Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary: Apocalypse
Chapter 18
In this chapter is a repetition of the fall of Babylon and the mourning of other nations, and their consternation for its sudden destruction, to which may be applied the three mentioned expositions. Among the sorts of merchandise, (ver. 13.) are mentioned slaves, and the souls of men. Some of our Protestant adversaries (see Mr. Theophilus Higgons) tell us, that it is only Popish Rome that deals with this sort of merchandise. But I must needs say, our adversaries have the misfortune to betray a shameful ignorance, whensoever they undertake to bring proofs to shew the popes to be antichrist. Here it is so evident that by the souls of men are meant only bond slaves, which merchants used to bring and sell at Rome, that Dr. Wells instead of slaves and souls of men, in the amendments made to the Protestant translation, has translated hired servants and bond servants, as Dr. Hammond had before put in his paraphrase, and proved it in his notes. It is from the mysterious visions of these revelations, especially in the 17th and 18th chapters, that divers Protestant writers would make the people believe that all the popes for above twelve hundred and sixty years have been the detestable antichrist, the great whore of Babylon, the monstrous beast with seven heads and ten horns. This new invention, and their wild fancies upon it, are full as monstrous as the beast. The obscurity of the visions furnishes them with a more convenient handle for their main design, which is to make the pope and the popery odious to the people, where they can with less hazard advance their groundless and licentious expositions: and where the expressions are mystical and allegorical, it is no hard matter, said Dr. Hammond, to transform any thing into any thing, and thus to lead the people by the nose, said Mr. Thorndike on this very subject. Never was there a fable invented by men, that pretend to be interpreters of the holy Scriptures, so empty, so incoherent in its parts, so contradictory to the Scripture, and to the unexceptionable authority of the primitive fathers, to use the words of Dr. Wells, who therefore is pleased to own that he is not so sanguine as divers others of his communion, to think that the popes are the great, literal, and famous antichrist, emphatically so called, but by another new invention, as groundless and as frivolous as the former, he would have above two hundred popes for the same term of twelve hundred and sixty years, to have been the mystical antichrist:
he does not only mean antichrist improperly and metaphorically so called, as are all heretics who teach false doctrine, and so are adversaries to Christ, of which St. John said, (1 John ii. 18.) they are become many antichrists. The doctor's mystical antichrist or antichrists, he pretends were foretold in this revelation of St. John, who were to reign for twelve hundred and sixty days, that is by a new exposition of his learned divines of the reformation, twelve hundred and sixty years, which no one dreamt of before them. I had designed and prepared an appendix to these annotations on the Apocalypse, with a confutation of their arbitrary expositions and groundless arguments; but by the advice of a learned friend, for whose judgment I have the greatest esteem, I shall only give the reader in short what I hope may be sufficient to shew that the popes can neither be that mystical antichrist, nor antichrist emphatically so called: and that both from the authority of Scriptures and of all the primitive Fathers, both of the Greek and Latin Church, in which we find any thing concerning antichrist. It may be observed that the Fathers, or ancient interpreters, sometimes give us their private conjectures and opinions, as St. Augustine takes notice, in which others do not join with them, as that antichrist is to be of the tribe of Dan, a Jew, and chiefly to be acknowledged by the Jews, who will pretend to be their Messias, who is to sit in the temple rebuilt at Jerusalem, to overcome three kings, and seven others to submit to him, &c. These are the suspicions and opinions of some; though none of them favour their system of the popish antichrist. But whosoever consults the primitive Fathers, as I make bold to say I have done with all possible exactness, will find that the Scripture and Fathers unanimously agree in these three following points, (utterly destructive of their systems of the popish antichrist) to wit: 1. That antichrist must be one single man; 2. that he shall not come till about the end of the world; 3. that he shall but reign a very short time. In the holy Scriptures we only find the word itself, antichrist, five times, that is, in the 1st and 2nd Epistle of St. John. In four of these places, he only speaks of antichrists improperly so called, as being seducers and adversaries of Christ; and of the one proper antichrist he only says, (1 John ii. 18,) as you have heard that antichrist cometh, or is to come. But it is generally agreed, even by Protestants, that St. Paul (2 Thessalonians ii.) speaks of the great antichrist;
