The nature of the beast in the book of revelation

One of the first things that comes to mind when you think about the book of Revelation in the Bible is the dragon and the two beasts that have the number 666 and make marks on people’s hands and foreheads. There is much speculation as to what this might mean. So let us take a look and see what people are saying.

The text

Then the dragon became furious with the woman and went off to make war on the rest of her offspring, on those who keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus. And he stood on the sand of the sea.

1 And I saw a beast rising out of the sea, with ten horns and seven heads, with ten diadems on its horns and blasphemous names on its heads. 2 And the beast that I saw was like a leopard; its feet were like a bear’s, and its mouth was like a lion’s mouth. And to it the dragon gave his power and his throne and great authority. 3 One of its heads seemed to have a mortal wound, but its mortal wound was healed, and the whole earth marveled as they followed the beast. 4 And they worshiped the dragon, for he had given his authority to the beast, and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast, and who can fight against it?” 5 And the beast was given a mouth uttering haughty and blasphemous words, and it was allowed to exercise authority for forty-two months. 6 It opened its mouth to utter blasphemies against God, blaspheming his name and his dwelling, that is, those who dwell in heaven. 7 Also it was allowed to make war on the saints and to conquer them. And authority was given it over every tribe and people and language and nation, 8 and all who dwell on earth will worship it, everyone whose name has not been written before the foundation of the world in the book of life of the Lamb who was slain. 9 If anyone has an ear, let him hear: 10 If anyone is to be taken captive, to captivity he goes; if anyone is to be slain with the sword, with the sword must he be slain. Here is a call for the endurance and faith of the saints.

11 Then I saw another beast rising out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb and it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercises all the authority of the first beast in its presence, and makes the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose mortal wound was healed. 13 It performs great signs, even making fire come down from heaven to earth in front of people, 14 and by the signs that it is allowed to work in the presence of the beast it deceives those who dwell on earth, telling them to make an image for the beast that was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 And it was allowed to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast might even speak and might cause those who would not worship the image of the beast to be slain. 16 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, 17 so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. 18 This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666. (Rev.12/17–13–18)

A bag full of references

The previous verses describe the dragon’s attack on the child (Jesus) and his mother. In both cases he fails completely, so he now assembles two more beasts, which are described in detail.

• The first reference goes back to the book of Job 40/15–41/37. It is a long story describing Behemoth and Leviathan, the two beasts from the sea and from the land (the beasts in Rev.13 also come from the sea and from the land). They are invincible to man, but not to God (Isa.27/1). Ps.104 gives the impression that Leviathan is no more than a toy compared to God.
• A similar hint is given in Rev.10/3, where the angle sets his foot on land and sea (claiming ownership of them).
• The first beast takes its description from Dan.7, which describes four beasts: the first like a lion, the second like a bear, the third like a panther. All together they have 7 heads (each one has 1, but the third has 4). The fourth has 10 crowns, which are ten kings, which even connects Rev.10 with the harlot in Rev.17. So what is the point of the reference in Dan.7? If you read this text to the end, you will see that the point of this chapter is to show that the beast is defeated.
• The next major parallel is Dan.3, the well-known story of Daniel’s friends in the fiery furnace. This describes the situation of the second beast. We have here a statue to be worshiped, people to be punished if they don’t and to be killed by fire and we even have 666 in Dan.3 looking at the measurements of the statue. The end of the story in Dan.3 is that Daniel’s friends are saved and the king acknowledges and praises God and promotes the friends.

At first glance, this chapter gives the impression of the dragon and his beasts as unbeatable rulers and oppressors, but the evidence screams “loser” when they face God and His people.

But the first appearance does not look like the first beast representing the all of the four kingdoms in Daniel:

The first beast and the beasts in Daniel

The twofold attack

Looking at the context, we see that this passage follows Satan’s failed attempt to destroy Jesus and Israel. Now he is angry and gathers two beasts to attack the descendants of Jesus — the Church.

