Chapter Thirteen

Satan enlists many helpers to assist him in his work. Chapter 13 introduces us to a pair of these assistants.

John first sees a beast coming out of the sea. Remember that water can be used to represent the nations, the great masses of people. So this is a political power which rises to persecute God's people. The power, throne and authority for this persecution are provided by the dragon, as we learn in the second verse.

Horns represent power. Heads represent authority. So the ten horns and seven heads tell us that we are looking at a very powerful authority, indeed. There is a more complete discussion of these seven heads in chapter 17, so we'll wait to say more until we get there.

What we have here is a representation of the persecution under the Roman government. This persecution declined with the death of Nero, which is what verse three is telling us. But the persecution picked up again under Domitian. If, as we said in the introduction, Revelation was written during the reign of Vespatian, the arrival of Domition was just a short while off. Vespatian's son Titus ruled only a couple of years, then Titus' brother Domitian came to power.

In verse five we encounter again that period of limited persecution when God provides for His people.

Another beast comes along in verse 11. This one comes from the earth. He has two horns like a lamb, but he speaks like the dragon. Could there be any better picture of the false, pagan religion that was used to sustain the Roman empire? The only other lamb we have seen in the book of Revelation is Jesus. But this beast is just trying to look like a lamb. His speech gives him away. The dragon is putting words in his mouth.

Verse 12 tells us clearly that the job of this land beast is to cause people to worship the sea beast. Emperor-worship was a critical element of Roman religion. History tells us that the Roman priests were some of the greatest con-artists who ever lived. They were masters at ventriloquism and pulled some of the very stunts described in verses 13-15. But the point is that they caused the people to worship the sea beast through deception. Don't forget that the words coming out of the mouth of the land beast are dragon words. And don't forget that the sea beast is a puppet of the dragon. Satan works through deception.

The chapter ends with a mark being placed on the hand or on the forehead of the followers of the beast. In passages such as Deuteronomy 6:8 God tells His followers to bind His laws on their hands and foreheads. We work with our hands and think with our heads.

Without the mark of the beast, it is impossible to buy or sell. What is the meaning of this mark? Remember we explained earlier in our study that each type of work had a patron god. To get a job in that field, a person had to offer sacrifices to that god. No pagan worship meant no job, and no job meant no buying or selling. This placed the Christians in a very difficult situation.

What is the meaning of the number itself? Notice first from verse 17 that the mark, the number and the name are synonymous. We have explained other times that the Bible often uses the concept of a name to represent the nature of a person. So John is not trying to identify a single person here. His intention is to point out the nature of the enemy.

If seven is a complete number, then what is six? It is an attempt at completeness that has failed. What does it mean if this six is repeated three times? Satan was a three-time loser in chapter 12. His helpers don't do any better in chapter 13

Attempts have been made throughout history to pin this number on a single individual. Since it is true that the Hebrews and others of their time assigned numerical values to letters, would-be scholars have wrangled with various combinations of Greek, Hebrew or Latin letters to arrive at the correct number and prove their point. The only thing that is certain in this approach is that the system can be twisted to arrive at just about any name. All we have to do is start with a pre-conceived idea of what we want the number to represent.

But, as we said, this misses John's whole point. He is identifying the nature of the enemy and not the name. The number 666 represents a human attempt at well-being, a human attempt at strength and a human attempt at religion. As always, human attempts are sadly lacking.

The truth of the matter is that only God can provide real well-being. Only God can offer real strength. And only God can show us real religion.

Satan offers deception. God offers the truth that will set us free.

Unless otherwise noted, "Scripture taken from the NEW AMERICAN STANDARD BIBLE(R), (C) Copyright The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977. Used by permission."