Monday, December 14, 2020

The Antichrist in Christian Church History

Searching for the Man of Sin Began in the Early Days of Rome

Oct 4, 2009 Michael Streich

Identifying the antichrist has been a preoccupation of Christians since the persecutions of Christians in Imperial Rome but has taken on new meaning in the 20th Century.

The search for an “antichrist” has been part of Christian tradition since the earliest days of Christianity. During the Roman period, various emperors involved in the persecution of Christians — from Nero to Julian the Apostat — were deemed worthy of the title.

As the Christian church became an established institution following the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire, it was a “spirit of antichrist,” reserved for heretics and “infidels,” that dominated eschatological views. Finally, in the 20th century, the search for the biblical antichrist took new meaning as prophetic interpretation embraced new perspectives, most notably in Protestant fundamentalist denominations.

The Ancient World Antichrists and Christian Persecution

No ancient world leader could have surpassed the qualifications of the Roman Emperor Nero as the awaited antichrist. In the Christian perspective, Nero was the ultimate incarnation of the definitive “man of sin.” His personal lifestyle of immoral behaviors and his proclivities to perceived maniacal violence were linked to the first persecution of Christians following the burning of Rome during his reign by later Christian writers.

Yet Nero was only the first of several emperors to persecute Christians. Domitian and Decius presided over bloody persecutions while Diocletian and Galerius ordered the Great Persecutions of the late 3rd and early 4th centuries. The mid to late 4th century emperor, Julian the Apostate, attempted to restore Paganism while ruthlessly suppressing Christianity. Many Christian leaders of the time viewed him as the promised antichrist.

The Spirit of Antichrist in the Middle Ages

Following the dissolution of the Western Roman Empire, the Christian church emerged as an institution of stability and leadership. Until the 16th century Reformation, excepting occasional heretical threats, the church dominated religious belief and tradition. Secular leadership, though often quarreling with the papacy and its agencies, never directly threatened the theological fundamentals of the church.

The spirit of antichrist was confined to heretical movements and equated with external threats such as the rise and expansion of Islam. Thus, the church was able to galvanize Catholic forces to combat the Muslim occupation of sacred sites in the Holy Land by launching the Crusades. Internal heretical movements like the Cathars in Southern France were also dealt with in similar fashion.

It was the Reformation that would equate the antichrist with the Medieval church itself. Reformer Martin Luther called the pope the “beast,” an Old Testament prophetic term equated with the end times and the coming of the antichrist. In his later years, Luther believed that the end of the world was imminent and that the papacy conformed to prophecies describing events preceding the return of Christ.

20th Century Perspectives on Antichrist

The recent century has seen the most activity in terms of the search for the Biblical man of sin. Significant changes in prophetic interpretation, traced to the dispensational system of theological understanding, established a chronology of eschatology that includes a “rapture” of believing Christians prior to the world domination of an antichrist figure.

This view has generated volumes of books, articles, and other commentary on possible antichrists that have included brutal dictators like Hitler and Stalin, as well as more benign figures like American presidents. When Ronald Wilson Reagan was elected in 1980, extremist writers noted that his full name consisted of three sequences of sixes. The number 666 is significant to those searching for an antichrist.

The Search for the Antichrist Will Continue

Future generations will continue to identify characteristics of the antichrist. Even reputable media outlets like the History Channel have devoted series to the subject.

For Christians, the search is part of an extensive end of times mentality. As long as prophecy is a vital part of Christian theology, identifying the antichrist will be a significant endeavor.

Sources:

Norman Cohn, The Pursuit of the Millennium (Oxford University Press, 1970).
Bernard McGinn, Antichrist: Two Thousand Years of the Human Fascination with Evil (HarperCollins, 1994).

Colonial Religion and End of Time Prophecy Beliefs

Aug 5, 2010 Michael Streich

Colonial Religious Beliefs in the End of the World - Mike Streich Photo Image

Colonial religious views included strong notions of apocalyptic belief that charted the end of time, identified Antichrists, and fostered revivalism.

