THE BEAST OF REVELATION 13
1. The beast is a servant of Satan and receives power from him.
2. The beast has power politically, a power that reaches all nations.
3. It speaks blasphemies, fights and overcomes the Saints, and supports Babylon. The wicked throughout the world worship it.
4. It seems to have existed in some form before the time of Christ, and it will continue to exist as a force in the world until the Lord returns in glory. Governments in any age that resist the spirit of truth, that exercise power over men & women inappropriately, that set themselves up as the source (rather than simply the protector) of people's security-all these partake of the spirit of the beast.(Parry, p. 164) SEE 1 NEPHI 13:1-9; See TPJS p. 287-294
Vs. 1 –-Note the JST –
Another sign-in addition to the one mentioned in 12:1. This one is in the likeness of things on the earth. This beast is a sign for the political kingdoms of the earth.
Rise up out of the sea – In ancient times the sea was often associated with evil, with chaos, with the enemies of God. The 4 beasts Daniel saw also came up from the sea (Dan 7:3)
Sea may symbolize the nations of the world, as waters does in 17:15. Thus, the beast rises to prominence from among the nations of the world. (Also look at D&C 61:14, 19-water danger vs.)
Seven heads – (The dragon of 12:3 JST 12:4 also had seven.)
Ten horns -
Ten crowns – The dragon had seven. Seven is a perfect number, but ten is not. The dragon has more power than the beast. These crowns are placed upon the horns, not the head as described with the dragon, suggesting that its power rests upon brute force.
Vs. 2 – The beast has power to rule like the beasts of the world rule, by force and strength. See Daniel 7. These kingdoms rule with power given by its ruler, Satan.
Vs. 3 – One of these kingdoms seems to be mortally wounded, but recovers as the world marvels. What if the Nazis or the Soviet Communism came back?
Sometimes we think we have Satan beat and then he comes back after us again.
Is this a contrast to the mortal wound that the Savior suffered on the cross? They both come back, but Christ will rule forever, the beast gets the lake of fire. (19:20)
The world does not see the beast as a beast. Modern day parallels? Sadam? Castro? Athletes, Rock and Movie Stars?
Vs. 4 – The beast seems unbeatable. You do not have to bow down and pray to something or somebody to worship it. We have an anti-Christ like Korihor, Sherem, Nehor. See also 1 John 2:18, 22; 4:3; 2 John 1:7.
Who is like unto the beast? Praise given to the beast that should be reserved for God. Example of Cavalier LeBron James when he spoke of meeting Michael Jordan. “It was like meeting Jesus.”
Vs. 5 – 42 months signifies temporary victory for SatanBlasphemy is usually one of three things; 1) say you are God if you are not. 2) Attempt to be worshipped as a god. 3) Doing things in god’s name without his authority.
Vs. 6 – Satan's campaign of evil achieves consideragble success
Vs. 7 – Satan’s war machine; 1) Apostasy, 2) Apathy, 3) Sin
Note the repetition of the sequence every kindred, tongue, people and nation. (5:9)
Vs. 8 – See Daniel 12:1-3
Vs. 9 – Remember this phrase from Rev. 2 & 3? How does it apply here?
Vs. 10 – We really don’t have to worry about the bad people receiving their rewards. Other translations clarify this verse to indicate that the trials and persecution the Saints face will require much patience and faith if they hope to endure. (NIV-New International Version, JB-Jerusalem Bible, RSV-Revised Standard Version, NEB-New English Bible). Life requires that we learn patience.
Vs. 11 – The counterfeit godhead is now complete. Dragon, Beast, 2nd Beast
SECOND BEAST OF REVELATION 13
- Comes from the earth (not the sea)
- Has the appearance of a lamb. (Christ)
- Is really like the Dragon. (Satan)
- Performs miracles to deceive.
- Causes a great division between good and evil (Vs. 15)
- Requires Allegiance (Vs. 15)
- Has economic power (vs. 17)
8. May represent religious philosophy more than political.
9. His exact identity rather as a false prophet or a kingdom has not been revealed, but is really fun to speculate about.
Vs. 11 – The first beast came out of the sea. Satan follows the law of witnesses. The two horns appears to be nothing more than in imitation of the Lamb. All bases covered.
