The beasts of Rev. 13 - Arafat and Abu Mazen

Huh? Arafat the "Beast"? When are Christians going to cut out this silliness? This is what I call "newspaper eschatology". Are we to interpet the Word Of God using secular newspapers?

[ June 29, 2003, 12:23 AM: Message edited by: ChurchBoy ]

 

You beat me to the punch Churchboy! This type of ridiculous hermeneutics is so subjective and just butchers the texts of scripture. How many years of Antichrist headhunting do we have to stomach? Our theology shouldn't change with each generation cramming their own contemporary bad guy into Revelation 13. I wonder what the folks in the 7 churches of Asia would think if we told them that the book that the Apostle John gave them had nothing to do with them at all, but for just $19.99 we could send them a copy of "Left Behind" to tell them how it all turns out. Stop looking at Israeli politics to see scripture fulfilled! The only hope for that unbelieving nation is the Gospel to provoke them to jealousy. Look to the true Israel, the One in whom all the promises of God are yea and amen. Look unto Jesus who kept the law and fulfilled the terms of the covenant and alone in whom God is well pleased.

 

Revelation 13:18 (NKJV) Here 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.


The beast of Revelation is none other than Lucious Domisus Ahinabarbus, who is better known by his adoptive name Nero Claudius Caesar. He is the only man who fits the bill as the specific and personal expression of the beast. Let us look at his qualifications.


The beast is identified by the number 666. In the ancient days alphabets served a two-fold purpose. Their first and foremost purpose was, of course, their service as letters. But letters were also assigned numerical values and thus served as numerals. The most familiar example of this dual function of alphabets can be found in the Roman numeral system. The Greek and Hebrew languages operated similarly. Nero Caesar, if spelled according to a Hebrew spelling (John and most of first century Christians were of Hebrew extraction) gives us precisely the value 666. Is it not remarkable that this most relevant emperor, who lived while those seven churches lived, and lived while John wrote, has a name that fits precisely the required sum? Is this a sheer coincidence, or an historical accident? Remember audience relevance. What would have been the purpose of frustrating readers for two millennia who could not possibly identify a twentieth-century (or later) beast? Isn't it far more reasonable to assume that John's original readers understood him very well in his identification of the beast?


The character of the beast qualifies Nero for this role. He possessed a bestial nature. Nero often acted in horrible viciousness. According to Suetonius, Nero was a sodomite who is said to have castrated a boy named Sporus and married him. He enjoyed homosexual rape and torture. He killed his parents, brother, wife, aunt, and many others close to him. He so prostituted his own chastity that after defiling almost every part of his body, he at last devised a kind of game: covered with the skin of some wild animal, he was let loose from a cage and attacked the private parts of men and women, who were bound at stakes.


Revelation 13:7 speaks of the power given to the beast to make war with the saints. Nero was the first of the imperial authorities to persecute Christianity. Tacitus records the scene in Rome when the persecution of Christians broke out: "And their death was aggravated with mockeries, insomuch that, wrapped in the hides of wild beasts, they were torn to pieces by dogs, or fastened to crosses to be set on fire, that when the darkness fell they might be burned to illuminate the night." Revelation 13:5 says that the beast would continue 42 months. The Neronic persecution was instituted in 64 AD and lasted until his death in June 68 AD, which is three and a half years, or 42 months. Nero fits the bill for the role of the beast.


The beast is to die by a sword according to Revelation 13: 10 & 14. Do you know how Nero died? According to Suetonius, he "drove a dagger into his throat, aided by Epaphroditus, his private secretary." Nero killed with the sword and was killed by the sword.


Revelation 17:3 tells us that the beast is red. The red color may be indicative of the bloodshed caused by the beast. But Suetonius writes of the legend associated with Nero's ancestral parentage, which explains why he had a red beard.


The beast's number is 666; in Hebrew, Nero's name adds up to 666. The beast is an awful character; Nero had a beastly character. The beast made war with the saints for 42 months; Nero persecuted Christians for three and a half years. The beast dies by the sword; Nero killed himself with a dagger. The beast is red; Nero had a red beard, which was very unusual in those times. Evidently the beast of Revelation is Nero. Remember, John told his readers, those first century Christians who lived in Asia Minor, that these things were to "shortly come to pass." We, twentieth-century Christians are not to be looking for some terrible beast to arise and bring great tribulation to believers, this has already happened during the time of Nero and the first-century Christians.


The second enemy in Revelation is the Harlot, Revelation 17:3-6.


So he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness: and I saw a woman sit upon a scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy, having seven heads and ten horns. And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup inj her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: And upon her fore head was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus: and when I saw her, I wondered with great admiration.


