10. THE GREAT RED DRAGON
THE second of the wonderful signs which John describes in the twelfth chapter of the Apocalypse is a great red Dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.
Now the Dragon himself is afterwards declared to be "the old serpent, he that is called the Devil and Satan, the deceiver of the whole world."¹ But the ten horns indicate also the fourth beast of Daniel's vision, and later revelations make the seven heads equally characteristic of it. The symbol seems, therefore, to represent the spiritual Power of Wickedness who impresses his image upon, and works in the sphere of flesh, by means of the fourth World-kingdom; in other words, it sets before us Satan in active energy through the medium of the Roman Empire.
The meaning of the heads and horns, in their earthly development, will be discussed presently. We will only remark in anticipation that the former are seven consecutive rulers of the Latin realms,² special agents of Satan in his various attempts to corrupt or destroy the followers of Christ; and that they appear crowned because the vision includes the reigns of all the monarchs who are represented by them.
The ten horns, on the contrary, are contemporaneous kings,³ the same as the toes of the image and the horns of Daniel's fourth beast; and their crownless condition intimates that those who are signified by them will not receive kingdoms while this scene of the
¹ Rev. xii. 9. ² Rev. xvii. 10. ³ Rev. xvii. 12, 13.
THE GREAT RED DRAGON.
vision is in process of fulfilment, but will begin their part in the great drama at some period subsequent to the removal of the Man-child.
Such, then, was the monster which appeared in heaven: nor was he standing in idle pose; for his eyes were fixed, and his energies concentrated, upon a Woman who was writhing in travail before him, while he was waiting to devour her child as soon as it should be born.
Now in Scripture a Woman is the symbol of a system or Church; ¹ and the one before us seems to represent the perpetual system of God in the world, the corporate body of those who, in whatever dispensation they may live, are recognised as His servants, and employed by Him as instruments to work out His great will upon earth, and to bring salvation to individuals whom He has chosen. It is to this latter function that we must refer the appropriate figure of a mother.
In the previous dispensation such a symbol would not have comprehended all Israel, but only the really faithful, the Israelites indeed. At the close of their age, these were found to be exclusively "the poor of the flock," ² who when they heard the voice of the great Shepherd, waited upon Him, and were gently led out of Judaism into the covenant of grace.
The description of the Woman seems to connect her with three dispensations. Her head was crowned with twelve stars, which, if we interpret them as in Joseph's dream, may signify the twelve sons of Jacob and refer
¹ Frequently also of a city; but such an explanation would be inappropriate to the present case, in which the Woman flies into the wilderness, and is pursued.
² Zech. xi. 11.
to the Patriarchal age. The moon is now beneath her feet: it was not, perhaps, always so. In the Mosaic dispensation she needed its reflected light at a time when no better was available, when she could seek the rays of her Lord's glory only as they glanced with diminished splendour from the Law. But now she is clothed with the sun, and appears, not on earth, but in heaven: for the Lord has revealed Himself to her, has become her glorious covering, and has raised her in Himself to the Heavenly Places.
As John gazed upon her, he saw that she was with child, and cried out travailing in birth and in pain to be delivered—a particular which enables us to discover the time of this scene accurately marked out for us both in the Old and in the New Testament.¹
In the last chapter of Isaiah, there is also mention of a subsequent delivery of the same Woman in very different circumstances. For in speaking of the restoration of Israel at the second advent, the prophet exclaims;—"Before she travailed, she brought forth; before her pain came, she was delivered of a Man-child. Who hath heard such a thing? Who hath seen such things? Shall the earth be made to bring forth in one day? Or shall a nation be born at once? For as soon as Zion travailed she brought forth her children."²
Here, as in the passage before us, a Man-child is born; but there is no long period of travail as in the other case. Nor is this child caught up to God and to His throne: on the contrary, he is nursed and comforted in Jerusalem, and the glory of the Gentiles
¹ Micah v. 1, 3; John xvi. 19-22.
² Isa. lxvi. 7, 8.
THE GREAT RED DRAGON.
comes to him and his mother like a flowing stream.¹
In other words, he represents the ruling body upon earth, not those who shall reign with Christ in heaven.