Protestant American religious tradition has always included a strong belief in the Second Coming of Christ. Although different denominations treat the Second Coming from the perspectives of their own theological belief systems, core elements of apocalyptic understanding are the same. The belief that the existing world would end, ushering in a Utopia, as well as the belief in an Antichrist was already prevalent among Colonial Christians, notably those faith traditions tied to the teachings of John Calvin. In Massachusetts, Puritans firmly believed that New England would be the capital of the “New Earth” of biblical prophecy, and that America had been chosen by God to redeem a lost world.

Common Core Elements of Millennialism in Colonial Religion

Puritans, like all American Protestants until the 20th Century, were post-millennial. They believed that Christ’s return would occur at the end of the final 1,000 year period. The closer to the end of time also meant an increase in Satan’s attacks upon the righteous. The Puritans of New England shared several core elements of apocalyptic belief that are still accepted by post-modern Protestants living in the 21st Century. These include:

Speculating on the exact or tentative date of Christ’s return
Interpreting contemporary events in light of biblical prophecy signs
Identifying Antichrists
Assigning a special role to America in God’s End of Time plan

Setting the Date for the “Day of the Lord”

Puritan minister and theologian Cotton Mather assigned three different dates for the end of time, beginning with 1697. Earlier, Increase Mather gave 1676 as the date the New Jerusalem would be established in America and another Puritan minister, John Cotton, believed 1655 marked the year that the Antichrist would be defeated.

Identifying the Antichrist in Colonial Religious Belief

From the first decade of the early church in Jerusalem, Christians have attempted to identify the biblical Antichrist who would appear in the end times to do battle with Christ and his church. Early colonial Christians were no different. Potential Antichrists included:

The pope
King Charles I
King George III
The Catholic French during the Seven Years’ War
Proponents of Enlightenment Rationalism

This view of a coming Antichrist also helped to explain why Satan appeared to be working so hard to attack God’s faithful. The Salem witch trials of 1692 represented a direct assault by Satan upon the Puritan community already threatened by outside influences. Cotton Mather had warned the theocratic community that Satan was at the door.

The Special Role of America in the Imminent Coming of Christ

Historian Paul Boyer writes that, “From the early 17th Century through the late 18th, the entire span of American colonial history was marked by speculation about America’s role in God’s plan.” John Winthrop’s “City on a Hill” became a metaphor defining the special mission God had for America.

The revivalism of the Great Awakening in the early to mid 18th Century further highlighted this notion of a divine or providential purpose. Jonathan Edwards, famously known for his sermon “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” pointed to the Great Awakening as a sign of the coming of Christ and the establishment of the new heaven and earth.

This would be repeated in the 19th Century during the Second Great Awakening, a period of intense revivalism that produced several new faith traditions originally rooted in the belief in the imminent coming of Christ. This includes the Seventh Day Adventist church – coming, in part, out of the Millerite Movement, and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

Impact of Apocalyptic Belief on American History

The “chosen people” or “chosen nation” aspect of millennial belief helped to justify expansionism and Manifest Destiny. It added to the national self-identity as a people blessed for a special purpose. Political Scientist James Morone writes that, “Evangelical fervor for Christ’s Second Coming led the way to both revolution and civil war; it ran deep in 19th Century black religion and reached its soaring apotheosis in Abraham Lincoln’s Second Inaugural Address.”

This legacy still motivates 21st Century Americans seeking to spread democracy throughout the world and baptize global cultures in egalitarian principles. Although many American evangelical faiths now hold to a pre-millennial Second Coming, the self-identity rooted in apocalyptic mission held to by Colonial Christians is still there.

Sources:

Paul Boyer, When Time Shall Be No More: Prophecy Belief in Modern American Culture (Cambridge: The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1992)
David D. Hall, World of Wonder; Days of Judgment: Popular Religious Belief in Early New England (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1989)
James A. Morone, Hellfire Nation: The Politics of Sin in American History (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2003)
Richard Weisman, Witchcraft, Magic, and Religion in 17th-Century Massachusetts (University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, 1984)

Witchcraft in the American Colonies

Magic and Superstition in Everyday New England Life

Sep 6, 2009 Michael Streich

Monument in Salem Commemorating the Trials - Salem Witch Museum Tour Photo

Persecution of witches was most apparent in Colonial New England where strict Calvinist views formed the basis of a theocratic, Old Testament model that accepted witches.

