The story of the omen begins with a wealthy married couple named Robert and Katherine Thorn who live an ideal life except that they do not have any children, and they want desperately to have a child. Robert Thorn is the U.S. ambassador to Italy and he and his wife try to have a baby, but the child dies in childbirth. At that moment, a mysterious priest approaches Robert and suggests to him that he should just take another baby whose mother had died giving birth. Robert listens to the priest and without telling his wife, takes the child from the hospital. The couple names the child Damien and continues having a normal life. However, as time goes by it becomes clear that Damien is not an ordinary child because a series of strange deaths begin to happen. First, the child’s nanny hangs herself on the boy’s birthday and a new nanny arrives to take care of the boy. Later the priest is killed by a lightning rod in a freak accident, and Katherine loses her second child when Damien pushes her off the balcony of their home. In order to find more information about the child’s background, Robert and a photographer named Keith travel from England to Rome, and then to Israel where Keith is decapitated by a pane of glass. Back in England Katherine is also killed by the new nanny, and Robert finally realizes that Damien is the antichrist or the devil’s child that has been born to doom the human race. In Israel, Robert finds an archaeologist who tells him that the only way to kill the child is by stabbing him with the seven daggers of Megiddo. Robert tries to kill Damien in a church after discovering that the boy has the devil’s number of three sixes as a birthmark, but Robert is shot by police before he can finish his task and save the human race. Damien is then adopted by the president of the United States who is a friend of Robert’s, and this makes the devil child smile because he is now in a position of power where he can perform his mission of deceiving humanity and sending us all to hell.
Damien is the child that represents the most frightening apocalyptic prophecy of the end of time. In the Christian religion the coming of the Antichrist is one of the last signs or omens indicating that the end of the world is near. In other words, this evil character is the archetype of doom, a false messiah that will contradict the teachings of Christ and deceive humanity and make us sin so we can lose our souls to the devil. Therefore, while Christ is considered the son of God who came to the world to atone for our sins and die for our salvation out of love for the human race, the antichrist is the son of the devil who comes to the world to fulfill his mission which is to condemn people to eternal damnation. According to religious historian Sabina Flanagan, in the Christian apocalyptic view “the end of the world would be heralded by various disasters, natural and social, the penultimate one of which would be the arrival of the Antichrist” (59). Therefore, Damien is evil incarnate and this is why he is always protected by supernatural forces, that mysteriously lead to the deaths of people who try to find the truth of his origin. As a child, he needs protection so he can be placed in a position where he can do the most damage. This is finally achieved when he is adopted by the president of the most powerful nation on earth. From this position he can influence public policy “lead a terrible persecution of the church,” (Flanagan, 59) and even bring about a world war that will end the human race. This is why Damien smiles at the end of the movie because he knows his demonic work is about to begin.
The movie the Omen hints at the idea of the devil playing a role in human affairs so it is useful to analyze this concept of the devil before we can fully understand how it relates to the anti-Christ. The Devil is perhaps the oldest archetype of evil that has existed even in ancient civilizations. The idea that this being represents the dark forces of the universe is essential to the teachings of the three major monotheistic religions, Judaism, Islam and Christianity, but other pagan cultures believed in this supernatural being as well. For Instance the atheist scholar Robert Ingersoll claims that
“We obtain our Devil from the Jews, and they got him from Babylon. The Jews cultivated the science of Demonology, and at one time it was believed that there were nine kinds of demons: Beelzebub, prince of the false gods of the other nations; the Pythian Apollo, prince of liars; Belial, prince of mischief makers. Asmodeus, prince of revengeful devils; Satan, prince of witches and magicians; Meresin, prince of aerial devils, who caused thunderstorms and plagues; Abandon, who caused wars, tumults and combustions; Diabolous, who drives to despair, and Mammon, prince of the tempters.”
