The antichrist is not a single future figure. Reasoning From the
Scriptures (pp. 32-33) teaches that 1 John 2:18's "many antichrists"
are collectively "the antichrist," 1 John 4:3 says it is "already
in the world," and 1 John 2:19 — "they went out from us" — describes
mainline Christendom apostatising from the true first-century
church. Any system denying "Jesus as the Christ" or opposing the
Watchtower is therefore antichrist: Nicene creeds, clergy,
Trinitarianism, Christmas, and Easter included.
The rs antichrist argument is a load-bearing identity claim — it
lets a JW dismiss every Protestant minister before the first
sentence. Your goal is not to win an eschatology debate. It is to
read 1 John whole, past rs's partial quotations, and let the letter
name its own antichrist.
- Grant the plural. John does say antichrists are "many" and
"already" (; 4:3). Irenaeus (Against Heresies 5.25, c.
AD 180) and Hippolytus (On Christ and Antichrist, c. AD 200) both
recognised a present-tense spirit of antichrist in the heretics of
their own day — and both also expected a climactic future figure.
Paul says the same: the "man of lawlessness" of is singular, personal, and destroyed by the Lord Jesus at
his bodily return. Every historic Protestant scheme — amillennial,
postmillennial, historic premillennial — holds the both/and. The
rs "plural only" reading flattens what John and Paul actually
wrote. - Let John name his own antichrists. in the NWT
defines them directly: the failing test is a spirit that does not
"confess Jesus Christ as having come in the flesh." 2 John 7 is
clearer still: "many deceivers have gone forth into the world,
persons not confessing Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This
is the deceiver and the antichrist." The antichrists of the letter
are specific and first-century — docetists and proto-gnostics who
denied that the Christ-spirit truly took on flesh. opens
with exactly that emphasis: "what we have heard, what we have seen
with our eyes, what we have looked at and our hands have handled."
That is anti-docetic, not anti-Nicene. It also tells you who the
"they" of are: the same docetists named in chapter 4
and in 2 John 7 — not the Reformation. Every Protestant confession
of every tradition affirms that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh,
which excludes mainline Christianity from John's category by the
text's own stated content. Historically the movement that actually
fits "went out from us" is the Watchtower itself: a nineteenth-
century restoration with a brand-new Christology, while mainline
Protestant confessions trace their Christology through the
Reformation to the Nicene Fathers to the apostles. - Throw the boomerang. John supplies two explicit tests for
antichrist Christology, both preserved in the NWT.
Test one, : "the one that denies that Jesus is the
Christ ... the one that denies the Father and the Son."
Test two, : a
spirit is from God if it "confesses Jesus Christ as having come in
the flesh." Now read in your own NWT, whose closing
sentence the Watchtower's translation leaves in the text: "This is
the true God and life everlasting." The grammatical question is
what "this" refers to. The immediate antecedent in the sentence is
Jesus Christ, and most modern critical grammarians — Murray Harris
in his monograph Jesus as God included — read 5:20 as a
Christological climax in an inclusio with and
("My Lord and my God"). The 15 October 2004 Watchtower article
"Who Is 'the True God and Eternal Life'?" defends the Father-
reading by having "this" skip its nearest antecedent, which
overrides the standard rule. The grammar stays contested, and you
do not need to win it. The question on the table is simpler: does
the rs book affirm that Jesus is the true God, or deny it? The
rs answer is no — which places the Watchtower's Christology on the
exact side of that the rs book uses to condemn mainline
Christianity. The boomerang is already in the text. - Land the gospel. John wrote the letter to secure his readers in
the gift of abiding in the Father and the Son. His closing line
names Jesus as the true God and life everlasting. That is where
this argument lands — not in a scored label, but in the invitation
to the Son.
John gives two tests for antichrist Christology: denial that Jesus is the Christ (), and denial that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh (; 2 John 7). The NWT preserves both, and in the NWT ends: "This is the true God and life everlasting." The rs book uses 1 John to call mainline Christianity antichrist — but the letter's own tests catch Watchtower Christology in its own net. The boomerang is in the text.