Of the birth with which we are now concerned
Micah speaks when he foretells that his people will smite the Judge of Israel upon the cheek, and then adds;—“Therefore will He give them up until the time that she which travaileth hath brought forth: then the remnant of His brethren² shall return together with the sons of Israel.”³
Thus the travailing occupies the whole time of
Israel’s rejection, that is to say, the Church-period, or space between the two advents. Guided by Micah’s prophecy we may regard it as commencing with the anguish of the disciples when the body of their murdered Lord was lying in the grave, and their despair could find vent only in the heart-broken lamentation, “We had hoped that it was He which should redeem Israel.” And ever since, it has gone on in the trials afflictions and persecutions of the Lord’s people, and will go on, until that night when of two sleeping in the same bed, the one shall be taken and the other left.
Precisely the same commencing and ending dates were also given by the Lord Himself, when, on the night before His death, He uttered the solemn words;—
“Do ye inquire among yourselves concerning this that
I said, A little while and ye behold Me not, and again
¹ Isa. lxvi. 12, 13.
² That is, the brethren of the Lord according to the flesh, or the Jews.
³ Micah v. 3.
a little while, and ye shall see Me? Verily, verily, I say unto you, that ye shall weep and lament, but the world shall rejoice: ye shall be sorrowful, but your sorrow shall be turned into joy. A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but when she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for joy that a man is born into the world. And ye, therefore, now have sorrow: but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no one taketh away from you."¹
Thus, then, the period of travail and anguish is exactly co-extensive with the time of the Lord's absence from His Church.
The offspring of the Woman is a male child as opposed to a female: for he is to rule in strength. Indeed the only particular given to us for his identification is his destiny "to rule all the nations with a rod of iron."
Now, in the second Psalm, the nations and the uttermost parts of the earth are promised to the Lord Jesus, with the added words;—"Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron; Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel."²
And again, in the Apocalypse, when He comes forth to take possession of His inheritance, it is said;—"And out of His mouth goeth a sharp sword, that with it He should smite the nations; and He shall rule them with a rod of iron."³
Therefore the destiny of the Lord Jesus and that of the Man-child are the same.
But when the Lord appears, the unity of Himself and His Church will be made manifest: whatever He
¹ John. xvi. 19-22. ² Psalm ii. 9. ³ Rev. xix. 15.
THE GREAT RED DRAGON.
has, she will share with him. And that the prerogative of the Man-child is no exception to this law He Himself assures us when He says to the remnant in Thyatira;—"But that which ye have, hold fast till I come. And he that overcometh, and he that keepeth My works unto the end, to him will I give authority over the nations. And he shall rule them with a rod of iron, as the vessels of the potter are broken to shivers; as I also received of My Father."¹
The prerogative was, then, originally given to Christ, and He has bestowed it upon all who overcome and keep His works to the end. And so the Man-child, as being heir to an inheritance common to the Lord and His people, seems to prefigure a mystic Christ of which the personal Christ is the Head, and the first-fruits of the Church the body; while the attitude of the Dragon points to the great object for which Satan uses the World-power, namely, to destroy the people of God.
We have said that the Man-child includes only the first-fruits of the Church: for a consecutive perusal of the twelfth and thirteenth chapters of the Apocalypse gives us the following order of events:—
I. The Man-child caught away to God and to His throne.
II. Satan cast out of heaven.
III. Antichrist evoked from the sea.
It is then evident that the believers represented by the Man-child will be caught away to God and to His Throne—that is, the Throne described as set for judgment in the fourth chapter—before the appearance of
¹ Rev. ii. 25-2
Antichrist, whose persecutions they will, therefore, escape.
Nevertheless, when the whole Church is assembled, we find that it consists not only of those who sit upon thrones, or the class of believers just mentioned, but also of others who have suffered death under the power of Antichrist; or, at least, have persisted in their refusal to worship him or receive his mark. These latter are the remnant of the Woman's seed whom the Dragon presently persecutes, those who will come out of the great tribulation, and who, whether alive or dead, will be caught up to their Lord at its close, just as the Man-child was before it began. But of this we shall say more in its proper place. Thus the travailing of the Woman will go on until the number of the first fruits is accomplished. Then the Man-child will be completely born, and straightway the whole body of waiting believers will be caught up to God and to His Throne. And the Church having been thus broken up as an earthly institution, the Lord will begin to work the redemption of Israel, a sequence of events which is also signified in the passage just quoted from Micah, which declares that as soon as the travailing Woman shall have brought forth, the remnant of the Lord's brethren, that is, the Jews, will return together with the sons of Israel."¹ And again, it corresponds with Paul's statement;—"A hardening in part has befallen Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in; and so all Israel shall be saved."² Thus the vision of the travailing Woman and the Dragon seems to exhibit the action of Satan in his
¹ Micah v. 3.