In Nathaniel Hawthorne’s 1835 story “Young Goodman Brown,” the pious Goodman Brown ventures into the “haunted forest” to converse with the devil. A resistant Brown is told, “Wickedness or not…I have a very general acquaintance here in New England.” Hawthorne reminds the reader of the Puritan preoccupation with evil as a very real and constant threat to the theocracy of the “godly communities.” It was what prompted Cotton Mather to write “Memorable Provinces relating to witchcraft and Possessions” one year before the outbreak of the 1692 witch trials. Witchcraft, magic, and superstition played a unique role in 17th Century New England.

Origins of New England Belief in Witches and Magic

Oxford historian Keith Thomas’ classic study of religion and magic in England states that the Reformation had placed “an unprecedented stress upon the reality of the Devil and the extent of his earthly dominion.” New England Puritans were well aware of the prolonged period of the European witch-craze that lasted from the 15th into the 17th century and claimed over half a million lives, mostly women. Their worldview accepted the active role of the devil. Even John Calvin, the theological founder of their doctrines, had burned witches.

Puritan Beliefs in Witches and Magic

Puritan views of witchcraft and evil were based on a literal interpretation of the Bible: “thou shalt not suffer a witch to live.” (Exodus 22.18) New England Puritans were Old Testament Christians, modeling their social structures on the Old Testament patriarchal system and appropriating the “covenant” promises for themselves. Thus, if one member of the community sinned, the entire community was punished. The first execution for witchcraft occurred in 1647 when Alice Young was convicted; between 1662-1663, a minor witch “panic” resulted in more executions.

Omens and Natural Wonders Fed New England Beliefs in Witches

Prior to the 1692 witch hysteria in Salem, three eclipses occurring in 1680, 1682, and 1686 were perceived as evil omens. It was these celestial events Cotton Mather referred to as “Memorable Provinces” in his 1691 treatise warning New England that the devil was preparing a final onslaught to disrupt the Puritan theocracy.

Secularism and the fruits of the Scientific Revolution and the emerging Enlightenment threatened the decades old belief systems of Calvinist New England. Additionally, by 1692, the trained clergy were less literate than their forerunners had been. These men tended to rely more on the accepted conventions of post-medieval cosmologies. Historian David Hawke writes that, “the supernatural was the basis of their piety.”

Witchcraft in the Other English Colonies

By the mid-17th century, it was a crime in Virginia to accuse someone of witchcraft and the charge itself was never considered a capital crime. A 1706 witchcraft trial in Virginia as well as a 1712 trial in North Carolina resulted in acquittal, despite that fact that the accused woman in Virginia confessed to witchcraft.

The absence of other accusations and trials – even in other colonies founded on the basis of “religious freedom,” suggests that the belief and treatment of witchcraft in New England was unique to Puritan views and entrenched within specific Biblical and Reformation interpretations. Additionally, Puritans resisted the prevailing European changes in intellectual thought that ultimately replaced medieval cosmology with pre-modern models of rationalism.

Aftermath of the Salem Witch Trials in Puritan New England

The Salem trials exposed the Puritan theocracy and in the process severely weakened theological belief and the ability to communicate effective sermons pointing toward an authentic Christian lifestyle. This would be remedied by the early 18th-Century Great Awakening that, through the articulate preaching of men like John Wesley and Jonathan Edwards, placed Christian responsibility on the individual rather than the community.

