In his second letter to the Thessalonians, Saint Paul drops an enigmatic phrase that has never ceased to intrigue readers of Scripture: before the end, he writes, the “man of lawlessness” must appear — but something, for now, restrains him. “And you know what is restraining him now,” adds the Apostle, as if it were something obvious shared with his correspondents (2 Thess 2:6).[1] This “what restrains” — in Greek to katechon — tradition has often called in French le frein (“the brake,” the restraint): that which brakes, contains, and still prevents evil from breaking loose fully.
The problem is that Paul knew what he was talking about, and so did the Thessalonians; but we, twenty centuries later, no longer have the key he assumed to be known. Hence one of the most famous admissions of humility in the history of exegesis, Saint Augustine's before this passage. This article therefore answers three precise questions: what exactly Saint Paul says, what has been understood by this “restraint” throughout Tradition, and how the spirituality of the Divine Will sheds light on this mystery — yielding neither to apocalyptic curiosity nor to the skepticism that would empty the text of its scope.
Saint Paul's text: “what restrains him”
The context: calming a fever about the end of the world
The Second Letter to the Thessalonians answers a concrete worry. Some Christians of Thessalonica had let themselves be troubled by a rumor — “whether by a spiritual utterance, or by a message, or by a letter allegedly from us” — claiming that “the day of the Lord” had already come (2 Thess 2:2). Paul writes to calm them: no, the glorious return of Christ is not so imminent that they should stop working or living normally.[2]
His argument is chronological. The Day of the Lord will not come “unless the apostasy comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of perdition” (2 Thess 2:3). Two things must therefore precede the end: a great apostasy, and the manifestation of a figure tradition will identify with the Antichrist. Yet, says Paul, this figure cannot reveal himself yet, because a force restrains him.
The two Greek words: to katechon and ho katechōn
The whole mystery hangs on two words, which are in reality two forms of the same Greek verb katechō (κατέχω): “to hold fast, to restrain, to contain, to hinder, to delay.” Saint Paul uses this participle first in the neuter, then in the masculine, one verse apart:
“And you know what is restraining him now [τὸ κατέχον], so that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only he who now restrains [ὁ κατέχων] will do so until he is out of the way.” — Saint Paul, 2 Thessalonians 2:6-7[3]
This shift from the neuter (what restrains) to the masculine (he who restrains) is the heart of the enigma. It suggests that the restraint is both an impersonal reality or institution (the neuter) and a person who embodies it (the masculine) — as one might say power and then he who holds power.[4] Interpreters will divide according to which aspect they emphasize.
Why this passage is one of the most obscure in the New Testament
Saint Paul writes in veiled terms, and he says so himself: “Do you not remember that I told you these things when I was still with you?” (2 Thess 2:5). He had explained orally to the Thessalonians the identity of the restraint; here he merely alludes to it. For Saint John Chrysostom, this discretion is deliberate and prudent: had Paul written plainly that the Roman Empire would one day be dissolved, he would at once have been accused of sedition.[5]
The result is that the original meaning was lost with the generation that knew it. Saint Augustine, the greatest exegete of the West, makes the disarming admission:
“I frankly confess I do not know what he means.” — Saint Augustine, The City of God, Book XX, ch. 19[6]
This admission is not a weakness but a lesson in method: on this point, Scripture yields no certainty, and Catholic prudence consists in presenting the hypotheses without imposing any of them as dogma. The Church, in fact, has never defined the identity of the katechon.[7]
What does the restraint hold back? The man of lawlessness and the Antichrist
A figure of religious revolt
What the restraint contains is not mere disorder, but a figure of revolt. Paul describes him in traits borrowed from the book of Daniel: “the adversary who exalts himself above every so-called god… so as to seat himself in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God” (2 Thess 2:4).[8] His coming will be “by the activity of Satan, with all power and with pretended signs and wonders” (2 Thess 2:9): he is a counterfeit of Christ, a parody of Redemption.
Christian tradition has named this figure the Antichrist. He is not first of all a political tyrant, but a religious imposture: man's claim to take the place of God.