² Rom. xi. 25, 26.
THE GREAT RED DRAGON.
endeavours to destroy the Church by means of the Fourth Empire, and the manner in which the Lord Jesus will finally baffle him by summoning His saints to meet Him in the air.
Immediately after the rapture of the Man-child, Satan and his angels are driven out of the Kingdom of the Air—which, as the World-rulers of this Darkness, they are now occupying—and forced down to earth, there to be confined within narrow bounds, until the Lord shall cast them into a still lower and more contracted prison. There is great significance in the mention of the agent chosen to expel them: for it would seem that Michael is the angel who was appointed to lead the children of Israel into Canaan, and to be, under Christ, their spiritual prince, at least until the promises have been fulfilled.¹ His appearance, therefore, shows that the sons of Abraham are again coming into remembrance before God, and identifies the conflict with that to which the heavenly interpreter alludes when he tells Daniel, “And at that time shall Michael stand up, the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people, and there shall be a time of trouble, such as never was since there was a nation even to that same time: and at that time ¹ Exod. xxiii. 20-23; xxxii. 34; Num. xx. 16. That Michael was this angel-guide appears from passages in which he is described to Daniel as “your prince” (Dan. x. 21), and as “the great prince which standeth for the children of thy people” (Dan. xii. 1). We may also find a strong corroboration in Jude 9, where there is an allusion to the rescue of Moses’ body from him that hath the power of death, in order that it might be preserved from corruption. For the archangel, who as the ruler of God’s host confronts the Prince of Darkness, is Michael. Those who have attempted to identify Michael with Christ must have overlooked Dan. x. 13, where it is plainly stated that the archangel, mighty though he be, is not Lord of all, but only “one of the chief princes” (אֶחָד הַשָּׂרִים הָרִאשִׁים). thy people shall be delivered, every one that shall be found written in the book."¹
Thus will the air be cleared of those evil powers which are now defiling it, and Satan must thenceforth direct his earthly realms from their own level. At the same time the heaven will be prepared for Christ and His Church, and will resound with the loud cry of joy;—
"Now is come the salvation, and the power, and the Kingdom of our God, and the authority of His Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accuseth them before our God day and night. And they overcame him because of the blood of the Lamb, and because of the word of their testimony; and they loved not their life even unto death. Therefore rejoice, O heavens, and ye that are tabernacling in them." But the voice which speaks gladness to heaven has a very different message for the world beneath it;—"Woe for the earth and for the sea; because the devil has gone down unto you, having great wrath, knowing that he hath but a short time." VII.
WHEN the Dragon had been cast out of heaven, John saw him endeavouring to vent his disappointed fury upon the Woman; but the two wings of the great eagle were given to her, and she was enabled to fly into the wilderness and avoid his persecutions.
At this point there seems to be need of careful attention; for if the Dragon could assail the Woman after
¹ Dan. xii. 1.
he had been cast out of heaven, it is clear that she also must have in some way descended. And this is just what we should expect; for the rapture of the Man-child is the signal for a dispensational change. The Jew has again become the great centre of the Divine action, and the Church has ceased to be the system of God upon earth, though its numbers in heaven are not yet completed. Believers still remaining below must, therefore, be considered as stragglers, and recruits enlisted by them, who will presently join the main body above. Meanwhile, though they preach and teach with power, they will not be able to affect the world at large, but will merely influence individuals, by whose conversion the number of the heavenly elect will be accomplished. The period may thus be regarded as one of transition—the old order having ceased as a recognised system, though many are still being brought to salvation by it; while the new is already in force, and the discipline of those who shall presently carry it out in power has commenced.
And so the Woman now represents faithful Israelites whom God will lead into the wilderness for refuge from the persecuting Dragon, just as once He led His people out of Egypt, and saved them from the hand of Pharaoh, bearing them upon eagle's wings.¹
Upon the Egyptians the waters of the Red Sea returned, and they sank like lead into the deep: now the earth opens her mouth, and swallows up the pursuing hosts which the Dragon again sends in hot chase after the Israel of God.
