Revelation

The Beast out of the Earth – Revelation 13:11-15

John sees a second beast, this time rising from the earth. The second beast is called a deceiver (13:14).  This second beast is called the false prophet in Revelation 16:13, 19:20; 20:10. Along with the red dragon and the beast from the sea, this third character introduced here is part of a “satanic trinity.” Irenaeus referred to this false prophet as the “armor bearer” of the Antichrist, Adv. Haer. 5.28.2).

Who Is the Antichrist?

As with the first beast, many commentators think this is an allusion to the two primordial beasts in Job, Leviathan and Behemoth. In several Second Temple period texts, God separated Leviathan and Behemoth on the fifth day of creation (1 Enoch 60:7-101, 24; 4 Ezra 6:47–54; 2 Apoc. Bar. 29:4). These two beasts are prepared for the “great day of the Lord” when they will be turned into food (1 Enoch 60:24).

1 Enoch 60.7–10  On that day, two monsters will be parted—one monster, a female named Leviathan, in order to dwell in the abyss of the ocean over the fountains of water; 8 and (the other), a male called Behemoth, which holds his chest in an invisible desert whose name is Dundayin, east of the garden of Eden, wherein the elect and the righteous ones dwell, wherein my grandfather was taken, the seventh from Adam, the first man whom the Lord of the Spirits created. 9 Then I asked the second angel in order that he may show me (how) strong these monsters are, how they were separated on this day and were cast, the one into the abysses of the ocean, and the other into the dry desert. 10 And he said to me, “You, son of man, according (to the degree) to which it will be permitted, you will know the hidden things.”

The second beast has two horns like a lamb, but it speaks with the voice of the dragon. The dragon has already been identified as Satan. The two horns are unusual since they are the usual number from a lamb; usually animals have many horns. It is possible, then, the horns do not represent rulers (as with the first beast), but rather suggest the appearance of harmlessness. But when the harmless looking beast speaks it is communicating the word of the Dragon, Satan. In the opening paragraph I suggested John has created a satanic parody of the trinity. If that is the case, then this second beast is like the Holy Spirit. Rather than communicating the word of God, it speaks the word of the Dragon.

What does this “false prophet” do? Unlike the first beast, John gives a series of activities associated with the false prophet and many evoke the activity of the Holy Spirit in the New Testament. (Note I am using masculine personal pronouns here because they are in the Greek text; this is a possible argument against a parody of the Holy Spirit since the Greek for spirit is neuter.)

First, the false prophet causes the inhabitants of the whole world to worship the first beast. If the first beast refers to the Roman empire, then worshiping the Roman empire naturally brings the imperial cult to mind. Most commentators understand this as an allusion to Daniel 3; Nebuchadnezzar set up an image and demanded everyone worship it or be put to death.

Second, he performs great signs which help convince the first beast has power. In the Gospel of John, Jesus did seven signs (σημεῖον) which were to convince people he was the Messiah (John 20:30-31). This false prophet does great signs (σημεῖον) in order to convince people that the Beast of the Earth has great power, and (perhaps) that the injured horn is the messiah.

Third, he heals the near-fatal wound of the first beast. This is the greatest of miracles, a parody of the resurrection of Christ. In Revelation 13:3 the first beast appeared to have died and was brought back to life, now in 13:14 it is the power of the false prophet that did this great miracle. It is important to observe the first beast was not actually dead, so this is a false-resurrection.

Fourth, he makes the image of the first beast speak.  This was a belief of the first century, that statues could magically be made to talk. Certain cults would use ventriloquism to make statues appear to talk. In this case the statues will pronounce judgement on all who do not worship it.

Fifth, he requires that all men receive the mark of the beast on their hand or forehead. This may allude to increasing pressure on Christians in Asia Minor to participate in the imperial cult. I will deal with the Mark of the Beast in another post.

John’s description of the first beast is consistent with warnings against false prophets in Deuteronomy 13:1-3, Jesus’s warnings about false prophets and false messiahs (Mark 13:21-23, Matt 24:23-25), as well as Paul’s description of the coming Lawless one (2 Thess 2:9-11). The Lawless One is empowered by Satan and will have “all power and false signs and wonders” in order to deceive those who have refused to love the truth. People believe these deceiving signs because God has sent a “strong delusion” so that they believe what is false. Similarly, here in Revelation 13 the second beast does great signs to convince the whole world of the power of the first beast.