1 John 2:18 says 'many antichrists,' plural. There is no single future antichrist figure — the Watchtower is simply reading what the text says.
The same verse in your NWT continues: "just as you have heard that antichrist is coming, even now there have come to be many antichrists." John holds both — present plural AND future singular ("is coming"). Paul does the same in : "the mystery of lawlessness is already at work ... then the lawless one will be revealed." Irenaeus and Hippolytus, writing within living memory of John's disciples, held both/and, and every historic Protestant scheme has followed them. The present plural is real; the future singular is sitting in the very next phrase.
1 John 2:19 'they went out from us' is the Bible's own prophecy of Christendom leaving the first-century true church.
Read the rest of the letter to find out who "they" are. in your NWT says the test is whether a spirit "confesses Jesus Christ as having come in the flesh," and 2 John 7 is clearer still: "many deceivers have gone forth into the world, persons not confessing Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is the deceiver and the antichrist." The defectors of 2:19 are the same group named in 4:3 and 2 John 7 — first-century docetists who denied Jesus had come in a real physical body. opens the whole letter with exactly that emphasis: "what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we have looked at and our hands have handled." Mainline Protestant churches confess Jesus Christ come in the flesh, so the verse's own content excludes us. Historically, the movement that left apostolic Christianity is the Watchtower — it began in the 1870s with a brand-new Christology, while mainline Protestant confessions trace their Christology through the Reformation to the Nicene Fathers to the apostles.
1 John 5:20 says 'the true God' is 'the true one' — the Father, not Jesus. The 2004 Watchtower article shows the grammar carefully.
The 2004 article defends the Father-reading by having the pronoun "this" skip over its nearest antecedent — "Jesus Christ" — to reach back to "the true one." That is grammatically possible but it overrides the standard immediate- antecedent rule. Murray Harris (Jesus as God) and the majority of modern critical grammarians read 5:20 as a Christological climax in an inclusio with and . The grammar is genuinely contested and I am not asking you to concede it this minute. I am asking you to notice that the NWT could have footnoted the sentence out and did not. And verse 2:22 — the verse the rs book uses to define antichrist — says the antichrist is "the one that denies the Father and the Son." If 5:20's natural reading is Christological, denying it is exactly what 2:22 flags.
Even if 'come in the flesh' was about docetists in the first century, the same category extends today to anyone opposing Jehovah's earthly organisation.
John supplies the content himself: denial that Jesus is the Christ (2:22), denial that Jesus Christ came in the flesh (4:2), denial of the Father and the Son (2:22). He does not write "opposition to an organisation." Once we substitute our own content for John's content, the word becomes a loyalty badge rather than a Christological test — and that substitution is exactly the move the rs book is making when it reroutes "antichrist" onto Christendom. The test John actually supplies is narrower, and it is the test the Watchtower's own Christology fails.
Do not overclaim the 1 John 5:20 grammar — it is contested and a prepared JW will come armed with the 2004 Watchtower article. Present the Christological reading as "the most natural and the majority critical view," and make the argument ride on 2:22 + 4:2 + 2 John 7, not on 5:20 alone. Do not drift into a dispensational rapture debate — this argument is neutral on millennial schemes. Do not call the JW at your door antichrist; the rhetorical point is that John's test is narrower than the Watchtower thinks, not that the person in front of you wears the label. And do not use "Christendom" with emotional weight — the word is loaded for JWs. Ask instead about "mainline Protestant churches who confess Jesus Christ come in the flesh," because that is what John's test is actually about.
Read 1 John through in your own New World Translation in one sitting. Mark every use of "antichrist" (2:18; 2:22; 4:3) and every place John defines what makes someone one. Then read 2 John 7, and — notice what "this" is sitting next to grammatically. Then read the 15 October 2004 Watchtower article "Who Is 'the True God and Eternal Life'?" and ask yourself whether skipping the nearest antecedent is convincing. Finally, read and ask: who was John writing against?