of perdition (II Thess. 2).”
The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, by Froom, Vol. 3, pg. 52.
The Westminster Confession of Faith (1647):
“There is no other head of the
church but the Lord
Jesus Christ. Nor can the pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof; but is that Antichrist, that man of
sin and
son of perdition that exalteth himself in the
church against Christ and all that is called God.”
The Creeds of Christendom With a History and Critical Notes, by
Philip Schaff’s, III, p. 658, 659, ch. 25, sec. 6.
Cotton Mather (1663-1728) (Congregational Theologian):
“The oracles of God foretold the rising of an Antichrist in the Christian Church: and in the Pope of Rome, all the characteristics of that Antichrist are so marvelously answered that if any who read the Scriptures do not see it, there is a marvelous blindness upon them.”
The Fall of Babylon by Cotton Mather in Froom’s book,
The Prophetic Faith of Our Fathers, Vol. 3, pg. 113.
John Wesley (1703-1791) (Methodist):
Speaking of the Papacy,
John Wesley wrote, “He is in an emphatical sense, the Man of
Sin, as he increases all manner of sin above measure. And he is, too, properly styled the Son of Perdition, as he has caused the
death of numberless multitudes, both of his opposers and followers… He it is…that exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped…claiming the highest power, and highest honour…claiming the prerogatives which belong to God alone.”
Antichrist and His Ten Kingdoms, by
John Wesley, pg. 110.
A Great Cloud of Witnesses
“Wycliffe, Tyndale, Luther, Calvin, Cranmer; in the seventeenth century, Bunyan, the translators of the King James
Bible and the men who published the Westminster and Baptist confessions of Faith; Sir
Isaac Newton, Wesley, Whitfield,
Jonathan Edwards; and more recently Spurgeon, Bishop J.C. Ryle and Dr. Martin Lloyd-Jones; these men among countless others, all saw the office of the Papacy as the antichrist.”
All Roads Lead to Rome, by
Michael de Semlyen, Dorchestor House Publications, p. 205. 1991.'.....https://bibleask.org/who-did-the-reformers-identify-as-the-antichrist/
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