The “mystery of lawlessness” already at work
Paul makes one capital point: “the mystery of lawlessness is already at work” (2 Thess 2:7). The evil that will culminate in the Antichrist is not reserved for a distant future; it acts even now, underground, like a hidden leaven. The restraint therefore does not prevent evil from existing — it only prevents its full manifestation, its revelation in the open, “in his time,” that is, at the moment appointed by God.
This distinction is essential for what follows: a restraint does not remove the force it contains; it holds it back until an appointed hour. That is why the same image will serve, in Catholic spirituality, to describe the action of the saints who hold back — without abolishing it — the Justice of God.
The framework given by the Catechism
The Catechism of the Catholic Church explicitly takes up this passage of Saint Paul when it describes the Church's ultimate trial before Christ's return:
“Before Christ's second coming the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. […] The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.” — Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 675[9]
The Catechism immediately adds a decisive safeguard: the Church has rejected millenarianism, that is, the expectation of an earthly triumph of Christ before the Judgment, “especially in the political form of a secularized messianism, intrinsically perverse” (§ 676).[10] The Kingdom will not be accomplished “by a historic triumph of the Church through a progressive ascendancy,” but by God's victory at the end of history (§ 677). This framework forbids turning the question of the restraint into an apocalyptic timetable or political speculation.
The great interpretations of the restraint in Tradition
For lack of certainty, Tradition has proposed several identifications of the katechon. The main ones can be grouped together.
The Roman Empire and political order
This is the most widespread interpretation among the Fathers. As long as the Roman Empire stands — and the order it guarantees — the final chaos is contained; its dissolution will open the way to the Antichrist. Tertullian is the most explicit:
“What is it but the Roman state, whose dissolution, scattered among ten kings, will bring in the Antichrist?” — Tertullian, On the Resurrection of the Flesh, ch. 24[11]
In his Apology, the same Tertullian explains that Christians pray for the emperors precisely because the Empire's duration delays the end of the world and the calamities accompanying it.[12] Lactantius, in Book VII of his Divine Institutes, likewise holds that the fall of Rome will precede and signal the end.[13]
Saint John Chrysostom, commenting directly on our passage, weighs the two hypotheses then current and decides:
“Some indeed say, the grace of the Spirit, but others the Roman empire, to whom I most of all accede.” — Saint John Chrysostom, Homilies on 2 Thessalonians, hom. IV[14]
Saint Augustine also reports this reading — some, he says, think Paul meant the Roman Empire and alluded to Nero, “whose deeds already seemed to be as the deeds of Antichrist” — but he refuses to hold it as certain.[15] Modern Catholic exegesis notes moreover that this traditional interpretation accords with the Pauline doctrine of legitimate authority as a rampart against disorder (cf. Rom 13:1-7): the Empire, then the State, as a dike holding back chaos.[16]
Legitimate authority and the order of the world
From the Roman Empire, one may broaden the view to the principle of authority itself. Every legitimate authority — political, social, ecclesial — contains the unleashing of evil by upholding law, justice, and peace. On this line, the restraint would be the order willed by God in the city of men, whose collapse would leave the field open to anarchy and imposture. This reading has the advantage of remaining valid long after the disappearance of the ancient Roman Empire.