Other Second Temple period texts describe the coming evil one as doing many great signs. Aune points to Sibylline Oracle 3.63-74 since it combines the Return of Nero myth with the satanic Beliar performing great miracles, including raising the dead:

Sib. Or. 3.63–67 Then Beliar will come from the Sebastēnoi and he will raise up the height of mountains, he will raise up the sea, the great fiery sun and shining moon, and he will raise up the dead, and perform many signs for men.

In summary, the second beast in Revelation 13 is the religious support for the empire and emperor described by the first beast. Although many in the modern west think of the separation of church and state as good and normal, the Roman world did not think of the political world as separate from the religious. The emperor demonstrated proper piety toward the gods and was deified and worshiped in the imperial cult. The imperial cult served to unified the empire and served to broadcast imperial propaganda throughout the Roman world.

Although little is known about the function of the imperial priesthood, John appears to be describing the function of the imperial cult and its priesthood. (Aune, 756; Beasley-Murray, 216). If the first beast is the Roman empire and the horns are various emperors, then the imperial cult was the religious support system for the empire, especially in Asia Minor. This will be clearer with the final activity of the second beast, forcing all people to take the mark of the beast.

The Beast Who Lived – Revelation 13:3-4

After describing the Beast from the Sea as the ultimate fulfillment of Daniel’s vision of the final nation (Dan 7:7), John sees that one of the heads seemed to have a mortal wound, but that wound was healed (13:3). This wound was healed by the second beast (13:12) and filled the world with wonder.

Worship of the Beast

The beast as a whole an empire and the horns are leaders or kings associated with that empire. In Daniel 7, the final beast referred to Seleucid control of Judea and the arrogant little horn was Antiochus IV Epiphanes. The son of man was given authority by God to judge this arrogant little horn (Dan 7:9-10) and establish a kingdom that would never end (Dan 7:14). Antiochus did in fact make war against God’s people, leading to the Maccabean Revolt. Although the revolt did result in a brief time of semi-autonomous self-rule, the Hasmoneans were not the anything like the son of man waging war against the arrogant horn until they possessed a kingdom that would never end (Dan 7:21-22).

Since the everlasting kingdom of God ruled by God’s representative, the son of man, did not happen in the second century B.C., John applies Daniel 7 to the evil empire of his own day, Rome. Picking up on many themes from Daniel, God will humble the empire and arrogant world leader just as he had humbled Babylon and Nebuchadnezzar, or the Seleucids and Antiochus. Rome did not lack for arrogant rulers in the first century A.D. and it is difficult to say which first-century Roman emperor John had in mind.

Who is the ruler of the empire who died and came back to life? It is possible “one of his heads” as “his first head.” It is possible to translate the number μίαν (accusative singular of εἷς) as “first,” but this is usually found in expressions of time, such as the first day of the week (Matt 28:1 for example). It is possible this unusual use of the word reflects a Hebrew or Aramaic expression (BDAG εἷς 4), which might be expected in a Jewish apocalypse like Revelation. If the word does refer to the first of the horns, then the references is to Julius Caesar. Julius was never an emperor; however, he was assassinated. There were no legends of a “revived Julius,” but he was deified and his family became central to the imperial cult.

Another common suggestion is that this revived emperor refers to Nero who committed suicide by slitting his own throat (Caligula is a possibility as well, since he was deathly ill and people wondered if he might recover, but the text indicates this head is killed by the sword in verse 14.). The rumor Nero was not dead persisted for many years after his suicide and many commentators take the recovery of the first beast as a reference to this myth. Dio Chrysostom said “Even now everyone wishes that Nero were alive, and most people actually believe it.” David Aune has an excursus on the Nero Myth along with an extensive bibliography (2:737).

Despite modern popular depictions of Nero as a tyrannical monster, he was popular in the eastern part of the empire. A rumor (or urban legend) spread that Nero had faked his death and was hiding among the Parthians where he was raising an army to retake the throne of Rome (Sib. Or. 4.119-122; Collins, The Sibylline Oracles, pp. 80–87). Tacitus refers to two pretenders in A.D. 69 (, Hist 2.8, 9; cf. Dio Cassius 64.9) and Suetonius mentions a third other active in A.D. 80 (Nero, 57).