and there he is called the man of sin, the son of perdition, he who opposeth, and is lifted up above all that is called God, or that is worshipped, &c. St. Paul also there adds, then that wicked one shall be revealed, (i.e. about the time of the day of judgment,) whom the Lord Jesus shall kill with the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of his coming: from which it follows, both that antichrist is to be one man, and that his coming and the glorious coming of our Saviour shall concur together. If our adversaries will understand the predictions of the prophet Daniel (Chap. vii, &c.) of antichrist, and not only of Antiochus, he must also be one particular king, who shall overcome other kings, that little horn that sprang up amidst other ten horns. In the Revelation or Apocalypse of St. John, we no where find the name of antichrist. Secondly, I take notice that divers of the ancient Fathers, as St. Chrysostom, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, Theodoret, &c. never bring any passages out of the Apocalypse when they speak of antichrist. Thirdly, nor is this to be wondered at, since divers of them by the beast, Babylon, and the scarlet whore, understood the devil, or heathen Rome with its heathen Roman emperors, and taught that all those visions till the 20th chapter are fulfilled already, before the coming of antichrist. Dr. Hammond gives their interpretations in these words, in his first note on the Revelation, chapter xviii: "What is said of the fall of Babylon cannot belong to Christian Rome, neither to the emperor Honorius, who was then a Christian, and at Revenna, nor to Innocentius, the pope or bishop of Rome, by the ordering of God's providence....rescued like Lot out of Sodom also at Revenna, nor generally to the Christians, who survived to restore and re-edify the city, a more Christian city than before, but to the heathen part of the city: so that the sum of the fall of Babylon is the destruction of the wicked and heathen, and the preserving of the pure and Christian Rome, and so in effect the bringing of that city and empire to Christianity." Thus Dr. Hammond. Nothing that the Protestants bring, as I think, has even the face or appearance of an objection, unless it be when they tell us, that by Babylon in St. John's Revelation is meant Rome; therefore, say they, the Church of Rome must be Babylon, and the scarlet whore that sitteth there must be the pope with his cardinals, clothed in scarlet and purple. I answer:
All Catholics, and all men of sense, have reason to wonder and ask by what kind of logic they have hooked or drawn into the consequence the Church of Rome. There is not, as the bishop of Meaux[Bossuet] desires the Protestants to take notice, in all these visions and predictions the least hint or insinuation of a fallen corrupted church, but of a heathen city and pagan empire. Many by Babylon understand the multitude of the wicked in general: but we will willingly allow that by Babylon was meant Rome, yet not Christian Rome or the Church of Rome, but heathen Rome and its pagan emperors, with their dress of purple and scarlet. Let me again cite to these our adversaries, the paraphrase of their learned Dr. Hammond, p. 985: "I will shew thee the vengeance that is ready to befall the imperial dignity of Rome, fitly styled the great whore....for their worship of many heathen gods. I saw a woman, that great whore, the imperial power of pagan Rome, seated on an emperor in a scarlet robe, a great blasphemer against God," &c. --- Now as to the ancient Fathers, and what they have witnessed and delivered to us concerning the three above mentioned points. St. Irenæus, on whose testimony the Protestants seem to lay the greatest stress, tells us, (lib. v. c. xxx, p. 361. Ed. Rig.) that antichrist shall be a wicked king....who shall overcome ten other kings. He also makes his conjecture on the number of the name of a single man. As to the time of his coming, he says, (p. 363) that it shall be at the end of the world, and when the end of all things shall come. That he shall reign upon the earth three years and six months: or, as he says again, for forty-two months. Rex impius et injustus....novissimo tempore....quoniam finis fiet....regnans annis tribus et sex mensibus, &c. St. Chrysostom: (tom. 6. Nov. Ed. Ben. p. 238) What is the little horn? I say it is antichrist appearing among some kings, and that he is a man, anthropos esti. See also his 3rd homil. on 2 Thess. Who is antichrist? a certain man, &c. anthropos tis. And hom. iv. Antichrist, says he, will be destroyed by Christ's coming, &c. Theodoret, on Daniel (Chap. vii. t. 2, p. 631. Ed. Par. 1642) The little horn is antichrist, &c. And Chap. xi. He will glorify the god Maozim in this place: which the Protestants may take notice of, that he expounds thus: Instead of the gods which his forefathers adored, he will set himself up for the strong and powerful god, signified by the word Maozim. See on 2 Thess. tom.