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the mystery of iniquity--the counterwork to "the mystery of godliness" (Ti1 3:16). Anti-Christianity latently working, as distinguished from its final open manifestation. "Mystery" in Scripture means, not what remains always a secret, but that which is for a while hidden, but in due time manifested (compare Eph 3:4-5). Satan will resort to a mode of opposition more conformed to the then imminent "appearing" and "presence" of the Saviour, and will anticipate Him with a last effort to maintain the dominion of the world [DE BURGH], just as at His first advent he rushed into open opposition, by taking possession of the bodies of men. "Iniquity," Greek, "lawlessness"; defiant rejection of God's law (compare Note, see on Zac 5:9, Zac 5:10). "Wickedness" (translated by the Septuagint by the same Greek, meaning "lawlessness," which Paul employs here), embodied there as a woman, answers to "the mystery of iniquity," here embodied finally in "the man of sin": as the former was ultimately banished for ever from the Holy Land to her own congenial soil, Babylon, so iniquity and the man of sin shall fall before Michael and the Lord Himself, who shall appear as the Deliverer of His people (Dan 12:1-3; Zac 14:3-9). Compare Mat 12:43. The Jewish nation dispossessed of the evil spirit, the demon of idolatry being cast out through the Babylonian captivity, receives ultimately a worse form of the evil spirit, Christ-opposing self-righteousness. Also, the Christian Church in course of time taken possession of by the demon of Romish idolatry, then dispossessed of it by the Reformation, then its house "garnished" by hypocrisy, secularity, and rationalism, but "swept empty" of living faith, then finally apostatizing and repossessed by "the man of sin," and outwardly destroyed for a brief time…

The apostle is very careful to hinder the spreading of an error into which some among them had fallen concerning the coming of Christ, as being very near (Th2 2:1-3). Then he proceeds to confute the error he cautioned them against, by telling them of two great events that were antecedent to the coming of Christ - a general apostasy, and the revelation of antichrist, concerning whom the apostle tells them many remarkable things, about his name, his character, his rise, his fall, his reign, and the sin and ruin of his subjects (Th2 2:4-12). He then comforts them against the terror of this apostasy, and exhorts them to stedfastness (Th2 2:13-15). And concludes with a prayer for them (Th2 2:16, Th2 2:17).

2:7 The power of the coming man of lawlessness (2:3-6) is already at work secretly, like the antichrists of 1 Jn 2:18. • secretly (Greek mustērion): A descriptor commonly used of rituals in the mystery religions (see 2 Thes 2:6). • at work: This connotes supernatural intervention, whether divine (1 Thes 2:13) or, as here, evil (2 Thes 2:9; Eph 2:2). • The one who is holding it back could refer to one who is in opposition to the man of lawlessness; to one who is possessed; or to Satan, the one who possesses (2 Thes 2:9; see study note on 2:6).