Beast of Revelation.pdf - Friends of the Sabbath Australia

Chapter 3
creatures Daniel had seen in his
vision recorded in Daniel 7.
However, the Beast that John saw
had seven heads and ten horns
(Rev. 13:1–2). We are told that the
“dragon” gave this Beast its power
and authority. Finally, we are told
that one of the creature’s heads was
wounded to death. But this fatal
wound was healed and the Beast
continued for 42 months (vv. 2–5).
This is strikingly similar to the
scene described in Daniel 7. In
Daniel’s vision, remember, four
creatures—a lion, a bear, a fourheaded
leopard and another terrible
creature with ten horns—emerge from a dark, stormy sea (vv.
1–7). These four beasts have a sum total of seven heads. The
creatures that Daniel saw clearly represented the succession of
empires from Nebuchadnezzar’s Babylon to Media-Persia, then
to Alexander’s Hellenistic Empire (which split four ways after his
death) and finally to the Roman Empire. It is from the fourth
creature, symbolizing Rome—the seventh head—that the “ten
horns” arise.
Notice the similarity of the two accounts. In each case there
are seven heads. In Revelation 13, John saw one creature, not four
distinct ones as Daniel did. But both prophets saw seven heads
and ten horns and both saw likenesses of a lion, a bear, a leopard
and a terrible creature. So with all these similarities, why are
there also differences in the visions?
When Daniel received his vision, virtually all of what he saw
was yet future. Babylon, symbolized by a lion, was on the scene,
but the others were yet to come. When John wrote, more than 600
years later, Babylon, Persia and Greece had all been swallowed
up by Rome. Where Daniel focused upon four empires, John saw
one continuous system that had begun with Babylon. He saw the
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