Troublesome Topic: Who Is This “Man of Lawlessness”?

2 Thessalonians 2:2

Translation

that you not be quickly shaken in your minds nor be frightened, either by a spirit, or a word, or a letter, as if [it were] from us,

that the Day of the LORD

is already here.

Paraphrase

That you not be easily disturbed in your minds nor thrown into confusion that causes alarm by those who say the Day of THE SUPREME RULER has already come, whether you heard it by way of a false claim to a special revelation from God, or

a false claim to a word from God, or a fraudulent letter that claims to come from us.

2 Thessalonians 2:3

Translation

Let no one deceive

you in any way,

because [it shall] not [happen] unless the apostacy

has come first, and the man of lawlessness,

the son damned to punishment,

has been revealed,

Paraphrase

Don’t allow anyone to deceive you by any means whatsoever, because the Day of the Lord shall not come until after

the apostacy has happened, and the man consumed by lawlessness, the excommunicated son who is damned to eternal punishment, has been revealed.

2 Thessalonians 2:4

Translation

the one who opposes

and exalts himself above everything called a god or worshipped, so as to sit

in the temple of GOD, declaring himself to be GOD.

Paraphrase

He is the one who opposes God and exalts himself above everything that men refer to as a deity, either properly or falsely, and above everything that is worshipped as a deity, either properly or falsely; he even goes so far as

to establish himself firmly and steadfastly in a prominent role in

the manner in which people meet with THE CREATOR AND OWNER OF ALL THINGS, and he tries to prove that he is indeed THE CREATOR AND OWNER OF ALL THINGS.

Asking “Who is this man of Lawlessness?” is an example of asking the wrong question because we cannot know, and Jesus told us not to try and figure these things out. When it happens, it will be obvious. Neither Jesus nor Paul gives us enough info to be able to identify one specific person. That is because they did not intend for us to be able to identify a specific person. Many extremely wicked people have lived since the time of Jesus, but none of them were the person Paul was talking about who would appear shortly before the arrival of Jesus in power and glory. We must conclude that we don’t have enough information to make a positive identification, and we were never intended to.

Should we freak out every time we see something that looks like apostacy to us? No.

Should we be careful to avoid apostacy? This is the right question, and the answer is: Absolutely!

The next lesson is: The Restrainer

Footnotes

1

According to Benson, there were several times that congregations Paul had planted got letters from someone pretending to be him. It sounds like that may have happened to the church in Thessalonica. Paul’s point to them was that anything or anyone who claimed that the coming of Jesus in power to judge the nations had already happened was false, therefore, the means used to convey that message was also false.

2: “Day of the Lord”

This phrase always meant the time when God would judge men’s actions and deliver punishment or reward. This choice of words tells us that Paul thought the coming of Jesus would be followed immediately by the final judgment and its punishments and rewards. He thought there would be no time between His coming and His judging.

3

Some translators render this as if it were the perfect participle which means “is at hand” but it is not a participle, rather it is a perfect verb form of a word that means “present” indicating that the presence or reality of that event has already arrived.

4

“Deceive” comes from a root word that means “to bite the bait that hides the hook.” Besides “deceive” it also means “seduce.” Its emphasis is on the final state of ending up totally deceived and paying the price for it.

5

This refers back to the three forms of falsehood mentioned in the prior verse and goes beyond those to include any other possible form of deception.

6

“Apostacy” comes from the words “stand” and “away from”. It means to “depart from a previous position and stand separate from it.” It can also mean “a revolt, rebellion or mutiny.” There are two ways to interpret this: If we understand this word in this context to mean “apostacy or falling away.” it implies that the people involved in this will be seduced and deceived (as Paul warned against in the previous verse) and will leave the faith in Jesus. This deception will not come from outside the church, but from within it, or from a person that appears to be a part of the church. If we understand it to mean a “revolt, rebellion or mutiny,” then it may be an indication that society in general will rebel against God. Scholars are divided on this matter, but to me the more natural reading seems to be that which uses the word “apostacy” as referring to people within the church. Falling away requires having some place to fall from; turning away requires something to turn from; rebelling requires being under an authority before one can rebel against it. Besides, human cultures have always been in rebellion against God.

7

“Man of lawlessness” is sometimes rendered “man of sin” because some manuscripts say “man of lawlessness” and some say “man of sin.” There is reasonable manuscript support for each variant. They both point in the same general direction. Some scholars think that “the apostacy” (with an article) and this “man of sin or man of lawlessness” are closely linked together implying that this individual is likely responsible for fomenting the apostacy.

8: “son damned to punishment”

A similar phrase is used of Judas Iscariot in Jn 17:12 where he is called the “son of perdition,” in many versions. “Perdition” is a good rendering because it does not point to annihilation but to being “cut off” and then “punished.” A few versions do not include the words “son of” but they do include the true meaning of this key word which is “loss, or to be cut off, and punished.” It is problematic to use words like “destruction” because it implies “annihilation,” which is not the point but rather the idea is that of being “cut off, excommunicated from the people of God, and condemned to eternal punishment.”

9: “Opposing”

This is not the same word, but it carries the same idea as the name Satan, which means “adversary.”

10

This word comes from a word which comes from another word meaning “to sit, to be well based, to be steadfast and firm.” The word in question can also mean “to set, settle or to appoint.” Here the word cannot mean “sit” in a literal way because there was no place to sit down in the temple or in the Holy of Holies, other than the floor, but people of importance never sat on the floor.

11

The second half of this verse would immediately bring to the mind of every Jew the actions of Antiochus Epiphanes who thought he was Zeus and had pigs sacrificed in the temple on an altar which stood before a statue (which was likely of himself pretending to be Zeus.) It is also the exact thing that Satan did while he was in heaven and is the reason he was kicked out of heaven (see Is 14:13-14).