Christianity then adopted the Jewish idea of the devil. This is suggested in the movie when Damien’s father travels to Rome, the site of the Catholic Church and to Israel, the birthplace of Judaism to search for Damien’s true origins. The Devil is also a major player in the Christian sacred book. As Ingersoll tells us, “The New Testament is far more explicit than the old…Certainly the writers of the New Testament believed in the existence of the Devil.” Therefore, the idea of the Devil is important to understand Damien’s mission on earth. Just like Christ was sent to earth by his Father to save souls, so was Damien sent to earth to doom them and do the Devil’s work. The claim that Damien was the son of the devil is supported by the bible “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar and the father of it” (John 8:44).Biblical scholar Steve Hall also believes that “His (Damien) real power comes from Satan (the Devil) himself.”Damien or as he is often called in the sacred texts, “the son of perdition.” Who came to the world to do his father’s work which is to doom our souls and send them to hell for eternity, and he will do this by using one weapon, deception.
As a matter of fact, in the movie the idea of Damien’s deceptive nature is already seen in how he is presented to the viewers. He appears to be a normal innocent well-behaved child who might even seem cute. He is born into a stable well respected family and grows up without any major traumas such as being the victim of abusive parents. During the first years of his childhood there is no indication of him participating in any act of delinquency or cruelty. He only shows his true identity when his mother threatens his position of privilege by expecting another baby. That is when Damien decides to throw her over the balcony and kill her true legitimate child. Damien’s deception is so perfect that no one suspects him to be evil. Even after his father finds out the truth about his origin and is told to kill the boy, he refuses to do so because he is only a child and Damien is his only son. It is only after Robert Thorn discovers the sign of the devil on Damien’s skin that he decides to kill this supernatural being disguised as a human infant. This is the true nature of the Anti-Christ, to fool people into believing he is normal and even good, so that they can follow him instead of Christ. Damien even fools the president of the United States who adopts him and will raise him as if he were his own child. As Hall claims, “He uses intrigue and his apparently peaceful intentions” and “most of the people of the world will be amazed by him, follow him, and even worship him”. Then “his power will seem to be worldwide.” Damien has succeeded in deceiving people and in the end of the movie he is very close to achieving power worldwide just like he was intended to do by his true father, the devil.
The major symbol in the movie is the triple six birthmarks found on Damien’s head which identify him without a doubt as the supernatural anti-Christ. This number has a biblical tradition and it can be found to refer to the man sent by the Devil to complete his mission on earth. In the Christian bible the Antichrist is referred to as a leader that will come at the end of time sitting at the head of a beast. The bible says “Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast; for it is the number of a man; and his number is six hundred threescore and six.” (Rev. 13:18). Although there have been many interpretations of this number, it is generally believed to refer to the man who will be born to deceive humanity and oppose the teachings of the Christian God. Damien then is the one who will come to earth riding on an enormous beast after his mission is accomplished.
Throughout history many people from the roman emperor Nero to the Nazi leader Hitler have been identified as the Antichrist. Even the philosopher Nietzsche gave himself that title in one of his books that criticize the values of Christianity. Many people today still believe that the Antichrist will come or it is already among us. The movie the Omen gives a clear portrayal of how the Antichrist will come to earth, not as an evil spirit with a hideous face, but as a powerful deceiver who will fool people into believing that evil is superior to what is moral and good. Regardless of whether one believes in this prophecy or not, it is amazing to know how ancient people used supernatural explanations for their human fears of the natural world. Evil does exist on earth and as long as this is true, the image of Damien as the Antichrist will always be the archetype for the darkest side of humanity. In the end, it is up to us to decide if good will prevail or if “The son of perdition” will triumph in the world.
Works Cited
Flanagan, Sabina. “Twelfth-Century Apocalyptic Imaginations and the Coming of the Antichrist.”
The Journal of Religious History. 24.1 (2000): 57-60 Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
Hall, Steve. “The Antichrist.” Abounding Joy. Dec. 2004. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
Ingersoll, Robert. G. “The Devil.” The Secular Web. 1899. Web. 11 Nov. 2010.
New Jerusalem Bible, John. 8:44. Rev. 13:18.
The Omen. Dir. Richard Donner. Prof. Gregory Peck, Lee Remick, and David Warner. Twenty Century Fox Productions, 1976. Film.
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