1 And I saw a beast coming up out of the sea. g It had ten horns and seven heads. On its horns were ten crowns, ,h and on its heads were blasphemous names. ,i 2 The beast I saw was like a leopard, its feet were like a bear’s, and its mouth was like a lion’s mouth. j The dragon gave the beast his power, his throne, and great authority. 3 One of its heads appeared to be fatally wounded, but its fatal wound was healed.
The whole earth was amazed and followed the beast. k 4 They worshiped the dragon l because he gave authority to the beast. And they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast? m Who is able to wage war against it? ”
5 The beast was given a mouth to utter boasts and blasphemies. n It was allowed to exercise authority , for forty-two months. o 6 It began to speak blasphemies against God: to blaspheme his name and his dwelling—those who dwell in heaven. 7 And it was permitted to wage war against the saints and to conquer them. p It was also given authority q over every tribe, people, language, and nation. r 8 All those who live on the earth will worship it, everyone whose name was not written from the foundation of the world in the book of life s of the Lamb who was slaughtered. ,t
9 If anyone has ears to hear, let him listen. u
10 If anyone is to be taken captive,
into captivity he goes.
If anyone is to be killed with a sword,
with a sword he will be killed. v
This calls for endurance and faithfulness from the saints. w
The Beast from the Earth
11 Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth; it had two horns like a lamb, ,x but it spoke like a dragon. 12 It exercises all the authority of the first beast on its behalf and compels the earth and those who live on it to worship the first beast, whose fatal wound was healed. 13 It also performs great signs, y even causing fire to come down from heaven to earth in front of people. z 14 It deceives those who live on the earth a because of the signs that it is permitted to perform in the presence of the beast, b telling those who live on the earth to make an image of the beast who was wounded by the sword and yet lived. 15 It was permitted to give breath to the image of the beast, so that the image of the beast could both speak and cause whoever would not worship the image of the beast to be killed. c 16 And it makes everyone—small and great, rich and poor, free and slave—to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, d 17 so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark: the beast’s name or the number of its name.
18 This calls for wisdom: ,e Let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, because it is the number of a person. Its number is 666.
13:1–2. In Rv 12, Satan was unveiled as the force of evil in our world, the menace behind human history who wages war against God’s people. In Rv 13, the dragon calls forth two legendary creatures, Leviathan from the sea (13:1) and Behemoth from the earth (13:11), as its agents of suffering and sin. According to Jewish tradition, these beasts were created on the fifth day, and their separation between the sea and the land was symbolic of God’s establishing order to the primordial chaos (Gn 1:21; Jb 40:15–19; 41:1–2). Here, however, we have a sinister reversal, as the dragon summons both creatures from their domains to unleash chaos onto the created world. The beast from the sea clearly resembles the dragon and likewise has seven heads and ten horns, but more diadem crowns (i.e., ten on its horns compared with the seven on the dragon’s heads, emphasizing the beast’s political might; 13:1; cf. 12:3). Its resemblance to and commissioning by the dragon (13:2b) suggest that the beast serves Satan. This beast combines the qualities of the four separate monsters of Dn 7:1–8 into one: the body of a leopard, the feet of a bear, and the mouth of a lion, and ten horns (13:1–2a). In Daniel’s visions, each represents an earthly empire (possibly Babylonians, Medes, Persians, and Greeks) that occupied and persecuted Israel at various points in history. The horn of Daniel’s fourth beast, which boasts “arrogantly” (Dn 7:20), is the Seleucid Antiochus IV Epiphanes, whose program to outlaw Judaism and Hellenize the Jews ignited a war for Judean independence that lasted approximately three and a half years, or forty-two months (168–65 BC; Rv 13:5; cf. Dn 7:25).
13:3–4. This amalgamated monster symbolizes Roman imperial rule. The heads represent the imperial family, and the head that has a “fatal wound” (13:3; cf. 13:12) is an allusion to the “revival of Nero” myth (Lat Nero redivivus), an urban legend that the slain Nero (who committed suicide by stabbing a sword into his throat; see 13:14) would rise again to reconquer the Roman world. Despite the lethal wound to one of the heads, it is the entire beast that is healed (13:3; cf. 13:12, 14). Thus, after Nero’s suicide (AD 68), Rome survived four emperors (Galba, Otho, Vitellius, and Vespasian) who vied for power. What looked like anarchy and a mortal blow would be followed by a remarkable recovery when Vespasian established the Flavian dynasty. Rome had united the known world by the sword and maintained civic order despite internal conflict. The empire must have seemed unstoppable. No wonder the ancient world worshiped Rome and wondered, “Who is able to wage war against it?” (13:4).
13:5–10. Like the mouth of the beast that utters “boasts” (13:5; cf. the little horn of Dn 7:20) and blasphemes God (13:6), emperors promoted their own glory by establishing the imperial cult in almost every major city throughout the Mediterranean. Caesars were given divine names like Apollo, Zeus, “our lord and god,” “son of god,” and “savior,” and were praised for bringing a “gospel of peace” (the pax Romana) to newly annexed lands. The empire claimed to be the world’s savior, and the world believed it. But the peace that Rome brought to disparate lands was wrought by slaughter and violence; its prosperity was at the cost of poverty and injustice for others. Roman luxury led to moral decay and decadence. [Blasphemy]
13:11–18. The second beast speaks with the authority of the dragon and promotes the worldwide veneration of the first beast (13:11–12). The second beast symbolizes the wealthy social elite of Asia Minor, its magistrates, city officials, and trade guilds, who not only held political office but were also priests in the imperial cult. They erected imperial temples, set up “the image” of the emperor on statues and other icons (13:15; cf. Ex 32:1–35), and sponsored extravagant festivals. Since the success of the festivals guaranteed political favors from Rome, those who refused to participate in the imperial cult (like the churches of Smyrna, Pergamum, and Philadelphia; 2:8–17; 3:7–13) could not “buy or sell,” since they were ostracized by the trade guilds (13:17).