For many Christians, Islam being featured prominently in the end times is a new concept, and for many, particularly pastors in the Protestant tradition, they are very interested to know the Reformers’ views on Islam.
Understanding the Abomination of Desolation will come at the end
Before we delve into their writings, there is a caveat. Personally, while I have great respect for the reformers and their spiritual insight, I am mindful of several declarations in Scripture that the understanding of the end times would not come prior to the end times. Below are just a few.
Daniel 12:4,9 “But you, Daniel, keep these words secret and seal the book until the time of the end. Many will roam about, and knowledge will increase.”… 9 He said, “Go on your way, Daniel, for the words are secret and sealed until the time of the end.
Daniel 8:26 “The vision of the evenings and the mornings
that has been told is true.
Now you are to seal up the vision
because it refers to many days in the future.”
Revelation 10:4 And when the seven thunders spoke, I was about to write, but I heard a voice from heaven, saying, “Seal up what the seven thunders said,and do not write it down!”
So while we value the reformers’ insights, we cannot regard the their views or even the early churches’ views on the times of the end with any great authority. In the same vein, should the Lord delay his coming another 500 years, saints at that time, should not hold our apparent understanding of the end times today with any authority.
Why then do we seek to understand and see fulfillment in our times?
It is our privilege to seek to understand how the Lord works and to seek to understand his mysteries. More importantly, we are commanded to watch:
Mark 13:23, 33 “And you must watch! I have told you everything in advance.”…”“Watch! Be alert! For you don’t know when the time is coming.”
Matthew 24:42; 25:13 “42 Therefore be alert, since you don’t know what dayyour Lord is coming.”…”13Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour.”
Revelation 16:15 “Behold, I am coming as a thief. Blessed is he who watches, and keeps his garments, lest he walk naked and they see his shame.”
What’s the point of watching or thinking about this?
We watch so we are not deceived.
It is useless to set the day and the hour for Christ’s coming.
It is folly to neglect it.
(Word Pictures in the New Testament, pp. 194-5).
I agree that we do not know the day or hour, however we should be able to see the times. Jesus condemns the pharisees for not understanding the times.
Matthew 16:1-3 “The Pharisees and Sadducees approached, and tested him, asking him to show them a sign from heaven. 2 He replied, “When evening comes you say, ‘It will be good weather because the sky is red.’ 3 And in the morning, ‘Today will be stormy because the sky is red and threatening.’ Youknow how to read the appearance of the sky, but you can’t read the signs of the times.”
But Jesus also speaks of the wise knowing and recognising he his near. Immediately before Jesus said that “no one knows the day or hour”, he also said, Matthew 24:33 “In the same way, when you see all these things, recognize that he is near—at the door.” And this makes sense that we will see and understand if the understanding of Daniel’s prophecies are secret until the end times.
Matthew 25:6 ““In the middle of the night there was a shout: ‘Here’s the groom! Come out to meet him.’”
And there are other commendations to look and notice the times.
Hebrew 10:25 “…encouraging each other, and all the more as you see the day approaching.”
1 Thessalonians 5:2-4 “But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that the day could overtake you like a thief”
But what did the Refomers think?
Theonomist and post-millenialist, the late Rev. Prof. Dr. Francis Nigel Lee (Queensland Presbyterian Theological College) wrote in his essay “Calvin on Islam”, that God sent two scourges to help keep the church pure: Islam and the papacy1. Lee expounds that many “bible-affirming commentators” such as: Selnecker, Nigrinus, Chytraeus, Bullinger, Foxe, Napier, Pareus, John Cotton, Thomas Parker, Increase Mather, Cotton Mather, Jonathan Edwards, and George Stanley Faber, all held that Islam and Papacy were predicted in Daniel or Revelation or both. Much of what follows are direct quotes, that have been verified from Lee’s works.2. To read the full text rather than selected quotes alone, see footnote 2.