Tacitus, Histories 2.8 About this time Achaia and Asia were terrified by a false rumour of Nero’s arrival. The reports with regard to his death had been varied, and therefore many people imagined and believed that he was alive. The fortunes and attempts of other pretenders we shall tell as we proceed; but at this time, a slave from Pontus or, as others have reported, a freedman from Italy, who was skilled in playing on the cithara and in singing, gained the readier belief in his deceit through these accomplishments and his resemblance to Nero. He recruited some deserters, poor tramps whom he had bribed by great promises, and put to sea. (LCL 1:173)

The fourth Sibylline Oracle may refer to this Nero redivivus legend:

Sib. Or. 4.119–122 Then a great king will flee from Italy like a runaway slave unseen and unheard over the channel of the Euphrates, when he dares to incur a maternal curse for repulsive murder and many other things, confidently, with wicked hand.

Sib. Or. 4.137–139 Then the strife of war being aroused will come to the west, and the fugitive from Rome will also come, brandishing a great spear having crossed the Euphrates with many myriads.

See this post for the Nero myth in Sibylline Oracle 8.

Larry Kreitzer follows Collins closely and extends the Nero myth to include Hadrian, referring specifically to 5.28-34; 93-110. Like Nero, Hadrian was responsible for destroying Jerusalem and his extensive tour of the east may have evoked the Nero redivivus myth. However, Jan Willem van Henten argued the Nero Redivivus legend is a modern scholarly construct. He surveys references to Nero in the Sibylline Oracles and concludes they are “creative recycling of tyrannical rulers’ stereotypes” rather than “a posthumous return to life of the emperor Nero.” For van Henten, scholars like Collins and Kreitzer “take the Nero redivivus for granted” (5).

Although a Christian text, the Martyrdom of Isaiah 4:2-3 compares Beliar, the satanic “king of this world” to Nero.

Mart. Ascen. Isa. 4.2–3 And after it has been brought to completion, Beliar will descend, the great angel, the king of this world, which he has ruled ever since it existed. He will descend from his firmament in the form of a man, a king of iniquity, a murderer of his mother—this is the king of this world—and will persecute the plant which the twelve apostles of the Beloved will have planted; some of the twelve will be given into his hand.

In Revelation the beast is the Roman empire, as the persecutor of the church. Like Dan 7:21-22, this beast will persecute God’s people until God himself intervenes to destroy the power of the beast and establish an eternal kingdom.

Along with Revelation 17:8, the death and resurrection of the first beast is a parody of Christ. Vern Poythress offers several examples of parody in Revelation 13.

  • He has a counterfeit resurrection in the form of a mortal wound that was healed (Rev 13:3). The miraculous character of his healing creates astonishment and followers for him, just as the miracle of the resurrection creates followers of Christ.
  • The beast has ten crowns (13:1), parallel to Christ’s many crowns (19:12).
  • The dragon gives the beast “his power and his throne and great authority” (13:2), just as the Father gives the Son his authority (John 5:22–27).
  • Worship of the dragon and the beast go together (Rev 13:4), just as worship of the Father and the Son go together (John 5:23).
  • The beast claims universal allegiance from all nations (Rev 13:7), just as Christ is Lord over all nations (7:9–10).

I would add to this list the mysterious “mark of the beast” as a parody of God marking his own people (the 144,000 in Rev 14:1).

As is often the case in Revelation, John looks back to the book of Daniel and re-works the apocalyptic outline of history to apply to his own day. Just as Babylon and Persia became Antiochus and the Seleucids, John transforms the image of a beast from the sea with an arrogant little horn into Rome. But also like Daniel, there is an aspect of this apocalypse which does look forward to an ultimate enemy of God’s people and an ultimate arrogant little horn who will be finally judged when God’s kingdom arrives (Rev 19:11-20:6).

 

Bibliography: Larry Kreitzer, “Hadrian and the Nero Redivivus Myth” ZNTW 79 (1988): 92-115; Vern S. Poythress, “Counterfeiting In The Book Of Revelation As A Perspective On Non-Christian Culture” JETS 40 (1997): 411-418; Jan Willem van Henten, “Nero Redivivus Demolished: The Coherence Of The Nero Traditions in the Sibylline Oracles,” JSP 21:3-17

A Dragon with Ten Horns and Seven Heads – Revelation 13:1-2

This first beast which rises from the sea has ten horns and seven heads. What do these horns represent? These horns are an allusion to Daniel 7:7. The fourth beast rising from the sea in Daniel’s vision has ten horns, representing a fourth empire which will persecute God’s people. Revelation reinterprets Daniel’s fourth beast as the Roman Empire.

The Beast from Luther Bible

Daniel 7:7 “After that, in my vision at night I looked, and there before me was a fourth beast—terrifying and frightening and very powerful. It had large iron teeth; it crushed and devoured its victims and trampled underfoot whatever was left. It was different from all the former beasts, and it had ten horns.