With baffled rage he turns back to make war upon
¹ Exod. xix. 4.
the remnant of her seed, "which keep the commandments of God, and hold the testimony of Jesus"—a description intended, possibly, to include all the people of God who will at that time be exposed to his malice, whether they be pious Jews, or Christians who were not found worthy to escape the impending woes. In order to carry out his purpose, he stands upon the shore of the sea, and evokes from its raging waters a seven-headed and ten-horned monster, the symbol of the great Empire which at the time of the vision was ruling the earth, and will again be needed by the Powers of Darkness as the end approaches. The Wild Beast thus called forth by the Dragon will, however, be found to differ from the fourth of Daniel's vision in that it has seven heads. For the revelation given to the Jewish prophet was confined to those particulars which affected his own nation; therefore the Beast which he saw was merely one-headed, as being the power which would destroy Jerusalem; but, nevertheless, ten-horned, because during the reign of the Ten Kings God will have resumed His covenant with Israel. Thus the career of the Roman Empire was exhibited to Daniel only at its points of contact with his city and people. Again: the Beast which now emerges from the sea of human revolution and anarchy—far from being diverse from all the others, like the fourth of Daniel's vision—is described as displaying the graceful body of the Grecian leopard, the feet of the Persian bear, and the cruel mouth of the Chaldean lion. It seems, therefore, to represent that last and compound form of Roman power which shall include all the territories, the strength, and the characteristics, of the four empires, and which stands before us, in Nebuchadnezzar's dream erect and complete in all its parts up to the moment when the stone descends from above and grinds it to powder.
The seven heads are no longer sparkling with diadems, because the time of their dominion has passed away. But the horns are crowned; for the Harlot Babylon, of whom we shall hear presently, has been overthrown, and the Empire is now in the hands of the ten confederate kings, who give all their power to their great chief.
While, however, the Beast doubtless represents the Fourth World-power in the energy of its last phase, it has also a restricted meaning which is more especially set before us. In the seventeenth chapter we are told that, after the seven heads have fallen, one of them shall revive, and will then be the Beast himself.¹ Hence we may understand why, in the present passage, the description is, not that of a state, but of a man—the great Antichrist, who, as concentrating in his own person all the power and intelligence of the Roman Empire, and directing it according to his will, is here identified with it. In regarding the Beast as the last emperor, we may consider the sea out of which he arises to indicate that which is below it, namely, the abyss, called in the Authorized Version sometimes "the deep," sometimes "the bottomless pit." Indeed, in another part of the Apocalypse² it is plainly stated that Antichrist will ascend from the abyss, or, in other words, that he will be a re-incarnated spirit from the dead.³ How this
¹ Rev. xvii. 10, 11. Compare xiii. 3.
² Rev. xvii. 8.
For further proofs see remarks upon Rev. xix. 20, p. 143.
may be, we learn from the account of the fifth trumpet,¹ at the sounding of which John saw a star which had some time previously fallen from heaven,² “and there was given to him the key of the pit of the abyss.”
Now there can be little difficulty in identifying the fallen star with Satan after his expulsion from the heavenly places by Michael. And, since the power has been granted to him, just as he opens the shaft of the abyss to let loose the infernal locusts upon the earth, so we may infer that he also unbars the gates of Death for the escape of Antichrist.
The description of the Beast shows how mighty will be the dominion and manifold the energies of the prince that shall come. He is like to a leopard;
he will display the quick determination and marvellously rapid action of Alexander, and at the same time carry out his plans with such grace and plausibility as to secure the admiration of the world. His feet are as the feet of a bear with all their terrible strength and power of crushing; he will add the vast fleets and armies of the second World-power to the agility of the third, and will possess forces sufficiently large to overwhelm and destroy all his enemies. His mouth resembles the mouth of a lion, the terror of the forest: for his power will be as that of Nebuchadnezzar, of whom it was said, “And for the majesty that He gave him, all people, nations, and languages, trembled and feared before him.”³
Just as the Lord was about to enter upon His
¹ Rev. ix. i.
² ἀστέρα ἐκ τοῦ οἱρανοῦ πεπτωκότα εἰς τὴν γῆν, “a star which had fallen out of heaven to the earth.”
Dan. v. 19.
