Daniel 1
Not finished, under construction
Revelation 13
The Beast Out of the Sea
1And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. 2And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.
3And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. 4And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?
5And there was given unto him a mouth speaking great things and blasphemies; and power was given unto him to continue forty and two months. 6And he opened his mouth in blasphemy against God, to blaspheme his name, and his tabernacle, and them that dwell in heaven.
7And it was given unto him to make war with the saints, and to overcome them: and power was given him over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations. 8And all that dwell upon the earth shall worship him, whose names are not written in the book of life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.
9If any man have an ear, let him hear. 10He that leadeth into captivity shall go into captivity: he that killeth with the sword must be killed with the sword. Here is the patience and the faith of the saints.
The Second Beast
11Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon. 12And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.
13He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. 14And he deceives [f]those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.
15He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed.
16He causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, 17and that no one may buy or sell except one who has [g]the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name.
18Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666.
Meaning of the Beast
The first thing we need to do is understand the basic meaning of the beast. We get this from Revelation 17. From reading Revelation 17 we will at least have a guide as to who or what the beast represents. We read in Revelation 17:
7But the angel said to me, “Why did you marvel? I will tell you the [c]mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. 8The beast that you saw was, and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to [d]perdition. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was, and is not, and [e]yet is.
9“Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. 10There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. 11The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to [f]perdition.
12“The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. 13These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast. 14These will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them, for He is Lord of lords and King of kings; and those who are with Him are called, chosen, and faithful.”
15Then he said to me, “The waters which you saw, where the harlot sits, are peoples, multitudes, nations, and tongues. 16And the ten horns which you [g]saw on the beast, these will hate the harlot, make her desolate and naked, eat her flesh and burn her with fire. 17For God has put it into their hearts to fulfill His purpose, to be of one mind, and to give their kingdom to the beast, until the words of God are fulfilled. 18And the woman whom you saw is that great city which reigns over the kings of the earth.”
Now we could literally spend hours and days going over each part of Revelation 17's description of the beast, however I am going to point out just a few quick points to remember. Please pay special attention to the highlighted parts.
7But the angel said to me, “Why did you marvel? I will tell you the [c]mystery of the woman and of the beast that carries her, which has the seven heads and the ten horns. 8The beast that you saw was, and is not, and will ascend out of the bottomless pit and go to [d]perdition. And those who dwell on the earth will marvel, whose names are not written in the Book of Life from the foundation of the world, when they see the beast that was, and is not, and [e]yet is.
We see the harlot or whore rides upon the beast. Consider the implication and we will discuss more on that later. Secondly, notice it says the beast was, is not, and yet is. That is something that will be brought up over and over.
Most people believe the beast is a person. Well, the beast has many parts to it as we just read, but I also believe the beast, at least in part, represents a person. If so consider the following.
The beast was. (This person existed, primarily before John's writing of Revelation.)
The beast is not. (This person obviously had died)
Yet the beast is. (Even though the beast lived and died...........they somehow lived on)
9“Here is the mind which has wisdom: The seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman sits. 10There are also seven kings. Five have fallen, one is, and the other has not yet come. And when he comes, he must continue a short time. 11The beast that was, and is not, is himself also the eighth, and is of the seven, and is going to [f]perdition.
Wow! We have a lot to unpack here. What do we know? We know there are Seven kings. Five or those kings had fallen. They were dead. So we know they are all kings, but there is something different about one of these kings.
After the words "Five have fallen" comes the words "one is and the other has not yet come". This means 6 of the kings of this "beast" had already come, and only only a future seventh king was to come....but wait, although there are only initially 7 kings mentioned we receive word of an eighth. This eight king was one of the first 5 fallen kings mentioned. WE know this because verse 11 states the beast that was (alive), and is not (alive)(but somehow is alive), is somehow an eighth king that was coming but eventually would go to perdition (destruction).
Before we continue, do you know of anyone that was reported to have lived, have died, and yet somehow lived? Was this person a king? If so, you may be on your way to discovering who this beast is.
Back to Revelation 13
So now we know we are looking for this eighth king that had lived, died, yet lives... lets go back to Revelation 13 verse 3.
3And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast. 4And they worshipped the dragon which gave power unto the beast: and they worshipped the beast, saying, Who is like unto the beast? who is able to make war with him?
The Dragon represents a power. It would take another complete study to discuss what the Dragon actually is, however for now I believe we can narrow down the Dragon to representing a power. That power could be "just a power", that power could be Yahuah, that power could be Satan. I'll let you ponder who or what the dragon is, but I definately think the Dragon represents a power.
We see in verse three, one of the heads of the beast (or kings) was wounded to death. That wound was then healed, or in other words, that king was brought back to life. Afterwards the world worshipped the Dragon (or power) that gave power to the beast (or king), and in other words said, who is like this king? and who is able to make war with him?