That horns represent rulers in Daniel 7 and Revelation 13 is clear. Daniel 7:24 and Revelation 17:12 interpret the horns are “ten kings who have not yet received a kingdom,” although the precise identity of those kings is open for debate. In Daniel 7, the only horn that is important is the blasphemous little horn which refers to Antiochus IV Epiphanes, the Seleucid ruler who sparked the Maccabean Revolt by outlawing certain Jewish practices. The fourth beast in Daniel 7 is the final kingdom before God’s representative, the Son of Man begins to rule over a kingdom which will never end.

The beast with seven heads and ten horns was introduced in Revelation 12:3 and will appear again in 17:3. In each case the horns wear crowns (διάδημα, diadem or royal headband) as a symbol of their kingship. That there are seven heads seems odd, but the power of this beast comes from the dragon, who had seven heads in 12:3. I discussed some of the possible ways to identify these ten kings in a post on Revelation 17.

One of the earliest interpretations of the first beast identified it as Rome. Both Irenaeus and Hippolytus thought the first beast was Rome, although the ten heads were ten kings who would replace of Rome (Adv. Haer. 5.26.1): “In a still clearer light has John, in the Apocalypse, indicated to the Lord’s disciples what shall happen in the last times, and concerning the ten kings who shall then arise, among whom the empire which now rules [Rome] shall be partitioned.”

Connecting Daniel 2 and 7, Hippolytus says: “A fourth beast, dreadful and terrible; it had iron teeth and claws of brass.” And who are these but the Romans? which (kingdom) is meant by the iron—the kingdom which is now established; for the legs of that (image) were of iron” (de Ant. 25). He then draws the obvious parallels to the great whore (quoting large sections of Revelation 17-18).

Although David Aune points out Roman emperors never wore diadems signifying royal status (Aune 2:733), it is still likely John means the reader to understand the horns as Roman power and the beast as Imperial Rome.

Each of the seven heads has a blasphemous name and in 13:16 the second beast will force people to write a blasphemous name on their foreheads. Later the whore of Babylon will have blasphemy written on her forehead. These names likely refer to the titles used by Roman emperors. For example, Nero minted coins with the phrase “Nero, Savior of the World” and Domitian used the title “Lord and God.”

John exposes the power behind the empire. Although the Roman Empire is the most powerful kingdom in human history, the source of its power is the dragon, Satan. This condemnation of Rome as Satan’s kingdom will become increasingly clear as John moves toward the climax in Revelation 19:11-20:6, the coming of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords to establish a real kingdom of peace.

Background for the Beast of the Sea – Revelation 13:1-2

At the end of Revelation 12, the dragon stands at the shore of the sea and summons two beasts, one from the sea and another rising out of the earth (13:11-18). These beasts make war against God’s people and demand worship from the entire world.

Beast from Sea Bamberg Apocalypse

Although the sea is sometimes interpreted as “disturbed and stormy social and political” of the first century, but since much of Revelation 13 is satanic parody, summoning the beast out of the sea may be a parody of creation. Satan is mimicking God standing at the chaotic sea creating the order of the earth (Gen 1:2). Vern Poythress, for example, suggests the sea in Revelation 13:1 evokes the chaotic pre-creation world before God imposes order on the days of creation. The coming time of tribulation will be a return to the “formless and void” (tohu-wa-bohu) before God’s creative actions in Genesis 1.

Greg Beale suggests Revelation 13 is in part based on Job 40-41. In those chapters there are two beasts who opposed God, the Behemoth on the land and Leviathan from the sea (Revelation, 682). “On earth there is not his like, a creature without fear. He sees everything that is high; he is king over all the sons of pride” (Job 41:33-34). Perhaps this is more clear in the Septuagint, “And the netherworld of the deep is like a prisoner (δὲ τάρταρον (tartarus) τῆς ἀβύσσου, “bottomless pit” or Abyss in Revelation). He regards the deep as a walk. There is not anything upon the earth like it, being made to be mocked by my angels. It sees everything that is high, and it itself is king of all that is in the waters” (Job 41:23–25 LES2).

In the Old Testament sea monsters like Leviathan and Rahab refered to foreign powers who oppressed Israel, especially Egypt Ps 74:14; 87:4; Isa 30:7; Ezek 29:3; 32:2-3; Jer 51:3 refering to Babylon). Revelation 13 draws on this common Old Testament imagery since the beast from the sea is an enemy of God and an persecutor of his people.