In the interest of full disclosure: I was personally acquainted with Dr. Lee, although I never discussed Islam with him, which was indeed odd as I was writing several books on Islam in the years before Lee’s passing. It was only while researching the reformers’ views on Islam that I came across an uncharitable reference to Dr Lee’s works. While his essays, more properly called notes, IMO, are in urgent need of formatting, nonetheless considerable attention has been applied to understanding Islam from the reformers’ view. I am indeed fortunate that his library was bequeathed to a close friend of mine, and so I have access to much of his reference material.
Calvin himself held that “Mahomet” was one of “the two horns of Antichrist.” 3 {I would suggest they were the two branches of Islam – Sunni and Shia}. And in his commentaries on Daniel (7:7-18), Calvin describes the four successive empires of the Ancient World that would precede the incarnation of the Messiah, and include the “Turkish Kingdom” as part of the Roman empire.
Rev. Dr. Matthew Henry, on his comment on the little horn (Daniel 7:20f) writes “…Others make the ‘little horn’ to be the Turkish Empire; so Luther, Vatablus, and others. Now I cannot prove either side to be in the wrong. And therefore, since prophecies sometimes have many fulfillings and we ought to give Scripture its full latitude (in this as in many other controversies) — I am willing to allow that they are both in the right….”4
Westminster Assembly theologian Thomas Goodwin goes into some detail that Islam and Papacy are the main subject of the Book of Revelation, claiming that Mohammad was the star spoken of in Revelation 9:1 Unto him [came] an innumerable company of Arabs, his countrymen who are here called ‘locusts’ for their multitudes…. Wringing Arabia, Egypt, Assyria, Armenia, and much of Asia the Less from out of the hands of the Eastern Empire — and extending their dominion further over Persia, East India and a great part of Africa and Spain.
In his magnificent book A History of the Work of Redemption, Princeton’s first President Rev. Prof. Dr. Jonathan Edwards explains:
“The two great works of the Devil which he…wrought against the Kingdom of Christ, are…his Anti-christian [Romish or Papal] and Mahometan [Muslim or Islamic] kingdoms — which have been, and still are, two kingdoms of great extent and strength. Both together swallow…up the Ancient Roman Empire; the [Papal] kingdom of Antichrist swallowing up the Western Empire, and Satan’s Mahometan kingdom the Eastern Empire…. In the Book of Revelation [chapters 16 to 20]…it is in the destruction of these that the glorious victory of Christ at the introduction of the glorious times of the Church, will mainly consist…. “
1260 ‘days’ or years…are so often in Scripture mentioned as the time of the continuance of Antichrist’s reign….” “First the Saracens…of the country of Arabia where Mahomet lived, about the year 700 began dreadfully to waste the Roman Empire…. These are supposed to be meant by the ‘locusts’ that we read of in the ninth chapter of Revelation. And then, after this, the Turks, who…were followers of Mahomet, conquered all the Eastern Empire. They began…to invade Europe 1300, and took Constantinople and so became masters of all the Eastern Empire in the year 1453…. These are supposed tobe prophesied of, by the ‘horsemen’ in the ninth chapter of Revelation.”
Lee continues…
Wrote John: “The fifth angel sounded [his] trumpet. And I saw a star fall from the sky upon the Earth. And to him was given the key of the bottomless pit.” (Rev 9:1).
The prototypical or original ‘fallen star’ was, and is, Satan. Yet according to Rev. Prof. Dr. Philip Schaff, Rev. Dr. Albert Barnes and also Apostolos Makrakis — the particular ‘fallen star’ mentioned right here, was the religious leader Mohammed (570-632 A.D.)5.
Also the 1637 Calvinistic Staten-vertaling Dutch Bible (commissioned by the famous 1618f ‘T-U-L-I-P’ Council of Dordt) remarks: “Some understand this star to be Mohammed and his followers. They around 620 scraped together his ungodly doctrine — which was brought forth from the bottomless pit — from [perversions of] Judaism, Paganism and Christianity.”