public ministry, Satan stood in the way, and offered to surrender into His hands all the kingdoms of the world and the glory of them, if He would but do homage to the god of this age; but the Saviour repelled the blasphemous temptation. The proposal will, it seems, be repeated to Antichrist, and will not meet with a second rejection. Then Satan will fulfil his part of the covenant, and will give to the Beast his power, his throne, and great authority; so that the hearts of all men will turn to the latter, and he will receive a dominion, not seized by force, but assumed with an unimpeachable title based, probably, upon a plebiscite of all Christendom. And when, in addition to this, the new hero is invested with a halo of supernatural glory by the discovery that he is an illustrious leader of ancient times who has returned to his place after a long sojourn in the regions of the dead, then, indeed, the whole world will be moved to wonder after him. It may, perhaps, be difficult to conceive how a spirit from the abyss could be thus recognised, after the lapse of so many centuries, as one who had already played a great part in the drama of men. Nevertheless, it is clear from the third verse of the thirteenth chapter that there will be a recognition sufficiently startling to draw the whole world in wonder after the Beast: how it will be brought about the day must declare. But so much progress has been made during the last few years in the demolition of the partition-wall between men and demons that it is impossible to say to what lengths the forbidden intercourse may not shortly be carried. Some have supposed that the seventh king will be
THE GENTILES slain; and that his body will then be restored to life, with the mark of the fatal wound upon it, by the entrance of another spirit. But such a solution of the difficulty does not seem to be in accord with what is revealed. The eighth king must be one of the first five resuscitated; since at the time of the vision in the seventeenth chapter he had already passed to the place of the dead after the completion of his first life,¹ and only five of the kings had then fallen.² It is in exact agreement with this that, in the earlier vision, John sees one of the heads of the Beast "as though it had been smitten—or, more literally, "slain"—unto death" at some previous time: for the participle ἐσφαγμένην is in the perfect tense.³ And this is the head which subsequently revives. Such, then, is the inconsistency of the human heart; men scoff at the resurrection of Christ, but will shortly be prostrating themselves before a lost spirit from the pit.
Nay, they will go still further, and worship also the Dragon—that is, the Devil—who will be openly acknowledged by the resurrected king as his Saviour. And, startling as such an idea would have been some years ago, the currents of thought are now so changed as to make it quite conceivable. For the terror once inspired by the mere name of the Prince of Darkness has been gradually dissipated by the denial of his very existence, by the theories which include him in a universal redemption, and by a general disposition to regard him—if there be such a being—as not altogether bad or irreclaimable; so that it will be easy for those who have gone thus far ¹ Rev. xvii. 8, 11. ² Rev. xvii. 10. ³ Rev. xiii. 3.
to go farther, until at length they are willing, like the Yezidis, to worship him as the giver of all earthly good, in other words, of all that carnal men care to have. Such direct worship he has already received in former times even from great nations, and "the thing that hath been, it is that which shall be." Nor would a return to the practice indicate a more violent change in human opinion than others which have been characteristic of our age. Indeed, the way to it is even now being pointed out by the multiform revival among modern Spiritualists and Theosophists of the Gnostic doctrine, that the serpent is the true friend of man, as having guided him to that which is the source of all his power—to the tree of knowledge.¹ As regards the Beast, a large portion of Christendom is already prepared to worship a man of transcendent ability and unbroken success. For, to pass by the adoration of saints in the Roman and Greek Churches, there is even now in existence a Positivist Calendar, in which each day is appointed for the "cultus" of some man remarkable in art, literature, philosophy, or in any other of those pursuits which are considered glorious among men. Meanwhile the general tendency of the world to hero-worship is daily increasing, and
¹ As an illustration of this reversal of doctrine, which is becoming popular, we quote an extract from the letter of the Paris correspondent of the Record (May 27th, 1881). He is speaking of an Anti-clerical Congress which had just been convoked by M. Schoelcher, an eminent senator, and of which he gives the following account. "This Congress showed its true spirit in electing as Vice-President Miss Maria Deraisme, a notorious atheistic lecturer. In a long speech she drew a parallel between Eve and Mary—Eve who freed mankind by the tree of science, while the education given by Mary to Jesus brought them again under bondage. One of the members of the assembly proposed that all children should be educated in the hatred of God." THE GENTILES manifests itself, not only in verbal praise, but also in the frequent erection of statues, in the celebration of centenaries, and in many other modes. To how great a height, then, will this feeling be raised when it is called forth by one who will concentrate in himself the consummate warrior, statesman, legislator, king, and philosopher; who will dazzle the world by the inexhaustible brilliancy of his abilities, and still more by continual flashes of supernatural power;¹ so that, to the carnal eye, he will seem to be some great deity who has at last appeared among men, to heal their sorrows, and bring in that golden age for which they have long been sighing. In their wonder we are told that they will say, "Who is like unto the Beast? who is able to make war with him?" In the last clause we may, perhaps, detect an allusion to the fulfilment of that which is represented in Daniel's vision by the uprooting of three horns before the little horn; and possibly also to the eleventh chapter of the Apocalypse, in which the Beast makes war upon the Two Witnesses, and by slaying them relieves the earth of their terrors and plagues.