Psalm 74:14 It was you who crushed the heads of Leviathan and gave him as food to the creatures of the desert.

Psalm 87:4 “I will record Rahab and Babylon among those who acknowledge me— Philistia too, and Tyre, along with Cush— and will say, ‘This one was born in Zion.’”

Isaiah 30:7 to Egypt, whose help is utterly useless. Therefore I call her Rahab the Do-Nothing.

Ezekiel 29:3 Speak to him and say: ‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: “‘I am against you, Pharaoh king of Egypt, you great monster lying among your streams. You say, “The Nile is mine; I made it for myself.”

Ezekiel 32:2-3 “Son of man, take up a lament concerning Pharaoh king of Egypt and say to him: “‘You are like a lion among the nations; you are like a monster in the seas thrashing about in your streams, churning the water with your feet and muddying the streams. 3 “‘This is what the Sovereign Lord says: “‘With a great throng of people I will cast my net over you, and they will haul you up in my net.

In the Pseudepigrapha, Leviathan and Behemoth were a single primordial beast separated by God at the time of creation.

1 Enoch 60:7-10 On that day, two monsters will be parted—one monster, a female named Leviathan, in order to dwell in the abyss of the ocean over the fountains of water; 8 and (the other), a male called Behemoth, which holds his chest in an invisible desert whose name is Dundayin, east of the garden of Eden, wherein the elect and the righteous ones dwell, wherein my grandfather was taken, the seventh from Adam, the first man whom the Lord of the Spirits created. 9 Then I asked the second angel in order that he may show me (how) strong these monsters are, how they were separated on this day and were cast, the one into the abysses of the ocean, and the other into the dry desert. 10 And he said to me, “You, son of man, according (to the degree) to which it will be permitted, you will know the hidden things.”

4 Ezra 6:47-52 “On the fifth day you commanded the seventh part, where the water had been gathered together, to bring forth living creatures, birds, and fishes; and so it was done. 48 The dumb and lifeless water produced living creatures, as it was commanded, that thereafter the nations might declare thy wondrous works. 49 “Then you kept in existence two living creatures; the name of one you called Behemoth and the name of the other Leviathan. 50* And you separated one from the other, for the seventh part where the water had been gathered together could not hold them both. 51 And you gave Behemoth one of the parts which had been dried up on the third day, to live in it, where there are a thousand mountains; 52 but to Leviathan you have the seventh part, the watery part; and you have kept them to be eaten by whom you wish, and when you wish.

In the Psalms of Solomon 2:28-32 Pompey speaks with the “arrogance of the dragon” who is judged by God with a dishonorable death.

Psalms of Solomon 2:28-32 And do not delay, God, to repay them upon their heads, 29 to speak the arrogance of the dragon (δράκων) in dishonor.” 30 And I did not delay until God showed to me his insolence, a man pierced on the mountains of Egypt, being scorned more than the smallest upon the earth and the sea, 31 his body being carried over the waves in great insolence; and there was no one to bury it 32 because he rejected him in dishonor.”

But the most oblivious background for this first beast from the sea is the fourth beast in Daniel 7. Beale, for example, calls Revelation 13:1-2 a “creative reworking of Dan. 7:1-7 (683). Revelation 13 describes the first beast as having ten horns (Dan 7:7) and seven heads and was like a leopard; bear and lion, Daniel’s first three beasts in reverse order. In Daniel, “the arrogant little horn” comes from this fourth beast.

In the context of Daniel, the immediate reference is to Antiochus IV Epiphanes and his arrogant persecution of Judea which led to the Maccabean Revolt. Revelation is written about 250 years after Antiochus, suggested John is re-interpreting the fourth beast of Daniel 7 as the current arrogant empire, Rome. If this is the case, then the wounded horn may refer to an emperor, just as the little horn referred to Antiochus.

The Dragon Makes War – Revelation 12:13-17

The final section of Revelation 12 the woman escaping the dragon. The individual images are difficult, but they all refer Satan’s persecution of the children of the woman. In Revelation 13 the dragon empowers two agents to wage war against God’s holy people (13:7).

Unclean spirits, Getty Apocalypse. Ms. Ludwig

For many interpreters the woman represents the church and her children, the holy people attacked by the dragon and the beast (13:7) is a metaphor for the church. Greg Beale, for example, interprets the chapter Jesus’s victory of Satan at the cross. Revelation 12:11 especially important for this interpretation since the holy ones have triumphed over Satan by the blood of the Lamb. As a result, the devil’s fury is expressed against Christians” (Revelation, 667). Beale draws parallels between the saints under the altar in Revelation 6:9 and the ones who have lost their lives in 12:11. He therefore summarizes this war against the holy ones “as a result of Christ’s victory over the devil, God protects the messianic community against the devil’s wrathful harm” (668).