Writes Rev. Prof. Dr. Alexander Keith: “There is practically no part of the entire Book [of Revelation] which is interpreted so uniformly as the exposition of the fifth and sixth seals…. It is applied to the Saracens and the Turks.” Indeed, Professor Davis (in his Short History of the Near East) adds: “The cloud of the Saracenic invasion from the Arabian deserts rolled northward!”
Comments Dr. Thomas Goodwin: “Then succeeds the sixth trumpet, which is the second woe-trumpet…ordained to bring calamities on the other part of the Eastern Empire which was left standing still…and professing the Christian Religion in Asia the Less and in Greece. Chapter 9:14-16, ‘saying to the sixth angel which had the trumpet, “Loosen the four angels which are bound in the great river Euphrates!”’….
“Now according to all the characters and footprints which we find in the Turkish stories — no prophecy doth or can more punctually describe any nation or event than this doth the Turks and their irruption upon the Eastern Empire. They then came first out of their native country [Turk-menistan to the east of the Euphrates in Central Asia] about the year 1040 after Christ. “They did seat themselves first by the river Euphrates. They were divided into four several governments or kingdoms known commonly in historians by these four names — first, Iconian, seated at Iconium; the second at Aleppo; the third at Damascus; and the fourth at Baghdad…on the river Euphrates. Who, having lain hovering thereabout for the space of two hundred years, did — about the year of Christ 1300 — overrun all Natolia or Asia the Less. Joining all into one kingdom under Ottoman the forefather of the present Great Turk, they did not cease till they had won Constantinople itself and all Greece…in the year 1453….”
Sir William Muir points out in his book The Caliphate: “Like swarms from a beehive or like locusts darkening the air, the one Arabian tribe after the other emerged and rolled to the North, and then spread out in great hordes to the East and the West.” Thus, the Arab Muslims almost totally wiped out the Christian Church all the way from Northern India to Northwest Africa.
Rev. Dr. Albert Barnes agrees: “With surprising unanimity, commentators have agreed in regarding this as referring to the empire of the Saracens, or to the rise and progress of the religion and the empire set up by Mohammed…. Mohammedan tradition speaks of locusts having dropped into the hands of Mohammed…. Nothing would better represent…the Saracenic hordes that came out of Arabia and that spread over the East, over Egypt, Libya, Mauritania, Spain — and that threatened to spread over Europe.”
The locusts have over them, Appollyon, or Abaddon, “The destroyer”. One of Allah’s names is “The Destroyer” (Al-Mumit).
Explains Luther:132 “In chapters 9 and 10 [of the Book of Revelation], the real misery begins. For these earlier bodily and spiritual tribulations are almost a jest, compared with the plagues that are to come. The first woe, the fifth angel, is Arius…who plagued the Church so terribly everywhere…. The second woe is the sixth angel, the shameful Mohammed, with his companions the Saracens, who inflicted a great plague on the Church — with their doctrines and with the word.”
Now it was God in Christ Himself Who unleashed this Turkish scourge from the Euphrates against the West.133 For the Voice from the four horns of the golden altar, comments the Geneva Bible, is “the Voice of Christ sitting at the right hand of the Father…. The four angels which are bound in the great River Euphrates” signify “the enemies of the East Country who would afflict the Church of God — as did the Arabians, Saracens, Turks, and Tartars.”
Also the Dordt Dutch Bible comments:134 “By these ‘four angels’ all expositors mostly understand the sect of the Mohammedans. They consist especially of four nations who subjugate all the others — namely the Arabs, Saracens, Tartars, and Turks.”
John Calvin in his commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2, regarding the man of sin, the son of destruction, while applying this to Catholicism and the papacy, also sees its fulfillment in the kingdom of Islam6. And while Calvin regards the temple as being spiritual, rather than the physical temple mount, he maintains that the heresies of Islam have taken more than a third of the church.