Vs. 12 – All that Jesus did was to go about doing the work of the Father.
Vs. 13-14 The king of the counterfeit scores again! Like unto the magicians of Egypt and Simon the Sorcerer with Peter in Acts 8:9-24
Vs. 15 – See Dan. 3:4-18, 25
Vs. 16 – 1 Kings 19:14, 18 - See Gerald Lund, "Things Which Must Shortly Come to Pass" - In the Roman empire there were vast numbers of slaves. Often a slave would run away from his master, go to a large city such as Rome, and try to disappear into the population. Since nothing about a human being marks him naturally as either a slave or free man, such runaways could pass as free persons as long as no one could personally identify them. To protect against that practice, slave owners would often brand their slaves with marks to identify them, just as modern stockmen permanently mark their animals for identification. To make this brand impossible to hide under clothing, most slaves were marked either on the palm of the right hand or on the forehead directly above the eyes. Therefore, it would have been common in John's time to see a person walking down the street with a mark on his right hand or on his forehead and to instantly identify him as a slave.
65 Out of that practice grew a secondary custom. Worshipers of various gods in the Roman pantheon, to symbolize the fact that they were totally dedicated to their god—in other words, that they were slaves or servants of their god—would also mark themselves on the right hand or the forehead. In this case they would mark themselves with a symbol of their god. Thus, a person might be seen walking down the street with a thunderbolt on his forehead, which symbolized that he was totally devoted to—that is, a slave to—Jupiter. A person marked with a trident said symbolically, "I am a servant of Poseidon, the god of the sea," and so on. John's readers, familiar with that concept and its significance, would not have puzzled over what he meant. To say that a person had the mark of the beast suggested that he was a slave of, or totally subservient to, the beast. Note that John uses the same imagery in a positive sense, indicating that there are those who are sealed in their foreheads with the mark of God (see Rev. 7:3). This use clearly signifies that these are people who belong to God; they are God's servants. Thus, while it is true that only Latter-day Saints have the additional keys necessary to correctly interpret Revelation, a careful study of non-LDS sources can bring many valuable cultural, linguistic, and historical insights that can greatly enhance our understanding of John's vision.
Vs. 18 – Perhaps the verse most speculated on in all of Revelation is vs. 18. The number of the beast has caused many to predict who or what the beast is. The method of assigning to letters a numerical value is called gematria. By using various languages to assign numerical values, one can arrive at dozens of names. As Reuss put it, “This famous number has been made to yield almost all the historical names of the past 18 centuries. The Lord has not seen fit to reveal the identity of this beast as yet, and to speculate with our students would not only be unwise but would run counsel of the prophet Joseph Smith.
The word gematria means literally “reckoning by numbers.” In most ancient societies, letters and numbers were used interchangeably, and each letter of an alphabet had a numerical value. Technically speaking, gematria is a mode of interpretation in which the numerical values are substituted for each letter in a word. By so doing, a word’s numerical value could be determined and compared for potential relationships with other words possessing the numerical value. . . When numbers are used in a calculated and symbolic manner, they support the premise that God is the author of the scriptures.” (Gaskill, p. 111)
"We don't have exact interpretations of many of the things John saw in this chapter. It is easy to get caught up in trying to figure out details and thus miss the rather obvious and simple messages. For instance, we may not know who or what the beast is or what his seven heads and ten horns are. However it is obvious that evil is being represented in the vision as vicious and destructive, something for us to avoid. The beast's seven heads might represent Santa's attempted counterfeits of God's perfect work since the number seven represents perfection in Bible symbolism. Or the seven heads could represent attempts by Lucifer to confuse us. (For example, which one is really Satan or his front organizations or what?) Or perhaps the seven heads could symbolize Satan's ability to come at us from several different directions, using many different types of temptations. The head wounded, that was then healed in verse 3, could remind us that just when we think we have overcome Satan's temptations, he bounces back and tries for us again. The important thing is for us to be reminded that Satan is a very capable enemy and we must do all that we can to avoid getting the mark of the beast in our foreheads, i.e., to avoid becoming followers of Satan." (Ridges p. 446-7)
