The beast and the false prophet
1 Then, I saw a beast rising out of the sea, with ten horns and seven heads, with ten crowns on its horns. On each head was a title challenging God.
2 The beast I saw looked like a leopard, with paws like a bear and a mouth like a lion. The dragon passed on his power, his throne and his great authority to the beast.
3 One of its heads seemed to be fatally wounded but this wound healed. The whole earth won dered and they followed the beast.
4 People prostrated themselves before the dragon who had given such authority to the beast and they prostrated themselves before the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast? Who can oppose it?”
5 The beast was given speech and it spoke boastful and blasphemous words against God; it was allowed to wield its power for forty-two months.
6 It spoke blasphemies against God, his name and his sanctuary, that is, those who already dwell in heaven.
7 It was allowed to make war on the saints and to conquer them. It was given authority over people of every tribe, language and nation;
8 this is why all the inhabitants of the earth will worship before it, those whose names have not been written in the book of life of the slain Lamb, since the foundation of the world.
9 Let anyone who has ears to hear, listen:
10 If your lot is the prison, to prison you will go; if your lot is to be killed by the sword, by the sword will you be slain. This is, for the holy ones, the time of endurance and faith.
11 Then I saw another beast rise out of the earth, with two horns like the Lamb but speak ing like the dragon.
12 This second beast is totally at the service of the first one and en joys its authority. So it makes the world and its inhabitants worship the first beast whose fatal wound has been healed.
13 It works great wonders, even making fire de scend from heaven to earth, in the sight of all.
14 Through these great wonders which it is able to do on behalf of the beast, it deceives the inhabitants of the earth, persuading them to make a statue of the beast which, although wounded by the sword, is still alive.
15 It has been allowed to give a spirit to this statue; the statue of the beast speaks and those who refuse to worship it are killed.
16 So this second beast makes everyone – great and small, rich and poor, free and en slaved – be branded on the right hand or on the fore head,
17 and no one can buy or sell unless he has been branded with the name of the beast or with the number of its name.
18 Let us see who is wise! If you are clever, you can interpret the number of the Beast; it is 66 6 and it is the name of a certain person.
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Comments Revelation, Chapter 13
• 13.1 The devil tries to stop Christ’s victory and to convince people that, in practice, Christ is not the master of life. If they wish to live, they must surrender their freedom and their conscience to another lord, namely, political power.
First generation Christians lived in the Roman empire that, after two centuries of conquests and organized action, managed to bring under one ruler many different peoples. People were marveling at the “Roman peace” and the prosperity that followed. They did not know the dangers of a totalitarian society: when John was writing, the emperor Domitian had just imposed on all his subjects the obligation to honor him as a god.
Under these circumstan ces, Christians had to make painful choices. By confessing Christ, the Lord of life, they would face persecution. John points to their responsibility: to remain faithful to Christ and refuse to worship Caesar. A handful of Christians would victoriously face the totalitarian state: the Church would conquer by the blood of its martyrs.
This is the point of the present vision. The two animals represent the two powers that join forces in service of the Dragon, namely, the devil against the Church.
The first beast looked like a leop ard (v. 2). It represents the persecuting power of the Roman empire, through images taken from Daniel 7:3-7. It comes from the sea, or the West, from Rome. The vitality and power of the Roman empire are like a caricature of the resurrection.
Then I saw another beast like the Lamb (v. 11). This beast comes from the continent, from the East, from Asia. It represents the reli gions that were competing with Christianity. They pretended to offer a heavenly salvation, but they did not condemn the sins of the Roman world, especially the corruption of society.
Speaking like the beast. These Asian religions were used, as are many religious groups in the world today. It is a fact that the agents of political pressure in the prosperous countries spend a great deal in the religious domain, and very often in the Third World; it is to paralyze the Church.
Persuading them to make a statue of the beast (v. 14). There was a religious movement behind the divinization of Rome and emperor worship. The cult of personality was not special only to the Roman Empire: it is deeply rooted in humans. Whatever its form it is threatening to the purity of faith.
The devil’s tactic consists in joining strong power with an ideology that Christians cannot accept: this is what happens now in all the countries that have no respect for the most basic requirements of conscience. Harassed both by leaders and public opinion manipulated by modern techniques of propaganda, believers must face open or disguised persecution. Economic problems give new means of pressure to power groups that can condemn people to lose their bread-earning work: they can no longer buy or sell, obtain work or study (v. 17).
Six hundred sixty-six: In books of that time, it was a common device to assign a numerical value to every letter of the alphabet and to get the “number” of an individual. Six hundred sixty-six can be figured out many ways, but it may correspond to “Emperor Nero.” We know that six means something imperfect: the one who tried to be seven (representing perfection) and did not make it.
We know that in the past some anti-Catholic polemists wanted to make this number apply to the pope. These fantasies have nothing to do with the content of this paragraph. Besides, those who know how to play with the numerical value of names can easily apply the number 666 to any of the people they know, with just a little patience. Thus, this number 666, even written by John, should be seen as a game. It was also a way of not openly attacking the Roman emperor.