I have a long-established academic interest in the study of Catholic apocalypticism and eschatological hopes, arising from my original reading of Second Temple Jewish texts and then the Patristics. Two years ago, I presented a number of authentic and sourced Byzantine prophecies in this thread: https://motheofgod.com/threads/byzantine-prophecies-on-the-last-emperor-and-era-of-peace.16950/. As I have noted in previous posts, many on this forum are familiar with the medieval Catholic and Eastern Orthodox prophecies of a Great Monarch. This eschatological figure essentially fulfils the Pauline function of katechon (from Greek: τὸ κατέχον, "that which withholds", or ὁ κατέχων, "the one who withholds", the eschatological restrainer of the 'lawless one' or Son of Perdition and thus of the eschaton, as described by St. Paul in 2 Thessalonians 2:6–7). There are a great deal of spurious 'prophecies' floating around on the internet, some sourced from books by Yves Dupont in the '80s, which 'riff' off of this concept but are either French royalist forgeries of the 19th cetury or modern pseudopigraphs. Whenever I post, for the benefit of other Catholics who find meaning and significance in this fascinating eschatological tradition, I make a concerted effort to help 'sift' the contrived texts from the authentic ones. I think this is a needful exercise. Today, I'm going to introduce posters to what may be our earliest extant witness to this prophecy in the form we're familiar with - in Book VII of the Divine Institutes by the third century church father Lactantius (c. 250 – c. 325), one of the most remarkable and eloquent patristic apologetics of the Christian faith. Yes, you read that right - the prophecy is of patristic origin. It is not simply folkloric, although the Last World Emperor / Great Monarch understandably morphed into a folk hero of popular religion after Pseudo-Methodius, an anonymous Syrian priest, committed his version of the prophecy to writing in the 7th century in the wake of the Ummayyad conquests, which became the medieval version of the original 'bestseller'. The scholar Marjorie Reeves, in her magisterial and definitive study, Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages, rightly traces the idea of a Great Monarch developing in the third-century theologian Lactantius: “Finally [in Lactantius’s account], the righteous are besieged in a mountain by Antichrist. Then they call to God and He sends a liberator—‘regem magnum de coelo’ [great king from heaven]—to their aid. Shortly after this Christ Himself appears in judgement with an army of angels” (Reeves 297). And as another scholar explains in, "Scripture and Pluralism: Reading the Bible in the Religiously Plural Worlds of the Middle Ages and Renaissance": Lactantius has many other interesting things to say (for example, he foreshadows St. Hildegard of Bingen in predicting environmental degradation, water stress / scarcity and atmosphoric pollution as key tribulations immediately preceding a period of peace and triumph for the Church on earth). Other scholars have noted that Lactantius hoped Constantine would be this earthly king who would act as the biblical katechon, which makes sense given that Christians in every age have looked to contemporary figures hoping for the fulfilment of the divine plan. This, at least, establishes that his great king prophecy is in relation to a human (non-divine) individual, like his great prophet (who acts as a kind of second Elijah and Moses, clearly one of the Two Witnesses of Revelation with the Great King impliedly being the other):
Here is the relevant text: https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/07017.htm But, test any one should think this incredible, I will show how it will come to pass. First, the kingdom will be enlarged, and the chief power, dispersed among many and divided, will be diminished. Then civil discords will perpetually be sown; nor will there be any rest from deadly wars, until ten kings arise at the same time, who will divide the world, not to govern, but to consume it. These, having increased their armies to an immense extent, and having deserted the cultivation of the fields, which is the beginning of overthrow and disaster, will lay waste and break in pieces and consume all things. Then a most powerful enemy will suddenly arise against him from the extreme boundaries of the northern region, who, having destroyed three of that number who shall then be in possession of Asia, shall be admitted into alliance by the others, and shall be constituted prince of all. He shall harass the world with an intolerable rule; shall mingle things divine and human; shall contrive things impious to relate, and detestable; shall meditate new designs in his breast, that he may establish the government for himself: he will change the laws, and appoint his own; he will contaminate, plunder, spoil, and