However, all of the allusions to the Old Testament and symbolism in Revelation 12 refer to Israel. The word dragon (δράκων) is rare in the New Testament, only appearing in Revelation as a metaphor for Satan. In the Septuagint it is used to translate the Hebrew תַּנִּין (tannin) a snake, but often a sea-monster or dragon. The word is used in Exodus 7:9 when Moses throws down his staff and it becomes a snake. The Septuagint uses the word dragon (δράκων).

This is not to say Moses’s staff became a Harry Potter style baby dragon, but the association of a sea-monster occupying the chaos of the sea is common in the Ancient Near East. For example, Jeremiah 51:34 describes Nebuchadnezzar as a sea-monster (using תַּנִּין, δράκων in LXX Jeremiah 28:34). Isaiah 27:1 and 51:9 describe God destroying the great chaos monsters Leviathan and Rahab. Rahab is not the woman from Jericho in Isaiah 51:9, but rather “a mythical monster, the name of which means ‘surger,’ and plays upon the restlessness and crashing of the sea,” (HALOT). In Psalm 89:9-10 speak of God’s power over the chaotic seas in the Exodus: “You rule the raging of the sea; when its waves rise, you still them. You crushed Rahab like a carcass.”

The woman is given to eagle’s wings to flee the dragon into the desert. The woman is not rescued by eagles, but she is given eagle wings. the use of a passive verb implies God is the one who gave her wings.

Rescued by means of eagle’s wings is probably drawn from Exodus 19:4 and Deuteronomy 32:10-11 (cf. Ps 103:5-7). When God rescued Israel from Egypt it was as if he had carried them on eagle’s wings and brought Israel to Mount Sinai in the wilderness. That she flees to the place prepared for her in the wilderness evokes Israel’s gathering around Mount Sinai. Isaiah uses similar language to describe a second Exodus when the exile comes to an end. Those who return to Zion will “they shall mount up with wings like eagles” (Isa 40:31). Beale suggests a possible parallel to Psalms of Solomon 17:18-27: “Those who love the gatherings of the holy ones fled from them. They were scattered from their bed like sparrows” (LES2).  The Words of the Luminaries (4Q504 Frag. 6:6-8 probably alludes to Isaiah 40:31 to describe the Exodus: “You have lifted us wonderfully upon the wings of] eagles and you have brought us to you.”

The woman is rescued and taken on eagle’s wings into the wilderness where she is nourished for “for a time, and times, and half a time.” In the context of the wilderness, God’s provision of manna and quail come to mind. The verb is used with this sense in LXX Deut 32:18. When Israel rebels, they forget “God who nourished you” (the Hebrew text has “gave birth”).

Verses 15-16 are quite strange. Frustrated by God’s protection of the woman in the wilderness, the serpent (now using ὄφις) “spews water like a river” is an attempt to destroy the woman and her child, but the earth opens its mouth and swallows the river of water. This unusual spewing may simply reflect the common practice of describing enemies as a flood or watery chaos when they seek to destroy Israel. For example, In Psalm 18:5-18 the writer is tangled in the cords of death, but the Lord rebuked the waters and “the channels of the sea were seen” (18:15). Reflecting on God’s victory over his enemies, Habakkuk says “You trampled the sea with your horses, the surging of mighty waters.”

Unable to destroy the woman, the dragon is enraged and makes war against the children of the woman. These children are the ones who “keep the commandments of God and hold to the testimony of Jesus.” Like Daniel and his friends, these offspring of the woman refuse to compromise on the commandments of God even if that means death at the hand of an evil empire. So too the willingness to sacrifice one’s life rather than compromise on core elements of faith and practice during the Maccabean Revolt. “They chose to die rather than to be defiled by food or to profane the holy covenant; and they did die. Very great wrath came upon Israel” (1 Mac 1:63-64). When facing torture for refusing to eat swine flesh, seven brothers responded “What do you intend to ask and learn from us? For we are ready to die rather than transgress the laws of our ancestors” (2 Macc 7:1-3).

This sets the stage for the increased of persecution in the second half of the book. The final line is a dramatic segue to the introduction of the beasts in Revelation 13: the dragon stood by the shore of the sea.