Sources:

David Freeman Hawke, Everyday Life in Early America (New York: Harper and Row, 1988)
Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Young Goodman Brown, “ Great American Short Stories edited by Wallace and Mary Stegner (New York: Dell Publishing Company, Inc., 1957)
Dale Taylor, The Writer’s Guide to Everyday Life in Colonial America (Cincinnati: Writers Digest Books, 1997)
Keith Thomas, Religion & the Decline of Magic (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1971)
Salem Witch Museum

Susanna Martin Accused of Witchcraft in Salem May 2, 1692

Jan 21, 2011 Michael Streich

Salem Witch Trials of 1692 - Wikimedia Commons Image: Public Domain

The examination of Susanna Martin demonstrates the folly of spectral evidence as the only legal tool used by magistrates to condemn innocent women to hang.

In 1692 Salem Village in Massachusetts saw itself as the battleground between the forces of the devil and God’s people. In that same year, Puritan theological leader Cotton Mather had written The Wonders of the Invisible World, noting that “…The New Englanders are a people of God settled in those which were once the devil’s territories…”

Historian Perry Miller refers to the “afflicted” Puritans that gave “spectral evidence” in the examinations and trials as “emotionally unstable” and lays the blame, in part, on “neurotic women and hysterical children.” This was the dilemma for Susanna Martin on May 2, 1692, in which she told her accusers, “I have no hand in witchcraft.”

The Examination of Accused Witch Susanna Martin

Susanna Martin refused to confess. As she was brought to the examination, her accusers reacted physically: “as soon as she came in many had fits.” This set the tone for the hearing. The reaction of the accusing members of the community predisposed the examiners. Martin was guilty and her sole recourse to avoid hanging was sincere confession. But a true witch could never confess, having made a pact or covenant with the devil, according to Puritan belief.

Before any questions were put to her, several of her accusers blamed her for their fits. Some were pinched. All were tormented physically. Martin’s response was to laugh. She was seventy years old and had been accused of witchcraft years earlier. As an old, impoverished widow, she fit the profile of women convicted and sentenced to death for witchcraft.

Martin’s Knowledge of the Bible and the Whispering Black Man

Her examiners asked how her appearance at the hearing could cause hurt to those in attendance. Martin’s response was from I Samuel 28: 14-15, casting the accusation of evil onto her accusers: “he that appeared in Samuel in the shape of a glorified saint can appear in anyone’s shape.”

If the devil could masquerade as the prophet Samuel, he could certainly do so as Massachusetts' farmers and their wives. Martin referred to Samuel as a “glorified saint,” indicating that the prophet was in heaven and that the apparition summoned by King Saul was a demon or perhaps the devil himself. Martin knew, from hearing countless sermons, that the devil could appear as an angel of God, intent on deceiving the faithful.

Susanna Martin’s accusers claimed that “…there was a black man with her…” The examiners asked Martin, “…who is the black man whispering to you?” The term “black” was often employed to refer to the “black arts” in the Colonial period. In Old English, the term is frequently associated with “black moor,” referring to Muslims that were considered infidels. Martin’s “black man” was an obvious reference to the devil. 18th Century Protestant broadsheets and woodcuts depicted demons as small black imps. Throughout Europe, the devil was often portrayed as a large, black tomcat.

Martin Defies the Salem Court and is Executed for Witchcraft

Spectral evidence sent Martin to the scaffold. Martin, however, proclaimed her innocence until the end and mocked the hysteria of her accusers. Spectral evidence encouraged the “wiles and subtlety” of her accusers, a phrase used by another accused witch Mary Easty. It was enough for Increase Mather to write in 1693, “It were better that ten suspected witches should escape, than that one innocent person should be condemned.”

Salem Witch Trials Shame the Puritans

Historian Perry Miller notes that once Massachusetts Governor Sir William Phips ended the trials, the entire episode was forgotten: “after 1692…the very word witchcraft almost vanishes from public discourse.” Miller notes that not until 1721 were the incidents openly discussed.

The Puritans were trapped by their own closed society – a society built upon a covenant relationship with God that, like the Old Testament Israelites, was constantly tested by heathen influences. Hence, the wiles of the “evil one” were long anticipated. Puritan history in New England has a long legacy of spiritual conflict between the righteous and those sowing the seed of discord, including witches and heretics like Ann Hutchinson.