In speaking on the battle of Armageddon in Revelation 16, Jonathan Edwards writes: “In this last great opposition which shall be made against the Church to defend the kingdom of Satan — all the forces of Antichrist and Mahometanism and Heathenism will be united…through[out] the Whole World…. It is said that ‘spirits of devils shall go forth unto the kings of the Earth and of the whole World, to gather them together to the battle of the great day of God Almighty’….These spirits are said to come out of the mouth of the Dragon, and out of the mouth of the Beast, and out of the mouth of the False-Prophet…. There shall be the spirit of Popery, and the spirit of Mahometanism, and the spirit of Heathenism — all united. By the Beast, is meant Antichrist…. By the False-Prophet…an eye seems to be had to Mahomet, whom his followers call the ‘Great Prophet’…. Christ and His Church shall in this battle obtain a complete and entire victory over their enemies. They shall be totally routed and overthrown…. “Satan has set up in opposition to the Christian Church…his Mahometan kingdom. It shall be utterly overthrown. The ‘locusts’ and ‘horsemen’’ in the ninth [chapter] of Revelation, have their appointed and limited time set them there…. “The False-Prophet shall be taken and destroyed. And then, though Mahometanism has been so vastly propagated in the World and is upheld by such a great Empire — this smoke which has ascended out of the bottomless pit shall be utterly scattered before the light of that glorious day, and the Mahometan Empire shall fall at the sound of the great trumpet which shall then be blown.” 7
There is much more that could be written or quoted, in great detail about how the reformers understood Islam and the various fulfillment. Rather than quote his essay, it is strongly recommended that you read Lee’s works on Islam. https://dr-fnlee.org/category/islam/
Through all this, very few reformers recognised the fulfillment of Daniel’s prophecy about the Abomination, for good reason: it was to remain secret until the times of the end. So they could see fulfillment of the Islamic hordes in many chapters of Revelation, but the times pertaining to the Abomination and the Blessed hope, were hidden from them, just as prophesied. So, for the postmillenial or amillenial, consider the reformers view that Islam is explicitly referred to in Daniel and Revelation, and is not a “spiritual” or “allegorical” application. For the pre-tribulationist believing that much of Revelation is yet future, consider that the Reformers could see much of the works of Islam fulfiling Revelation.
The Reformers did not see the decline and fatal wound of Islam; they did not live to see Israel regathered, and the land bloom as prophesied. They scarcely could have imagined the raw power that the United States would wield, or the end of papal authority over secular governments, or the unashamed promotions of all kinds of sexual immorality.
For you and I today, it is worth reading the insights of the reformers, but we must realise too that the ultimate understanding will only remain secret until the times of the end. We watch, and consider history and contemporary events to see whether they fulfill the Lord’s promises. We look forward to his return.
FOOTNOTES
- Lee, F.N. (2000) “Calvin on Islam”, p.4. https://studylib.net/doc/18479083/islam-in-the-bible-rev.-professor-dr.-francis-nigel-lee
- Lee, ‘Luther on Islam and Papacy’, https://dr-fnlee.org/luther-on-islam-and-the-papacy/
Lee, ‘Islam in the Bible’, https://dr-fnlee.org/islam-in-the-bible/
Lee, ‘Calvin on Islam’, https://dr-fnlee.org/calvin-on-islam - J. Calvin: Sermons on Deuteronomy (18:15), Edinburgh: Banner of Truth Trust, 1987 rep. [1556-57], p. 666. and https://www.monergism.com/thethreshold/sdg/calvin/Sermons%20on%20Deuteronomy%20-%20John%20Calvin.pdf, pg.1351
- M. Henry: A Commentary on the Holy Bible, with Practical Remarks and Observations, London: Marshall Bros. Ltd., n.d., IV:1270f.
- See P. Schaff’s article Mohammed, in Schaff-Herzog Encyclopaedia of Religious Knowledge, Funk & Wagnall, New York, 1891, III:1541; A. Makrakis’s Interpretation of the Revelation of St. John the Divine (Orthodox Christian Educational Society, Chicago, 1972); and A Barnes: Revelation [1860], Baker, Grand Rapids, 1949.
- https://biblehub.com/commentaries/calvin/2_thessalonians/2.htm
- J. Edwards’s, History of Redemption, (Period II Part II Application 4).