The preaching of the Gospel to all nations
Another interpretation, ancient and taken up by modern exegetes, reads the restraint in the light of Christ's word: “This gospel of the kingdom will be preached throughout the world… and then the end will come” (Mt 24:14). What restrains would then be the proclamation of the Gospel, which must first reach all peoples; as long as the mission is not accomplished, God holds back the end. Some even identify “he who restrains” in the masculine with the apostle Paul himself, or more broadly with the missionary Church.[17]
The archangel Saint Michael
Several authors connect the restraint with the heavenly combat described in Daniel and in Revelation. “At that time Michael shall arise, the great prince who stands guard over the children of your people” (Dn 12:1); and Revelation shows Michael and his angels fighting the dragon (Rev 12:7). The katechon would then be the archangel Saint Michael, guardian of God's people, whose withdrawal would signal the hour of trial.[18]
The Holy Spirit, grace, and God Himself
A more spiritual reading sees in the restraint the action of grace or of the Holy Spirit, containing evil in souls and in the world. Chrysostom knew it and preferred the Roman Empire; it met with great fortune afterwards. The Antiochene exegetes Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret of Cyrus, for their part, identified “he who restrains” with God Himself and His power, that is, with the decree of His Providence which sovereignly fixes the hour: nothing happens before the time God has determined.[19]
The following table summarizes the main hypotheses:
| Interpretation of the restraint | The neuter (what restrains) | The masculine (he who restrains) | Main proponents |
|---|---|---|---|
| Empire / Roman order | The Empire and its order | The emperor | Tertullian, Lactantius, Chrysostom |
| Legitimate authority | The social order willed by God | The holder of authority | Extension of the imperial reading |
| Preaching of the Gospel | The mission to be accomplished | The apostle / the missionary Church | Ancient reading, taken up in modern times |
| Saint Michael | Angelic protection | The archangel Michael | Danielic and Johannine reading |
| Holy Spirit / grace | Grace containing evil | The Holy Spirit | Ancient spiritual reading |
| God and His Providence | Divine power | God Himself | Theodore of Mopsuestia, Theodoret |
None of these readings is imposed by the Church; several may even complement one another, for God acts through secondary causes — an empire, an angel, the Gospel, grace — without ceasing to be Himself the sovereign master of time.
A modern reception to be distinguished from exegesis
In the 20th century, the term katechon enjoyed a second life outside theology, as a concept of political philosophy. The German jurist Carl Schmitt made it the figure of the historical power that “restrains” the advent of the Antichrist and the end of the present aeon.[20] This usage is culturally interesting, but it must be clearly distinguished from the theological interpretation of the verse: it is a late philosophical reuse, not a reading of Scripture by the Church.
The restraint read in the light of the Divine Will
So far, Saint Paul's restraint denotes what holds back the manifestation of the Antichrist. But Catholic spiritual tradition knows another use of the same image, astonishingly close: what holds back the Justice of God ready to strike a guilty world. It is in this light that the writings of Luisa Piccarreta also speak of a “restraint.”
Another restraint: the souls who hold back the Justice of God
In the Book of Heaven, Jesus often returns to one idea: the holiness of a few souls holds back His Justice and defers the punishments that the sins of the world would call down. The vocabulary is exactly that of restraint. To Luisa, who asks Him what her state as a victim is for, Jesus answers:
“Your state, being totally opposed to theirs, puts a restraint on my Justice.” — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 4, October 2, 1900[21]
Elsewhere, He compares His Justice to a cloud laden “with hail, thunder, and lightning,” adding: “In you, it found a restraint so as not to weigh too heavily on the peoples.”[22] And again, more than twenty years later: “For it holds back the course of my Justice.”[23]
Victim souls and the saints, ramparts of Justice
This doctrine is neither isolated nor eccentric: it extends a constant biblical intuition. Abraham bargains with God for the salvation of Sodom for the sake of a few just men (Gn 18:23-32); Moses stays God's arm on behalf of the unfaithful people (Ex 32:11-14). The just man, by his prayer and holiness, stands in the way of punishment. The Book of Heaven stages this mystery with force, when Luisa hears a mysterious woman weeping over defenseless peoples:
“What makes me weep even more is the absence of those fortresses of Justice that are the victim souls. These souls are the one and only support holding back Justice in these extremely sad times.” — Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 4, December 5, 1902[24]
Jesus likewise says that the presence in a soul of His operative Will disarms Him: “How many evils and punishments I hold back out of regard for this soul!”[25] The soul living in the Divine Will thus becomes, by participation, a true spiritual katechon: not by political force, but by the union of its will with God's.
The true force holding back evil: holiness, not politics
The comparison illuminates both texts by each other. Saint Paul sought what holds back the Antichrist; Tradition hesitated between the Empire, the angel, the Gospel, and grace. The Divine Will does not claim to settle the exegesis of the verse, but it points to where the deepest dike lies: not in human institutions, but in holiness. What truly holds back the unleashing of evil is souls united enough to God for His Will to act in them and through them.[26]
This perspective moreover accords with the great spiritual reading of the katechon (the Holy Spirit, grace, God Himself): the most real restraint is of a supernatural order. Political order can contain outward disorder; only grace, welcomed by surrendered hearts, contains the “mystery of lawlessness” at its root.