Since the woman is seated upon the seven-headed beast and is called Babylon, some have thought she represents the city of Rome. But since the beast itself is Rome this would be redundant; Babylon is used to refer to an enemy of God, which in this case is Jerusalem.


There are several reasons to identify the harlot as Jerusalem. The Harlot is called Babylon. Babylon is called the great city in Revelation 14:8; Revelation 11:8, which is the first mention of the great city, refers to the place where our Lord was crucified, which was Jerusalem. She is great because of her covenantal status in the Old Testament. Jerusalem had previously been called by pagan names comparable to Babylon, as in Revelation 11:8, "spiritually is called Sodom and Egypt". This is because she acts like God's enemy. In Isaiah 1:9-10, God calls Jerusalem `Sodom and Gomorrah' because of her sinfulness.


The harlot is filled with the blood of the saints according to Revelation 17:6, 16:6, and 18:21&24. Throughout the book of Acts, Jerusalem is portrayed as the persecutor of Christianity.


Acts 7:51-52 (NKJV) "You stiffnecked and uncircumcised in heart and ears! You always resist the Holy Spirit; as your fathers did, so do you. Which of the prophets did your fathers not persecute? And they killed those who foretold the coming of the Just One, of whom you now have become the betrayers and murderers."


In the Olivet Discourse context Jesus said in Matthew 23:34-36,

"Therefore, indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes: some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city, that on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar. Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation."


The harlot is arrayed in Jewish priestly colors according to Revelation 17:4. Exodus 28 prescribes these colors for the High Priest. The High Priest also wore a tiara on his forehead that said, "holiness unto the Lord" (Exodus 28:36-38). This harlot has a blasphemous tiara on her forehead, Revelation 17:5. She was supposed to be holy to the Lord but she has become the mother of harlots.


There is an obvious literary contrast between the harlot and the bride that comes down out of heaven. If we compare Revelation 21 & 17, we see two women: one is a harlot, the other a bride; one is Jerusalem that is above, the other is Jerusalem from below. Paul talked about these two Jerusalems in Galatians 4:25-26 (NKJV):


for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children; but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all.

Notice how John is introduced to the harlot, and notice how he is introduced to the bride. They are negative mirror images.


Revelation 17:1 (NKJV) "Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls came and talked with me, saying to me, "Come, I will show you the judgment of the great harlot who sits on many waters,"

Revelation 21:9 (NKJV) "Then one of the seven angels who had the seven bowls filled with the seven last plagues came to me and talked with me, saying, "Come, I will show you the bride, the Lamb's wife."


The harlot is seated on the seven headed beast which obviously represents Rome. This indicates not identity with Rome but some form of alliance with Rome. The Jews were the ones that demanded Christ's crucifixion. When Pilot wanted to turn Jesus loose because he found no guilt in him, the Jews said in:


John 19:15 (NKJV), "But they cried out, "Away with Him, away with Him! Crucify Him!" Pilate said to them, "Shall I crucify your King?" The chief priests answered, "We have no king but Caesar!"

The Jews were siding with Caesar against Jesus. The Jews constantly agitated against the Christians to get the Romans involved in their persecution. In Acts 17:7 the Christians were accused by the Jews as those who preached another king contrary to the decrees of Caesar. The harlot is seated on the beast because Jerusalem depended upon Rome to persecute the Christians.


Revelation was obviously written before Nero's death in 68AD. The prophecies of this book have been fulfilled. It was written about things which would take place shortly after its writing. It deals with the persecution of believers under Judaism and Rome and predicts God's judgement upon these enemies of the church. Its purpose, therefore, is to strengthen and encourage believers in time of trial.


This book is to be understood preteristicly rather than futuristically. In doing so you avoid the wild speculation of interpreting everything in the daily news as a sign of the times. Our country is not getting worse because it is the end times, it's getting worse because Christians are neglecting their calling. We are to be salt and light. We are to call our world to faith in Jesus Christ. I think that futurism causes a pessimistic attitude about the future, and it blinds believes to the wonder of the New Covenant. Those believers who continue to look for a future second coming that will be "soon" set themselves up for disappointment and heartach.

Part of a sermon by David Curtis.

 

Paul tells us who the anti-christ is in 2Thess chapter 2.[the son of perdition]Do a Greek word study of the word perdition and it will lead you to the word Apollyon which is Lucifer himself.

This same chapter says that we will not be gathered back to Christ Jesus until the man of sin[son of perdition] sits in the temple of God,showing himself that he is god.Isaiah chapter 14 satan has already made this claim.

Anytime you see 3 of the same numbers in sucession alarms bells should sound.The number 6 is the number of man[less than perfect]and 3 sixes also mean perfectly IMPERFECT.Lucifer fits this description as he is a fallen angelic man.This is one school of thought on this topic not the only one.