The remainder of John's description contains a thrice-repeated phrase, "it was given unto him"; an expression which emphasizes the fact that what follows
¹ In 2 Thess. ii. 9, the English Version reads, "lying wonders," which conveys the impression that the wonders themselves will be mere delusive tricks, like that of the blood of St. Januarius; but this seems to be incorrect. The literal rendering of the Greek is, "with all power and signs and wonders of a lie;" that is, connected with or belonging to a lie, used for the purpose of authenticating it. The signs and wonders will be real enough in themselves, and will be effected by the exercise of Satanic power, as we are plainly told in the beginning of the verse; but they will be used to gain credence for the lie that Antichrist is God. will be specially allowed by God as a means of forcing half-hearted believers to self-denial and decision, and of hardening the godless for their doom. And, first of all, we are particularly warned that the Beast is permitted to utter his blasphemies. For his words against the living God will be so stout and defiant, that those who hear them, and see no interference, might start back appalled, and be led to doubt the very existence of Jehovah, had they not been previously told that so it must be. They will be comforted also by knowing that a limit is set to the power of this terrible one; during forty and two months he must practise and prosper,¹ and then he will fall to rise no more. This period seems to be "the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world to try them that dwell upon the earth,"² the great tribulation, and the latter half of Daniel's Seventieth Week. The blasphemy of Antichrist will not, however, expend itself solely against God: he will also assail "them that are tabernacling in the heaven"³—for so the words should be rendered—that is, those believers who have been caught up from earth, and of whose departure and place of sojourn he will evidently be aware. But they will be removed far beyond his reach; therefore he will turn fiercely upon the people of God who still remain in the world, and refuse to worship himself and the Dragon. Against them it is said that he will "make war," an expression which supposes an organized resistance on their part. But such a resistance will be useless, and could only be attempted in culpable ignorance of the Divine revelation; for power will be given to the Beast over all kindreds, and tongues, and nations, ¹ Rev. xiii. 5.
² Rev. iii. 10.
³ Rev. xiii. 6.
and he will be irresistible until he is confronted by the great King.
There are, however, not a few Christians who would soon drift into a policy of resisting evil by force of arms, because they are at all times disposed to neglect precepts and revelations which are not in accord with their own feelings. Such are those, who, forgetting their Lord's warning to beware of the leaven of Herod, and the fact that if their citizenship be in heaven they must be strangers and pilgrims here, plunge into the politics of this world with as much animation, and often with more manifest emotion, than they evince in striving for the Kingdom of the Heavens. They talk, too, of what they call liberty, little regarding the law of their King, which knows no liberty save that wherewith Christ has made us free; recognizes no citizenship but that which is in heaven; and, while bidding its hearers obey in earthly things the powers that be, teaches them such complete indifference to their worldly condition that it commands, "Wert thou called being a slave, let it not be a trouble to thee; but if thou art even able to become free, use it—that is, remain in slavery—rather."¹ Christians who turn away from the spirit of such precepts are often enticed to mind earthly things when they should be watching for the King from heaven, and many of them are even now unconsciously aiding the
¹ 1 Cor. vii. 21. "This rendering, which is that of Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Œcumentius, Photius, Estius, Wolf, Bengel, Meyer, De Wette, and others, is required by the usage of the particle εἰ καὶ, by which the καὶ, 'also,' or 'even,' does not belong to the εἰ, as in καὶ εἰ, but is spread over the whole contents of the concessive clause. . . . It is also required by the context; for the burden of the whole passage is, Let each man remain in the state in which he was called."—Alford.
Roman apostasy to recover its power over England. Anon they will rue their own work; the Woman shall again direct the Beast, and become drunken with the blood of the saints. Then, as soon as the other great foe, popular infidelity, arises and assails the false Church, they will probably for a while sympathize with the new movement, hoping that it will tone down to their standard of right. When, however, the Lawless One tears away his veil, and the decree goes forth that all must worship him or die, these carnally-minded believers will receive a second sharp rebuke.
But yet another lesson will be needed; for as soon as Antichrist, upon their refusal to pay him adoration, prepares to move his hosts against them, they will altogether forget the example of the Captain of their salvation, Who would not suffer His servants to take up the sword in defence of His own body, and Who bade them remember that the disciple is not greater than his Master. Not knowing the Scriptures, they will say, God cannot permit so great wickedness! Who is this Philistine, that he should defy the armies of the living God? And so they will go forth to war: scenes of bloodshed and slaughter will follow, and as they perish in battle, or are captured and put to death, their eyes will at length be opened, and they will, perhaps, remember the words of the angel to Daniel;—"And some of them of understanding shall fall, to try them, and to purge, and to make them white."¹ But hard is the lot of those who will not be instructed by the word of Jehovah, and can be turned from earthly things only by a bitter discipline which must pursue them to the last hour of life. ¹ Dan. xi. 35.