From restraint to Reign: when the Divine Will shall reign
One question remains: will this restraint always hold? Saint Paul announces that one day “he who restrains” will be taken out of the way, and the lawless one will appear — before being destroyed “by the breath” of the Lord's mouth (2 Thess 2:8). History is therefore not indefinite progress: it will know its trial. But the last word belongs to the victorious Christ.
It is here that the spirituality of the Divine Will opens a hope, without falling into the millenarianism condemned by the Catechism. Luisa announces a reign of the Divine Will “on earth as it is in Heaven,” that is, a spiritual fulfillment of the Our Father, in which holiness would win over the Church and the world. This reign is neither a political kingdom, nor an earthly utopia, nor a date on a calendar: it is the blossoming of grace in souls.[27] Far from opposing Saint Paul's restraint, it reveals its positive meaning: holding back evil already prepares the triumph of the good. Its development will be found in the articles The Reign of the Spirit and Why speak of a reign of the Divine Will on earth?.
What to remember
The “restraint” Saint Paul speaks of (to katechon, 2 Thess 2:6-7) is that mysterious force which still prevents the Antichrist from fully manifesting himself, until the time appointed by God. Its precise identity remains an enigma deliberately left open: Tradition has proposed the Roman Empire, legitimate authority, the preaching of the Gospel, the archangel Saint Michael, the Holy Spirit, or God Himself, without the Church imposing any of these readings — Saint Augustine himself admitted his ignorance.
The spirituality of the Divine Will adds no new exegetical theory; it shifts our gaze to what is essential. In the Book of Heaven, Jesus calls “restraint” the holiness of victim souls and of souls living in His Will, which hold back His Justice and defer punishments. What truly contains evil is therefore not first an institution, but grace welcomed in hearts surrendered to God. And the purpose of this restraint is not to freeze history in fear, but to prepare the day when “God's Will shall be done on earth as it is in Heaven.”
To go further
- The Divine Will — the overall doctrine of the gift.
- Luisa Piccarreta (1865-1947) — life, writings, and ecclesial status.
- The Book of Heaven — Luisa's main corpus.
- The Reign of the Spirit — the fulfillment of the Our Father without millenarianism.
- Preparation for the end times — Catholic eschatology and the final trial.
- Answers to objections against Luisa Piccarreta's work — doctrinal discernment.
Notes and References
2 Thessalonians 2:6: “Et nunc quid detineat scitis” (Vulgate). The Louis Segond translation reads “vous savez ce qui le retient” (“you know what restrains him”); Catholic versions (Crampon, Jerusalem Bible) render it equivalently as “ce qui le retient” / “ce qui retient” (“what restrains him” / “what restrains”).
12 Thessalonians 2:1-3. Paul's pastoral aim is to correct the mistaken expectation of an imminent Day of the Lord, which was driving some to idleness (cf. 2 Thess 3:6-12).
2Greek text: v. 6 τὸ κατέχον (to katechon, substantivized neuter present participle, “what restrains”); v. 7 ὁ κατέχων (ho katechōn, masculine participle, “he who restrains”). The verb κατέχω means “to hold fast, to restrain, to contain, to hinder, to delay.”
3The shift from the neuter to the masculine suggests that the restraint is both a reality or an institution (the neuter) and the person who embodies it (the masculine). It is one of the major clues in the debate over the identity of the katechon.
4Saint John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Second Epistle to the Thessalonians, Homily IV: had Paul said openly that the Roman Empire would be dissolved, “he would at once have been overwhelmed as a troublemaker” (text on newadvent.org, Homily 4 on Second Thessalonians).
5Saint Augustine, De civitate Dei (The City of God), Book XX, ch. 19. Reference English text (NPNF): “I frankly confess I do not know what he means.” Augustine discusses the passage of 2 Thess 2 there without concluding.
6No magisterial document defines the identity of the katechon. The divergence of the Fathers (Roman Empire, grace, God) and Augustine's admission show that it is a question of exegesis that has remained open.
