It is fictitiously claimed by historicist conspiracy theorists that the origins of the doctrine of futurism were concocted by the Jesuit ministers of the Roman Catholic Church as a clever way to distract people from knowing "who the real Antichrist is". One such character who does this is a character we've seen in this series before. His site can be found here. It is quite clear from reading his sources on both preterism and futurism, the former we will tackle in the next article of this series, that he straw-mans both positions! Futurism does not insist on the "resurrection" of a Roman Empire. Futurism rather holds the postulation, historically Rome has not been divided up into ten kings and the Roman Empire may not have actually fallen to begin with as even Spain can claim legitimacy to the Roman Imperial Throne due to its connections with the Habsburgs. We established this position in the previous entry.
He contends that the Futurist school was created out of "panic" as the Pope was being exposed as the Antichrist as Martin Luther and the Reformers began "exposing" the Pope as the true Antichrist that Scriptures identified. Let alone, they can't even tell you which Pope was the Antichrist! But that's beside the point, the historicist school says the Papacy as an office is the Antichrist conflating its ecclesiastical role with the role of the Church played by those operating mostly independent of the Papacy and confusing its role as a secular role as opposed to a religious role. Thus, the historicist argument continues to be void of actual historical substance to back it up. I always found it rather odd that the Papacy even lacks a military. One could say the Swiss Guard is their military but that's more of a body-guard unit of Swiss soldiers. In fact, among the requirements to being in the Swiss guard is that you have to be Swiss. That's not a Papal militia but a secular militia supplied by an independent sovereign. Historicism can never make up its mind as to whether the Papacy is the Beast or the Whore of Babylon. Some say the entire Catholic Church led by the Papacy is the Whore of Babylon. Maybe the reason why historicism is such a bungled mess of interpretation has less to do with the book of Revelation being difficult but rather because the historicist school belongs in the trash-bin of history.
So the Pope, now freaking out (allegedly) because he was identified as the Biblical Antichrist got this guy named Francisco Ribera. The rest of the article's polemics is actually a bit humorous so let me quote it:
"Like Martin Luther, Francisco Ribera also read by candlelight the prophecies about the Antichrist, the Beast, the little horn and that man of sin. But because the Pope was his boss, he came to conclusions vastly different from that of the Protestants. “Why, these prophecies don’t apply to the Catholic Church at all!” Ribera said. Then to whom do they apply? Ribera proclaimed, “To only one sinister man who will rise up at the end of time!” “Fantastic!” was the reply from Rome, and this viewpoint was quickly adopted as the official Roman Catholic position on the Antichrist."
Thus, Ribera is now the "father of Futurism". Only this is wrong. Very wrong. Futurism actually had a very strong history in the Roman Catholic Church prior to the Protestant Reformation. It goes back to St. Irenaeus of Lyons. St. Irenaeus was the disciple of St. Ignatius who was a disciple of St. John, the one who wrote the Apocalypse. This is why the futurist school has maintained weight even with a position that the Olivet Discourse was entirely fulfilled (though most Furturists contend the Olivet Discourse was not entirely fulfilled). We'll go back to different preterist schools in another post though. For now, we will look at the classical futurist position developed by St. Irenaeus.
In Against Heresies, St. Irenaeus interprets the four beasts in Daniel 7 as Babylon, Medo-Persia, Macedonia, and Rome (Bk. V, ch. 26). St. Irenaeus describes the fall of the Roman Empire particularly as "The ten toes, therefore, are these ten kings, among whom the kingdom shall be partitioned, of whom some indeed shall be strong and active, or energetic; others, again, shall be sluggish and useless, and shall not agree" (ibid). On the number 666, St. Irenaeus has this to say:
"the name Evanthas (ΕΥΑΝΘΑΣ) contains the required number, but I make no allegation regarding it. Then also Lateinos (ΛΑΤΕΙΝΟΣ) has the number six hundred and sixty-six; and it is a very probable [solution], this being the name of the last kingdom [of the four seen by Daniel]. For the Latins are they who at present bear rule: I will not, however, make any boast over this [coincidence]. Teitan too, (ΤΕΙΤΑΝ, the first syllable being written with the two Greek vowels ε and ι, among all the names which are found among us, is rather worthy of credit. For it has in itself the predicted number, and is composed of six letters, each syllable containing three letters; and [the word itself] is ancient, and removed from ordinary use; for among our kings we find none bearing this name Titan, nor have any of the idols which are worshipped in public among the Greeks and barbarians this appellation. Among many persons, too, this name is accounted divine, so that even the sun is termed Titan by those who do now possess [the rule]."
Clearly, St. Irenaeus holds the interpretation of Daniel 7 as being a literal division of ten kings and one man coming to uproot three of the kingdoms possessed by those ten kings. But he holds Antichrist as a literal man, not an "office" of the Papacy. The Papacy was of course alive and active in the days of St. Irenaeus and St. Irenaeus even has a list of the prominent Popes in order to prove Apostolic Succession! (Bk. 3, ch. III) So the Papacy did not arise from obscurity as this little horn did.
St. Hippolytus follows St. Irenaeus and writes this of the ten horns:
"As these things, then, are in the future, and as the ten toes of the image are equivalent to (so many) democracies, and the ten horns of the fourth beast are distributed over ten kingdoms, let us look at the subject a little more closely, and consider these matters as in the clear light of a personal survey." (On Christ and Antichrist)
And of course, this is futurist thinking. The Barbarian kingdoms, though uncivilized, were monarchies, not democracies. Thus, the division into ten horns could not be the division of the Western Half in 476! Further, Sts. Hippolytus and Irenaeus are indeed thinking holistically of the Roman Empire. It is difficult to tell whether they would have thought the Holy Roman Empire the legitimate succession but they would have definitely acknowledged the legitimacy of Constantine's successors! Of course, if historicism is merely the position that Biblical prophecy unfolds throughout history, then technically all of the early church's positions on the subject are historicist. Because they felt the collapse of Rome was to come and that it would be divided into ten kingdoms. This was a prophecy in the making.
The Ven. Bede also maintains a futurist approach in his Explanation of the Apocalypse and we can see a clear depiction of the reign of Antichrist as futuristic in St. Hildegard of Bingen's Scivias (Bk. 3, Vision 11). All of these came long before St. Robert Cardinal Bellarmine and Francisco Ribera so to say that the origins of futurism lie with the Jesuits is an intellectually dishonest and deceitful abuse and misunderstanding of historical theology on this subject.
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