With a warning to those believers who will be disposed to defend themselves by arms, John concludes his account of the first Beast. If any, he says, are for leading into captivity, into captivity they must go; if any wish to kill with the sword, with the sword they must be killed.¹ God will not bless their efforts; for, as the last sentence of the verse declares, this will be a time when the saints must have no weapons but patience and faith.
VIII.
THE WILD BEAST FROM THE EARTH.
WHILE John was still wondering at the monster from the sea, he saw a second Wild Beast ascending out of the earth. In this case also we may probably look for a double meaning, and again regard the symbol as representing a system as well as the man who organizes it. In the first application, "the earth" may signify a settled state of things brought about, perhaps, by the former Beast, who quells the tossing anarchy out of which he arises and consolidates society: it may point to some such condition of affairs as the first Napoleon had already effected in revolutionary France, when he essayed to move the Pope from Rome to Paris, and make him his subordinate and coadjutor. In the second or personal application, since this being also is a spirit from Hades, we may take "the earth" in its literal sense, and compare the words of the witch of Endor in regard to Samuel's appearance;—"I saw a god ascending out of the earth;" "an old man cometh up." The same idea is also found in the
¹ Rev. xiii. 9, 10.
THE WILD BEAST FROM THE EARTH.
fourth verse of the twenty-ninth chapter of Isaiah, which should be rendered ;—“ And thy voice shall come up like that of a demon from the ground, and thy speech shall mutter out of the dust.” And in the tenth Psalm, the second Beast is described as “the man from out of the earth.”
He is sometimes called “ the False Prophet ” ; while the seven-headed monster is invariably termed “ the Beast.” He is said to have the horns of a lamb, but the voice of a dragon ; there is in his outward appearance and profession a travesty of the meekness and gentleness of the Spirit of Christ ; but, whenever the fulness of his heart finds vent through his mouth, he proves himself to be inspired by the great Dragon “ which deceiveth the whole world.” He is thus the chief of those of whom the Lord said, “ Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves.” While, then, the first Beast assumes the place of Christ and demands worship, the second stands before him as his prophet. There is no mention of priests ; for the new deity knows nothing of substitution or vicarious sacrifice, and needs only a prophet to declare and execute his will. This at once shows us that we have here no reference to Popery, at least in any form in which it has hitherto appeared.
Though the place of the False Prophet is subordinate, he, nevertheless, exercises all the authority of his chief, and uses it for the one purpose of compelling men to worship the Beast, on the ground that he has been slain, and has risen again from the dead. To this end he puts forth miraculous power, and, like Elijah, calls down fire from heaven in the sight of wondering multitudes. The effect of such a display will be very great, more especially in the case of Jews; and we must remember that it will be counteracted neither by a Satanic spirit of scepticism, nor by anything unpalatable in the doctrines which it supports. The False Prophet will follow up his advantage, and at once cause an image of the Beast to be made for adoration, into which, when it is completed, he will send a spirit to command from its mouth the slaughter of any who refuse to bend the knee. And that none may escape the ordeal, all grades of men, the small and the great, the poor and the rich, the bond and the free, will be compelled to imprint upon their foreheads or right hands a visible mark, consisting either of the name or the number of the Beast, and exhibited as an open profession of their devotion to him. On the part of the Beast and False Prophet, none will be allowed to buy or sell without showing the mark; so that those who refuse to receive it will be reduced to starvation if they conceal themselves, or be put to death if they are discovered. But, in vindication of God, an angel will be sent to fly in mid-heaven with the awful proclamation;—"If any man worship-peth the Beast and his image, and receiveth a mark on his forehead, or upon his hand, he also shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is prepared unmixed in the cup of His anger; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke of their torment goeth up for ever and ever; and they have no rest day and night, they that worship THE WILD BEAST FROM THE EARTH.
