The Encyclopedia Of Demons And Demonology

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of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition, who
opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god
or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the
temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. Do you
not remember that when I was still with you I told you
this? And you know what is restraining him now so
that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery
of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now
restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And
then the lawless one will be revealed and the Lord Jesus
will slay him with the breath of his mouth and destroy
him by his appearing and his coming. The coming of
the lawless one by the activity of Satan will be with all
the power and with pretended signs and wonders, and
with all wicked deception for those who are to perish,
because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.
Therefore God sends upon them a strong delusion, to
make them believe what is false, so that all may be condemned
who did not believe the truth but had pleasure
in unrighteousness.
REVELATION makes reference to other opponents,
chiefly the Beasts of the Land and the Sea, and the Dragon
or SERPENT, the Devil himself.
The concept of the Antichrist was more fully developed
in the second century C.E., chiefly by the church
father Irenaeus, who argued that the best defense against
the DEVIL is Christ. Christian prayers and the uttered
name of Christ cause DEMONs to flee. However, the Antichrist,
a human, will appear as an apostate, murderer,
and robber. He will have “all the Devil’s power,” Irenaeus
said, and will attract followers and worshippers. The Antichrist
ultimately will be defeated, and Satan and his demons
will go to everlasting torments in HELL.
Origen, another father of the early church, termed the
Antichrist “the son of the evil demon, who is Satan and
the Devil.” He will be supported in his final confrontation
with Christ by Satan and his demons, who were imprisoned
at the time of the Passion. Augustine, one of the
most influential early fathers, assumed the Antichrist to
be a single individual rather than groups of wicked men.
By early medieval times, the Antichrist was increasingly
regarded as a person rather than a personification
of evil. The Antichrist would be fostered by LUCIFER or
would be the form that Lucifer himself would take, at
the end of the world. This form became more and more
entrenched in theological writings, in folklore, and in
theater and literature. One common story line held that
Lucifer would beget the Antichrist with a Babylonian
whore.
After the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century,
the pope was often called the Antichrist, while Catholics
said MARTIN LUTHER would beget the Antichrist.
In 1848, the Blessed Virgin Mary, appearing in apparitional
visions at La Salette, France, predicted that the seat
of Rome would serve the Antichrist: “How I warned and
warned that Satan would enter into the highest realms of
the hierarchy in Rome. The Third Secret, My child, is that
Satan would enter into My Son’s Church.”
In 1928, Lucifer was a principal demon possessing
a woman in Earling, Iowa (see EARLING POSSESSION).
Father Theophilus, the EXORCIST, became convinced
that the hour of the Antichrist was near. However, he
did not think that the Antichrist would be a son of the
Devil, but Lucifer himself, who would fashion a body
out of earthly matter in order to operate in the world.
The Antichrist as son of the Devil is the most popular
view in modern times, represented in fiction and
in films such as ROSEMARY’S BABY, THE OMEN, and THE
DEVIL’S ADVOCATE.
FURTHER READING:
Augustine. The City of God. Translated by Marcus Dods,
George Wilson, and J. J. Smith; introduction by Thomas
Merton. New York: Modern Library, 1950.
Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible. 2nd ed. Edited by
Karel van der Toorn, Bob Becking, and Pieter W. van der
Horst. Grand Rapids, Mich.: William B. Eerdmans, 1999.
Russell, Jeffrey Burton. The Devil: Perceptions of Evil from
Antiquity to Primitive Christianity. Ithaca, N.Y., and London:
Cornell University Press, 1977.
———. Lucifer: The Devil in the Middle Ages. Ithaca, N.Y.,
and London: Cornell University Press, 1984.
———. Satan: The Early Christian Tradition. Ithaca, N.Y.,
and London: Cornell University Press, 1981.
Vogel, Rev. Carl. Begone, Satan! A Soul-Stirring Account of
Diabolical Possession in Iowa. Rockford, Ill.: TAN Books
and Publishers, 1973.
apple The fruit of the Tree of Knowledge that led to
the fall of Adam and Eve became, during the witch hysteria,
one of the favored ways for DEMONS and the DEVIL
to enter a person and cause POSSESSION.
Eating almost any food might invite possession, especially
if cursed by a witch or sorcerer, but apples were
held to be especially dangerous. Demonologists, among
them the ruthless Henri Boguet, preached warnings
about them.
One famous apple possession is the “Vienna Possession”
case, in which a 16-year-old girl claimed that her
grandmother sent her demons into an apple and gave it to
her to eat. The girl was supposedly afflicted by more than
12,000 demons.
Apples, cultivated in Britain as early as 3000 B.C.E.,
have had a long association with MAGIC and WITCHCRAFT.
In mythology, they are the fruit of heaven, longevity, and
immortality. In folklore, they are love charms and have
been used in divination and spells to reveal lovers and
future spouses and to cause people to fall in love. In 1657,
Richard Jones, a 12-year-old boy in Shepton Mallet in the
county of Somerset in England, was said to be bewitched
by Jane Brooks, who gave him an apple. Jones suffered
fits, and neighbors said they saw him fly over his garden
wall. Brooks was charged with witchcraft, convicted, and
hanged on March 26, 1658.
The apple is associated with enchantment and FAIRIES.
According to English folklore, it is bad luck to pick all the