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An Image to the Beast

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 20, 1896

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 22, No. 8.

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An Image to the Beast

"Study to show thyself approved unto God."
Lesson X.—Sabbath, March 7, 1896.

An Image to the Beast.

Review Questions.—(a) From what did the Protestant churches soon depart? (b) What soon became their condition as regards unity of doctrine? (c) What is the spiritual condition of these divided churches? (d) What unscriptural dogma is held by them in common? (e) To what is appeal made that the Sunday sabbath may be established?
1. When a backslidden and divided church unites with the state, what always results?
“And there followed another angel, saying, Babylon is fallen, is fallen, that great city, because she made all nations drink of the wine of the wrath of her fornication.” Rev. 14:8.
2. What warning does the Lord in love still send to his people?
“And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; 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 ascendeth up forever and ever; and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. Here is the patience of the saints; here are they that keep the commandments of God, and the faith of Jesus.” Verses 9–12. See note 1.
3. Against what three things does this message warn?
“And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand.” Verse 9.
4. What have we found the beast to be?
Ans.—The Papacy. But note that the “beast” is not the Roman Catholic Church as such, nor the Papacy as meaning the church. It is the union of that church with the state.
5. What occurred in 1798?
“And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death.” “And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.” Rev. 13:3, and verse 11.
6. Was this to be the end of the first beast power?
“And his deadly wound was healed; and all the world wondered after the beast.” Verse 3. See note 2.
7. What scriptures show that it will be an active, living oppressor of God’s people in the last great conflict? Rev. 14:9–12; 13:14; 15:2; 16:10; 19:19, 20.
8. What power did the prophet see arising when the papal beast went into captivity (A.D. 1798)?
“And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.” Rev. 13:11.
9. What prominent characteristics did the beast possess?
“And he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.” Verse 11.
10. Of what are a lamb and a dragon symbols?
“And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four beasts, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth.” “And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world; he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.” Rev. 5:6; 12:9.
11. What would the two horns symbolize?
Ans.—“Horn” is a symbol of exaltation, power, and honor. 1 Sam. 2:1, 10. They would here indicate the two leading features in the government represented by the beast, which are Christian in origin, and which give the government its prominence and power.
12. What would be represented by “speaking like a dragon”?
Ans.—“Beast” represents government. A government speaks through its laws. Speaking like a dragon would therefore be to issue persecuting laws (Rev. 12:13) against the people of God.
13. To what, then, in the character of a government must the symbol of the two-horned beast apply?
Ans.—To a government just rising to power and prominence in 1798, which held professedly to two prominent Christian features that gave it prominence, and which, notwithstanding this, shall become a persecutor.
14. What two characteristics of Christianity apart from its spiritual power give it prominence in the world?
Ans.—Absolute equality of mankind (Acts 17:26), and absolute religious liberty or freedom to believe or not believe without coercion (John 12:47).
15. In what government alone can and do these specifications find fulfillment? Ans.—In the United States of America. See note 3.
16. How great power does the two-horned beast exercise, and for what purpose is it used?
“And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.” Rev. 13:12.
17. What was to be manifest in his territory, and in what fulfilled? Ans.—Fulfilling in Modern Spiritualism and other workings of Satan.
“And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, and deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.” Verses 13, 14.
18. What would these deceptions lead the people to do?
“Saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.” Verse 14.
19. What did the first beast represent, and what elements constituted it?
20. In what, then, would an image to the beast consist?
Ans.—In a union of church and state, or the church using the state for the furtherance of her own cause.
21. What law was to follow the making of the image?
“And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed.” Verse 15.
22. What would be fulfilled in this?
“And he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon.” Verse 11.

Notes.