Is AI a tool for the Antichrist?

Peter Thiel is a Silicon Valley venture capitalist who made his mark with PayPal, Facebook, and Palantir before becoming one of the largest donors to the Republican Party and an early advocate for President Trump. However, he’s in the news this week for an entirely different reason. 

Thiel helped organize an exclusive conference in Rome, where he led four days of discussions on the Antichrist and his view that modern society is hurtling toward an inflection point that could pave the way for the end times. He claims that the Antichrist will use issues like nuclear war, climate change, and—perhaps most importantly—artificial intelligence to promise security in exchange for devotion and lead people to submit willingly to the sort of one-world, totalitarian government depicted in Revelation. 

But while the lectures in Rome are not the first time he has taught on this subject (he gave similar talks in San Francisco and Paris), this week’s event has generated far more attention in religious circles. Part of the reason is that the meetings were arranged by Catholic organizations and located on the Vatican’s doorstep, both of which raised the ire of the Pope and others who have condemned Thiel’s message.  

The Catholic newspaper Avvenire went so far as to describe Thiel as “an agent of chaos.” Father Antonio Spadaro, a prominent Jesuit theologian, added that Thiel “arrived in Rome not merely as a man of technology but as an interpreter of the Apocalypse.” 

While Thiel would perhaps dispute the first accusation, there’s little in his work on this subject that would take issue with the second. When it comes to apocalyptic topics, he speaks with a level of confidence and specificity that leaves little doubt that he sees his beliefs as far more than theories. 

Should we be afraid?

One of the ironies in Thiel’s message is that he believes the Antichrist will come by making people so focused on their fear of innovation and technology—whether AI or other developments—that they become obsessed and see every aspect of their lives through the lens of that fear. As he told Ross Douthat last summer, “The way the Antichrist would take over the world is you talk about Armageddon nonstop. You talk about existential risk nonstop, and that is what you need to regulate.”

Yet, throughout these lectures and in other conversations, he stokes many of those same fears. And this emphasis on fear is one of the key areas where he is correct in his assessment of the general public, yet fundamentally wrong in his assessment of the Bible’s teaching of how Christians should respond. 

As he described in his San Francisco lecture last fall, “If the Antichrist is going to take over the world, you need something very powerful to stop it.” The larger context surrounding that statement implies that he sees some force in the world serving that function, whereas Scripture’s teaching on the subject is that it will ultimately be Jesus who wins the day (Revelation 19:20). 

That Christians are meant to find our hope and strength in Jesus rather than ourselves or some other force is crucial to maintaining a biblical understanding of these issues. After all, this battle between Christ and Satan’s attempts to oppose him is not limited to the end times.

Antichrist or antichrists?

In the first of his letters to the churches in Asia, John writes “Children, it is the last hour, and as you have heard that antichrist is coming, so now many antichrists have come” (1 John 2:18). One of the problems with spending too much time dwelling on who the final Antichrist will be is that Satan likely has someone who could fit the description living in the world at all times. 

When John wrote Revelation, that someone was likely the emperor Domitian. And, up until the reign of Constantine, whoever sat on the throne in Rome was often seen as a popular candidate for the role of the devil’s chosen one. Later on in church history, Martin Luther came to see the pope as the Antichrist during his struggles with the Catholic Church. And more recent generations have looked to Hitler, Stalin, and a host of other infamous leaders. 

The truth is that Satan doesn’t know when the end times will start. Jesus was quite clear that only the Father knows that information (Matthew 24:36), and it seems safe to assume he’s not sharing those details with the devil. Consequently, the only way Satan could be assured of having an antichrist-type figure when the events of Revelation commence is if he has someone who fits the description present at all times.

That’s important for us to understand today because it means that looking for clues as to who such a person or entity might be is largely fruitless. God wants our attention focused on his plans rather than on speculation about the devil’s, so he’s told us just enough to know what’s necessary to follow his plans well. And that fact is made even clearer in Christ’s description of what to expect when the end times finally do arrive. 

Only two outcomes

In Matthew 24, the disciples approach Jesus in private to ask when the apocalyptic events he’d just described would come to pass. Christ replies by telling them about “wars and rumors of wars,” famines, earthquakes, and persecution (Matthew 24:3–14). 

Given the COVID pandemic, an increase in natural disasters, and the series of wars that have placed most of the world only a step or two removed from the conflict, it’s understandable that more and more Christians would be interested in Thiel’s thoughts on the Antichrist and what the Bible teaches about the end times. 

However, Jesus did not tell us to look for these kinds of events so that we could predict when he’s coming back. Instead, the purpose was so that, when bad things happen, we wouldn’t be afraid.

You see, when we hear of wars, natural disasters, plagues, and everything else, our dire situation can really only end in one of two ways. 

The first possibility is that these events will pass and the world will put itself back together in some new semblance of normal, in which case we should not be afraid. The second possibility is that these events really do mark the end times, in which case Jesus will return shortly and—again—we should not be afraid. 

Either way, Christ wanted his followers to live in such a way that when the world was falling apart, they were not. And that is still his calling for each of us today. 

So, whether AI brings about the Antichrist, the world hurtles toward the sort of global totalitarianism that Thiel describes, or any of these other predictions and concerns come to pass, the proper response for Christians is to keep our focus on helping people to know Jesus and to live with confidence that God is still in control. 

Are you living with such confidence today? 

Quote of the day:

“It is not my aim to introduce doubts and fears into your mind; no, but I do hope self-examination may help to drive them away. It is not security, but false security, which we would kill; not confidence, but false confidence, which we would overthrow; not peace, but false peace, which we would destroy.” —Charles Spurgeon

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