7The description of 2 Thess 2:4 (“he exalts himself above every so-called god… seating himself in the temple of God”) takes up the traits of the impious king of Daniel 11:36 and the figure of the “abomination of desolation” (Dn 9:27; 11:31; cf. Mt 24:15).
8Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 675, explicitly citing 2 Thess 2:4-12. The Church's “ultimate trial” takes the form of the Antichrist imposture.
9Catechism of the Catholic Church, § 676, condemnation of millenarianism (cf. Denzinger-Schönmetzer 3839) and of secularized messianism; § 677 on God's final victory, not through ascending historical progress.
10Tertullian, De resurrectione carnis (On the Resurrection of the Flesh), ch. 24. English trans. (Evans, tertullian.org): “who but the Roman state, whose disruption, being dispersed among ten kings, will bring in Antichrist?” The “ten kings” refer to Daniel 7.
11Tertullian, Apologeticum (Apology), ch. 32: Christians pray for the emperors and for the stability of the Empire, for its duration defers the end of the world and the calamities accompanying it (an idea traditionally summed up in the prayer pro mora finis, “for the delay of the end”).
12Lactantius, Divinae institutiones (Divine Institutes), Book VII: the fall of Rome and of the “Roman name” will precede and announce the end of the world and the coming of the Antichrist.
13Saint John Chrysostom, Homilies on 2 Thessalonians, hom. IV. English text (NPNF): “Some indeed say, the grace of the Spirit, but others the Roman empire, to whom I most of all accede.”
14Saint Augustine, The City of God, Book XX, ch. 19: “Some think that the Apostle Paul referred to the Roman empire… he alluded to Nero, whose deeds already seemed to be as the deeds of Antichrist.” Augustine reports this opinion without making it his own.
15Note of the New American Bible (Catholic edition) on 2 Thess 2:6-7: traditionally, v. 6 has been applied to the Roman Empire and v. 7 to the emperor, as ramparts holding back chaos (cf. Romans 13:1-7 on legitimate authority).
16Interpretation taken up by modern exegetes (notably O. Cullmann): the neuter restraint would be the preaching of the Gospel to all nations (cf. Matthew 24:14; Mk 13:10), and “he who restrains” the missionary or the Church accomplishing it.
17Reading supported by Daniel 12:1 (“at that time Michael shall arise, the great prince”) and Revelation 12:7 (Michael and his angels fighting the dragon): the restraint would be the archangel Saint Michael, protector of God's people.
18The Antiochene exegetes Theodore of Mopsuestia and Theodoret of Cyrus identified “he who restrains” with God Himself and His power — the decree of Providence sovereignly fixing the moment of the end. This reading accords with the doctrine of divine mastery of time (cf. Acts 1:7).
19Carl Schmitt, Der Nomos der Erde (1950) and Glossarium: the katechon becomes there a concept of political theology denoting the historical power that holds back the advent of the Antichrist. A late philosophical usage, distinct from scriptural exegesis.
20Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 4, October 2, 1900. Jesus to Luisa, on the meaning of her state as a victim: “your state puts a restraint on my Justice.”
21Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 4, November 17, 1902: divine Justice compared to a cloud laden “with hail, thunder, and lightning,” for which the victim soul serves as a restraint “so as not to weigh too heavily on the peoples.”
22Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 13, December 28, 1921: Luisa's situation must continue, “for it holds back the course of my Justice.”
23Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 4, December 5, 1902: “those fortresses of Justice that are the victim souls… the one and only support holding back Justice in these extremely sad times.”
24Luisa Piccarreta, The Book of Heaven, volume 16, May 9, 1924: in the presence of a soul whose life is His Will, “how many evils and punishments I hold back out of regard for this soul!”
25On the scope of acts accomplished in the Divine Will and their dimension of communion, see Joseph L. Iannuzzi, The Gift of Living in the Divine Will in the Writings of Luisa Piccarreta (thesis, Pontifical Gregorian University, 2012), as well as the 70 Questions on the Gift of Living in the Divine Will.
26On the reign of the Divine Will understood as a spiritual fulfillment of the Our Father, and not as millenarianism (CCC § 676), see The Reign of the Spirit.
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