put to death. And at length, the name being changed and the seat of government being transferred, confusion and the disturbance of mankind will follow. Then, in truth, a detestable and abominable time shall come, in which life shall be pleasant to none of men. Cities shall be utterly overthrown, and shall perish; not only by fire and the sword, but also by continual earthquakes and overflowings of waters, and by frequent diseases and repeated famines. For the atmosphere will be tainted, and become corrupt and pestilential — at one time by unseasonable rains, at another by barren drought, now by colds, and now by excessive heats. Nor will the earth give its fruit to man: no field, or tree, or vine will produce anything; but after they have given the greatest hope in the blossom, they will fail in the fruit. Fountains also shall be dried up, together with the rivers; so that there shall not be a sufficient supply for drinking; and waters shall be changed into blood or bitterness. [...] Nor, however, will these things take place in the accustomed manner; but there will suddenly appear stars unknown and unseen by the eyes; the sun will be perpetually darkened, so that there will be scarcely any distinction between the night and the day; the moon will now fail, not for three hours only, but overspread with perpetual blood, will go through extraordinary movements, so that it will not be easy for man to ascertain the courses of the heavenly bodies or the system of the times; for there will either be summer in the winter, or winter in the summer [...] When the close of the times draws near, a great prophet shall be sent from God to turn men to the knowledge of God, and he shall receive the power of doing wonderful things. Wherever men shall not hear him, he will shut up the heaven, and cause it to withhold its rains; he will turn their water into blood, and torment them with thirst and hunger; and if any one shall endeavour to injure him, fire shall come forth out of his mouth, and shall burn that man. By these prodigies and powers he shall turn many to the worship of God; and when his works shall be accomplished, another king shall arise out of Syria, born from an evil spirit, the overthrower and destroyer of the human race, who shall destroy that which is left by the former evil, together with himself. He shall fight against the prophet of God, and shall overcome, and slay him, and shall allow him to lie unburied; but after the third day he shall come to life again; and while all look on and wonder, he shall be caught up into heaven. But that king will not only be most disgraceful in himself, but he will also be a prophet of lies; and he will constitute and call himself God, and will order himself to be worshipped as the Son of God [...] Then he will attempt to destroy the temple of God, and persecute the righteous people; and there will be distress and tribulation, such as there never has been from the beginning of the world. As many as shall believe him and unite themselves to him, shall be marked by him as sheep; but they who shall refuse his mark will either flee to the mountains, or, being seized, will be slain with studied tortures. He will also enwrap righteous men with the books of the prophets, and thus burn them; and power will be given him to desolate the whole earth for forty-two months. That will be the time in which righteousness shall be cast out, and innocence be hated; in which the wicked shall prey upon the good as enemies; neither law, nor order, nor military discipline shall be preserved; no one shall reverence hoary locks, nor recognise the duty of piety, nor pity sex or infancy; all things shall be confounded and mixed together against right, and against the laws of nature. Thus the earth shall be laid waste, as though by one common robbery. When these things shall so happen, then the righteous and the followers of truth shall separate themselves from the wicked, and flee into solitudes. And when he hears of this, the impious king, inflamed with anger, will come with a great army, and bringing up all his forces, will surround all the mountain in which the righteous shall be situated, that he may seize them. But they, when they shall see themselves to be shut in on all sides and besieged, will call upon God with a loud voice, and implore the aid of heaven; and God shall hear them, and send from heaven a great king to rescue and free them, and destroy all the wicked with fire and sword. The world therefore being oppressed, since the resources of men shall be insufficient for the overthrow of a tyranny of immense strength, inasmuch as it will press upon the captive world with great armies of robbers, that calamity so great will stand in need of divine assistance. Therefore God, being aroused both by the doubtful danger and by the wretched lamentation of the righteous, will immediately send a deliverer.