Spectral evidence had already been discounted in Europe where the witch craze had run its course. But New England Puritan society was closed and paranoid. It was the special covenantal relationship, built upon Old Testament concepts, which perceived a literal devil doing everything in his power to destroy community solidarity.

Susanna Martin was a heroic martyr who refused to succumb to what Miller refers to as “abnormal states of mind.” Her confession might have spared her, but she would not perjure herself. Her death was a righteous act of principle.

Sources:

Alison Games, Witchcraft in Early North America (Rowman & Littlefield, 2010)
Alan Heimert and Andrew Delbanco, editors, The Puritans in America: A Narrative Anthology (Harvard University Press, 1985)
Perry Miller, The New England Mind From Colony to Province (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1983)
Perry Miller and Thomas H. Johnson, The Puritans (American Book Company, 1938)
Richard Weisman, Witchcraft, Magic, and Religion in 17th-Century Massachusetts (The University of Massachusetts Press, Amherst, 1984)

Sunday, December 13, 2020

Collective Bargaining and Unionization in America

Feb 20, 2011 Michael Streich

Senator Robert Wagner Speaks About the NLRA - Library of Congress/U.S. Gov't Photo Image

The National Labor Relations Act allowed for collective bargaining in union disputes between workers and employers, ensuring fair negotiations.

1877 was a difficult year for American labor and capitalism. Over the next twenty years, industrialization widened the gulf between rich and poor. In 1886 alone, there were over 1,400 strikes across the nation. Often turning violent, as with the 1892 Homestead steel plant strike in Pennsylvania or Chicago’s Haymarket strike in 1886, the goals of labor were equated with socialism and anarchism. Not until 1935 was collective bargaining legalized under the National Labor Relations Act. Today collective bargaining is again under attack.

Collective Bargaining and the NLRA

The National Labor Relations Act guarantees private sector workers the right to organize unions and bargain collectively through union representatives with employers. Public sector employers like teachers are excluded, although many public sector employees are represented by unions. Both state and past judicial decisions have broadened collective bargaining to include almost all employees, even if publicly employed.

Individual states can regulate collective bargaining and arbitration or outlaw union activity by public sector employees altogether, as many Southern states have done. Collective bargaining, as part of the NLRA, was a means toward good faith negotiation between employees and employers. Eliminating collective bargaining would deprive employees of a way to protect benefits like health care and pensions.

The Continued Need for Unions in America

The economic downturn that began in 2008 continues with unemployment rates at or over 9%. Many states are facing budget “shortfalls” in the billions of dollars, necessitating the elimination of public sector jobs and the curtailment of vital social services. Caught in between are millions of workers that will lose health and pension benefits.

Unions in America were originally formed to organize workers against the excesses of labor practices such as 12-14 hour work days. Industrial workers lived in “factory towns” like Pullman town near Chicago, subsisting at the mercy of employers. In the South, factory towns sprang up around large textile enterprises like Fieldcrest Mills in Reidsville, NC or Cannon Mills in Salisbury, NC.

Originally, unions like the 1869 Knight of Labor combined temperance with worker agendas. Craft unions like Samuel Gompers’ American Federation of Labor catered to skilled workers, fighting for an eight-hour workday and higher wages. Not until the Progressive Era were many of these complaints addressed.

Unemployment and the Great Depression

Senator Robert Wagner’s National Labor Relations Act was designed to establish rights for workers through union representation. Collective bargaining was one important tool in reestablishing equilibrium between labor and capital, although critics deemed it socialism.

The NLRA became a hallmark of New Deal legislation. At the same time, unionization was viewed as a form of monopoly that could restrict the number of workers employed. Despite this, however, collective bargaining continues to ensure an open dialogue between employer and worker. It continues to serve as a form of protection against arbitrary actions designed to strip workers of key benefits.

Sources:

Cornell University Law School, Legal Information Institute

J. Joseph Huthmacher, Senator Robert Wagner And The Rise of Urban Liberalism (Atheneum, 1968)

Page Smith, The Rise of Industrial America: A People’s History of the Post-Reconstruction Era (Penguin Books, 1984)