The Pulpit Commentary — 2 Thessalonians — Section 33

,l<'l!cription does not apply to the pope or the papacy: (a) Because the pope, though the hP.ad or a syst.c-m of idolatry, does not oppose God or exRlt hims .. lf ahove him but rather owns himself " e. servant of servants of the most high God," and blesses the people, not in his own name, but in the Name of the Triune God. (.S) Because instead of exalting himself above God or objects of worship, he multiplies the objects 'or worship by the canonization of new saints, and submits, like the humblest of his followers to the worship of the very saints he has made. ('I') Because the pope, though guilty of Rrrogating almost Dil'ine powers to himself, does not supersede God so I\S to make himself God. The man of sin "sitteth in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God." Though votaries of the papacy have often given Divine titles to the popes, the Popes have never assumed to be God, but only vicars of Jesus Christ on earth. They ha"c clRimcd t.o be viceroys of God. The temple of God cannot be the Vatican• nor the Christian Church, which is an ideal building; nor can Rorue be regarded as th~ centre of the Christian Church. (5) Because this prophetic sketch contains no allusion to strictly papal peculiarities, such as idolatry, either as to the Virgin Mary, saints angels, or relics, the invention of purgatory, priestly absolution, bloody fanaticism' <lebased casuistry, lordship over the world of spirit.~. (b) The description applies ~ the man of sin-the lawless one-for whom the Papacy prepares the way by a Iona course of apostnsy from the truth. (a) Thie terrible person is t.o oppose God and ali worship of every sort, and may therefore be regarded as an impersonation of infidel wickedness. (,8) He is t.o sit down in the vaoated "temple of God'' and claim all the attributes of divinity. He sits down in God's place-for the temple is God's dwelling~ iu some actual temple, and appropriates it to his own use. Wherever the scene of thiff marvellons usurpation may be, it signifies the obliteration of all Christian interests and the triumph of atheistic malignity. When the Lord comes, 11 shall he find faith in the earth?" We see how Positivism in our own day has forsaken the worship of a personal God and betaken itself to the worship of concrete humanity. The man of Bin will use the papacy as Auguste Comte travestied it in constructing forms of Posi- tivist devotion, by turning it into some darker shape and making it the tremendous instrument of the world's final ruin. Ill. THE CHECK TO TJIE FULL DEVELOPMENT OF THE MAN 01!' SIN. "And now what restmineth ye know, in order that he may be revealed in his own time. For the mystery of iniquity is already working only till he who now restraineth be taken out of the way." These words imply: 1. That the apostasy was already in being; for" the mystery of lawlessness is already working." The two, if not identical, are closely connected together. (1) It antagonizes Christ, who is "the mystery of godliness" (1 Tim. iii. 16). The mystery is a process, not a person, yet it works against the person of Christ. (2) Many of the elements of the "apostasy" were in existence in the days of the apostles, at least in the germ-state. The Epistle to the Colossians and the Second Epistle to Timothy point to an early development of Gnostic error which found its place in due time in the papal system (Col. ii.; 2 Tim. iii.). The self-deifying 1endency was manifested in the conduct of several of the Cresars. 2. The words imply that the working of the apostasy was still undefined and as yet unguessed at. It was still "a mystery," t.o be revealed in due time. Nothing is more remarkable than the gradual growth of error in the patristic age. False opinions held by pious Fathers in one age were held by errorists in the next age to the exclusion ot the truth. 3. The word, imply that, a, the apostasy t0ou1d last through ages, the check would likewise exercise a continuous effect. The common opinion is that the Roman empire was the restraining power upon the development of the man of sin. It was certainly such upon the course of the apostasy, which was to prepare the way for the man of sin. It held the Papacy in check till it was itself swept away by barbarian violence. B1icause it has passed away, it does not follow that the man of sin must have been revealed at once; for other checks have been supplied, and ue being still continuously supplied, in the polity of nations and in the face of Divine truth, to restrain the last terrible manifesta- tion of his power. IV. THE 00011 OF THE !UN or sor. "Whom the Lord Jeaus shall consume with the breath of bis mouth, aud shall destroy with the appearance of his coming." I. Thia d- Mt ,.ifer to the Word and Spirit of Chrut working in tlu minds of men for the , / ~ of untichristi.an error and antithei,tic wickedneRs. but to the aclual oa. 11. 1-17.] 'fHE SECOND EPISTLE TO THE THESSALONlANS. 31