Let us take a closer look at these two beasts. They act together and support each other. They are also described in a parallel pattern

At the end there is another interesting chiasmus: “Here is” and “If someone” shows an equivalence between “Who has understanding: Count” and “He who has ears, let him hear”, i.e. knowledge should lead to action (hear=obey in Hebrew) and “wisdom” with “patience and faith of the saints”, showing that the Weisheit should result in patience and faith.

He does this in two ways:

• By force and intimidation (conquering the saints, killing any resistance or people who don’t want to follow).
• By deception, which is a little harder to understand, but I will explain.

First some observations:

• The dragon and the two beasts are three, like the Holy Trinity.
• The dragon gives all authority to the first beast, just as God gives all authority to Jesus.
• The first beast appears to be killed and resurrected from the death, just us Jesus died and was resurrected.
• Every knee bows to the first beast as it does to Jesus.
• Everyone worships the first beast as they should worship Jesus.
• The second beast has two horns like a lamb.
• The second best speaks with the authority of the first beast, just as the Holy Spirit speaks with the authority of Jesus.
• It can make fire fall down from heaven in front of all the people as a reminder of Elijah’s sign of the true God.
• It can make a statue come alive, showing that it is more than an idol and recalling the work of the Spirit in Ezekiel.

When we see all this, it becomes clear that Satan forms an evil trinity with the

• the dragon, who represents God the Father, who gives all power to the
• the first beast, who resurrects and has power over all nations, representing Jesus, who is worshipped by the second beast,
• the second beast, to make all worship him as the Holy Spirit does, and to perform signs and wonders, and to cause the dead to live.

The dark side

Your first reaction might be that this is just evil. But on a second thought, it might look appealing.

• There is a faith that they people will be astonished when they see the strength of the beast. Don’t we sometimes wish that people wouldn’t think our faith is silly? Or that our prayers are powerful?
• Or a worldwide spread of the gospel that people will accept Jesus because you are tired of inviting people to God only to get rejections?
• Or do you want to see more signs and wonders because you are beginning to doubt that God is really after all?
• Or are you looking for healing for loved ones that no prayer helped?
• Or you want a God who destroys his enemies and evildoers — an answer to the question: If there is a good God, why does He not stops evil?
• Or do you want all people to submit to our value system?

This Trinity provides all the things that we may miss from time to time, but something is not right.

• The first beast does not give his life out of love, but to make people afraid.
• The first beast does not do things to glorify God, but to insult Him.
• The beast does not build up the church, but attacks the believers.
• The second beast does not invite people, but coerces them and threatens them with the loss of their lives or financial survival.

In short, the beast stands for all the things that God does not stand for: manipulation, intimidation, punishment, and forcing people into a system. Unfortunately, the church often does just that, and this chapter of Revelation challenges the church not to do it.

There is no “leaving loving acts for the greater good” because love is the greater good.

The mystery of the second beast

You may ask yourself: How could this happen, that even the Church would fall for this, even though the Bible describes such behavior as the act of the beast?We find the answer in verse 11: “Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth. It had two horns like a lamb, but it spoke like a dragon.From the outside, the Evil Trinity and the Holy Trinity look alike (two horns like a lamb [Jesus]), but the difference is the voice (spoke like a dragon). But who can recognize/hear the voice - only His sheep as Jesus says.

But hearing His voice also means in Hebrew thinking “obeying His voice”. So: Only the Church can distinguish between the Holy and the Evil Trinity. When the church uses fear, violence, or manipulation, it is not following God, but following the way of the beast.

What about miracles

But we should not “throw out the baby with the bathwater". After reading this, you may want to avoid anything described with the beast.

• It performs signs and wonders, so wonders are bad.
• It is victorious, so we should avoid being strong.

This is not the case, because the devil would do a very bad job of imitating God if everything were different. God and the Church are victorious (maybe in a different way) and God is still doing miracles today, but this signature move of God is His love, which the devil cannot/does not want to copy.

The devil advertises victory, no matter what the death toll.

God comes in love and cares for people, even if it does not always look so victorious.

Dig Deeper

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