Church Fathers on Mark 13:26

After that the Lord had finished all that concerned Jerusalem, He now speaks of the coming of Antichrist, saying, 'Then if any man shall say to you, Lo, here is Christ; or, to, he is there; believe him not.' But when He says, 'then,' think not that it means immediately after these things are fulfilled about Jerusalem; as Matthew also says after the birth of Christ, 'In those days came John the Baptist;' [Matt 3:1] does he mean immediately after the birth of Christ? No, but he…

For then shall Satan be unchained, and work through Antichrist in all his power, wonderfully indeed, but falsely. But a doubt is often raised whether the Apostle said 'signs and lying wonders,' because he is to deceive mortal sense, by phantoms, so as to appear to do what he does not, or because those wonders themselves, even though true, are to turn men aside to lies, because they will not believe that any power but a Divine power could do them, being ignorant of the power…

Some however refer this to the time of the Jewish captivity, where many, declaring themselves to be Christs, drew after them crowds of deluded persons; but during the siege of the city there was no Christian to whom the Divine exhortation, not to follow false teachers, could apply. Wherefore it is better to understand it of heretics, who, coming to oppose the Church, pretended to be Christs; the first of whom was Simon Magus, but that last one, greater than the rest, is…