God’s Word for You
Daniel 11:21-22 Antichrist arises
by Pastor Timothy Smith on Thursday, January 15, 2026
21 In his place shall arise a contemptible person; they will not confer him with royalty. He will come in without warning and seize the kingdom through slippery talk. 22 Armies shall be overpowered by him and broken before him. Also, the prince of the covenant shall be broken.
The contemptible person is the last king in the long parade that has been passing by the people of Jerusalem as the Angel has been foreseeing and foretelling all of these many things that were to come. This last king’s name is Antiochus IV, also called Antiochus Epiphanes. The Angel will use the reign of this king to predict many other things, all about the rise of the Antichrist.
The words, “they will not confer him with royalty” may sound as if it is an insult to this king, but the truth is very different. He stole the throne. When the little son of King Seleucus was named the successor of his father, Antiochus Epiphanes raced over from Athens to claim his place as the king’s protector, but instead of bringing home the true heir (Demetrius, who was a hostage in Rome) he set up another son of Seleuchus, an infant, but then the infant died (probably murdered by Antiochus himself) and Antiochus IV grabbed the throne with the support of many Greek courtiers and nobles who supported him. Such was his sort of “slippery talk.”
He took possession of several cities and fortresses in Syria, Phoenicia and Judea, which were at least in name still possessions of Egypt. When Egypt objected, he attacked at once and without holding anything back, and so “armies were overpowered by him.”
Who is “the prince of the covenant”? The word nagid “head, chief, prince,’ is also used to designate the priestly and even high-priestly office, as well as the office of the king (see 2 Samuel 6:21; 1 Kings 1:35; Isaiah 55:4; Jeremiah 20:1; 1 Chronicles 9:11; 2 Chronicles 19:11; Job 31:37 etc.). In Daniel 9:25 the Messiah is even called the nagid. Here it must be a reference to the high priest, for there were no prophets in Israel after Malachi until John the Baptist came, and there were no kings who were Israelites after Zedekiah was blinded and his sons were butchered and he was marched away into Nebuchadnezzar’s dungeons until the day he died (2 Kings 25:7; Jeremiah 52:10).
But was there a high priest who died early in the reign of Antiochus Epiphanes? Yes there was. This was the same Onias (the Third) who had opposed the previous king when he sent a man to plunder the temple. The Greek Seleucid court never forgot this, and forced Onias III to give up his position to the priest Jason. Onias then fled—one report says he went north, and another that he went south. But whichever way he went, he was murdered (either in Daphne, near Syrian Antioch, or in Leontopolis in Egypt). This prince of the covenant was therefore “broken.”
These things foreshadow the rise of the Antichrist from within the church. But what are we to say for certain about the Antichrist from the verses before us? In 1982, David C. Thompson published a paper in the Lutheran Synod Quarterly (published by the ELS) titled, “The Antichrist and the Papacy.” In his introduction, Thompson says, cautiously, “Some of the prophecies in Daniel are no doubt typological, in which case there is a problem in deciding which traits apply to both the type and the antitype and which apply only to the type…. When reading through the prophetical parts of Daniel and Revelation (which might speak about the Antichrist) and a statement is made which concurs with those marks listed in 1 and 2 John and 2 Thessalonians, it should be assumed that these statements support and/or help explain the clearly designated marks in those epistles. In other words, the unclear passages should be viewed in light of the clearer passages” (p. 1-2). This is an excellent, and indeed, the only correct way to handle the Antichrist passages here in Daniel 11.
In this case, we see a connection with this mark of Antichrist: “When he rises up, the Antichrist uproots some of the authority of the earthly kingdom from where it came” (Daniel 7:8, 7:24). This echoes the more serious mark that he will rise up from within the church itself (2 Thessalonians 2:4). Also, with the apparent murder of the high priest (the prince of the covenant), he will show himself to be a terrible opponent of the church and of the Gospel (1 John 2:18; 2 John 1:7).
These things are warnings, and they are given so that we will be prepared and will recognize him for what he is. For the opponent of Christ and of the Gospel is the opponent of every Christian. Still, since God has given no definite promise that Antichrist will be destroyed in our lifetime, but only that we will recognize him and that the answer to his lies is always the Word of God, we must pray that God will help us to stand firm upon his holy Word of truth. Without his help, we cannot stand. With his help, we cannot fail to stand, for “the Christian means to be saved by believing rightly.” But do not cease your vigilance, and do not stop praying.
In Christ,
Pastor Timothy Smith
Pastor Smith serves St. Paul’s Lutheran Church in New Ulm, Minnesota. To receive God’s Word for You via e-mail, please visit the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church website.