the Beast and his image, and whoso receiveth the mark of his name." To this dreadful threat succeeds an exhortation;—"Here is the patience of the saints, they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus." They must prove themselves to be saints and obedient believers by firmly, but quietly, refusing to sanction in any way the rebellion against God and His Christ. If they yield, in the very least degree, to the terrible pressure which will be brought to bear upon them, they are lost; for this is the testing time, the great hour of temptation. No wonder that John immediately hears a voice from heaven, saying;—"Write, blessed are the dead which die in the Lord from henceforth."¹ For as soon as this Reign of Terror commences, from that very moment, the greatest favour which God can show will be to gather in quickly those whom He loves with the sickle of death. In such fearful straits will those believers find themselves who are not ready at their Lord's first summons: so bitter will be the discipline from which
¹ It is the custom to quote these words as if they might be used indiscriminately of those who die in the Lord at all times; but the limitation, "from henceforth," should have checked this general application. That death is not always a blessing to the saved is evident from the fact that Paul declares it to have been inflicted as a punishment upon certain careless Corinthian Christians. "For this cause," he says, "many among you are weak and sickly, and not a few sleep" (1 Cor. xi. 30). It is possible for a believer to lose his reward by being cut off in the Lord's anger before his work is done, and the passage quoted above seems to show that this is a thing of not very infrequent occurrence. Just in the same way the wicked may by aggravated sin shorten their time of grace. "How oft is the candle of the wicked put out"—not suffered to burn out (Job. xxi. 17). "Bloody and deceitful men shall not live out half their days" (Psa. lv. 23). they must learn to be thenceforth unhesitating in their obedience to the great King. But strength will be given to them, so that neither they, nor their converts, nor the God-fearing Jews, will yield to Antichrist; but will rather submit to be destroyed in a persecution more furious than any which has yet raged against the servants of God. One of many passages in which it is described is the tenth Psalm, the first verses of which, when more carefully translated than in our version, run as follows.
1. "Why, O Jehovah, standest Thou afar off?
Why hidest Thou Thyself in times of trouble?
2. Through the pride of the wicked the afflicted is feverish with fear;
They are taken in the plots which they (the wicked) have devised.
3. For the wicked boasteth of his soul's desire;
And the spoiler he blesseth; he despiseth Jehovah.
4. The wicked, such is his haughtiness, (saith);—'He will not require.'
'There is no God,' is the sum of his thoughts.
5. Strong are his ways at all times:
Far above are Thy judgments, out of his sight.
As for all his adversaries, he puffeth at them.
6. He saith in his heart, 'I shall not be moved;
From one generation to another I am he who shall not be touched by evil.'
7. Of cursing is his mouth full, of deceit and oppression;
Under his tongue is mischief and wickedness.
8. He sitteth in the ambush of the villages;
In the secret places he slayeth the innocent;
His eyes are privily fixed upon the helpless.
9. He lieth in wait in his secret places, like a lion in his lair;
He lieth in wait to catch the afflicted;
He catcheth the afflicted by drawing him into his net.
10. And crushed he (the afflicted) sinks down and falls,
The helpless among his strong ones."
THE WILD BEAST FROM THE EARTH.
That this Psalm refers to the persecution shortly to be carried on by the second Beast seems to be intimated by its concluding verse, in which the oppressor is described as "the man from the earth." It opens with the cry of the persecuted, which ascends to God like that of the Lord Jesus in the extremity of His agony, "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken Me!" Then their terrible condition is graphically depicted. They are feverish with fear: life is not secure for a moment: at any time they may be discovered, dragged before the image of the Beast, and there forced either to worship or to die. From morning till night snares are incessantly being laid to entrap them into an avowal of their faith: nor do they dare to enter any of the markets or shops; for not even the smallest necessary can be bought unless the purchaser first uncover his forehead or hand, and show that he is stamped with the sign of the Beast. The third verse intimates that all the desires of the False Prophet will be towards the Wicked One who is set over him: that he will bless him and give thanks to him, cruel spoiler though he be, while at the same time he will despise Jehovah.
Indeed, from the following clauses we may infer that his chief characteristic will be an utter ignoring of God, a development of the infidelity which is even now daily increasing in popularity. And whatever may be his professions of truth, he will be crafty and altogether unscrupulous.
The eighth verse returns to the energetic cruelty of his persecutions. Neither village nor secret place will be safe from his agents: with untiring activity they will search every remote corner, and hunt down all those who will not bow before the image, whether they be believers in Christ, or conscientious Jews.
But possibly the secret places may be establishments like the Inquisition, with its subterranean dungeons and hidden chambers of torture and death. And with this interpretation the next clause seems to agree, alluding, as it probably does, to some frightful system of espionage.
IX.