Revelation 13:3, commentary and pictures

The beast is the papal church-state power that rose when the church left the gospel for civil power to enforce its aims, trample God's law and persecute His people. One of its heads was wounded to death when the papacy was overthrown in 1798 and the pope was taken captive by the French army, going itself into the captivity it had inflicted on others. Its deadly wound is healed when that papal power is restored and again appears in strength at the close of time, just before the greatest event in earth's history. All the world wonders after the beast by uniting in worldwide honor to Sunday, an institution resting on Roman authority, exalted in place of the seventh-day Sabbath hallowed at creation and commanded in the Decalogue. The chapter thus sets before every person the final choice between loyalty to God in keeping the seventh-day Sabbath and worship of the beast in a human-instituted false sabbath enforced by decree with punishment and death.

Beast Identity and Setting

The beast of the prophecy is the papal power, a leopard-like church-state persecuting power that arose when the church departed from the gospel and sought civil power, using the state to advance its own aims and punish dissent. It is numbered among the earthly governments especially engaged in trampling upon God's law and persecuting His people, carrying its war forward to the close of time against a people of God greatly in the minority. The prophecy of Revelation 13:1-10 and its connection with Revelation 13 and 14 shows all classes except the little flock uniting to exalt Sunday and enforce it by stringent laws, with the worship and mark of this first beast to be enforced by the two-horned beast.

The beast is a power existing through the ages in different forms symbolized by its seven heads, and in the period of Revelation 13:1-10 its dominant head is the Papacy, whose union of church and state made it a persecuting power. It combines the characteristics of the four beasts of Daniel 7, Babylon, Persia, Greece, and Rome, showing it to be the inheritor of the power successively held by those four empires. It arose from the sea, meaning peoples and multitudes and nations and tongues, showing the papacy was upheld by many nations. It received its civil power and seat at the city of Rome and great authority from the dragon, which is pagan Rome.

That gift of power, seat, and great authority marks a change in the form of opposition to God, from open pagan defiance to opposition carried on under profession of allegiance to Him, with the papacy becoming Satan's agent after paganism gave way to it. In this form it exercised persecuting power for 1260 years, a period of papal oppression that began in 538 and ended in 1798 before it went into captivity. The all the world that wondered after this church-beast is the Old World as known to the ancients, and does not include the different locality out of the earth where the two-horned beast representing the United States comes up. The wounded head and healed wound also belong to the wider end-time setting in which civil powers and churches unite against God's purposes, human authority replaces God's law, Satan rules through an organized empire of evil, and religious laws arise in conflict with God's Sabbath, with the chapter presenting a power to become prominent in the last days even where the wound and healing are not separately explained.

Deadly Wound Inflicted

The deadly wound is the downfall and abolition of the papal power in 1798, when the pope was taken captive by the French army. This captivity fulfilled the prophecy that the power which had led others into captivity would itself go into captivity. It came at the close of the 1260-year period of papal oppression that began in 538 and ended in 1798.

The pope who received the wound was Pius VI, who was led into captivity and died in captivity. He was carried captive to Valence and confined in the tower overlooking the waters of the Rhone, and died there. His bust remains there, with a marble monument beneath it containing his heart, marking him in history as the one pointed out by prophecy.

The wound deprived the papacy of its strength and forced it to desist from persecution, ending its persecuting power. For many centuries Satan destroyed God's faithful witnesses through the great powers controlled by paganism and the papacy, symbolized by the dragon and the leopard-like beast. Under the dominion of Rome they were tortured and slain for more than a thousand years, until the deadly wound ended papal persecuting power and marked the time when the beast with lamb-like horns was seen coming up.

Healing and Worldwide Wonder

The healing of the deadly wound is the restoration and return of papal power after its downfall and abolition in 1798. The papacy will appear again in its power in the last time, standing on the borders of the greatest event in the world's history. That return shows the time of trouble is near and calls the churches to be aroused, to awake and search the Scriptures and not sleep under Satan's power seeking to lull God's people, for God will make known to His faithful ones what shall be in the last time and His word will come to His people in power, swelling by God's appointment into a loud cry.

The restored papacy again receives worldwide homage in both the Old and New Worlds, fulfilled especially through honor paid to Sunday observance, an institution resting on the authority of the Roman Church. The healing is the worldwide exaltation of Sunday in place of the seventh-day Sabbath, which God hallowed and sanctified at creation, sustained by the miracle in the giving of the manna, and proclaimed in the very bosom of the Decalogue given on Sinai as His memorial of creation, yet now discarded. The man of sin places before the world an idol sabbath on the first day of the week, a spurious sabbath and child of the papacy nourished and cherished by the Protestant world, blinding the professed Christian world so that the false takes the place of the true in faith and the world unites in disloyalty to the only true and living God to tear down His memorial and exalt a common working day in its place. None sinks into disregard of the fourth commandment except as urged on by religious teaching and by union, concord, and cooperation with companions who are Satan's instruments, refusing light, refusing to take the Word of God as it reads, choosing Satan's lies rather than a Thus saith the Lord, and making obedience hard for those who see the truth, even as Satan deceived Eve and used her to entice Adam and has kept up this specious working on human minds to the present.

The deadly wound healed means a worldwide religious unity under Sunday law that leaves Sabbathkeepers as a little feeble people standing alone in defiance of the laws of the land. In that time the followers of the beast claim they have the truth, claim miracles and great power and signs and wonders among them, claim angels from heaven talk and walk with them, and call their worldwide conversion and harmony the temporal millennium long expected. They cut off the resources of God's people so they cannot buy or sell, reduce them to abject poverty and stricken condition, mock their feebleness and smallness of numbers, charge them with taking an independent separatist position from all the rest of the world, insist they must concede to the customs, practices, and laws of the world or go out of it, ridicule them for claiming to be the only ones right on earth, and threaten to destroy them.

The wondering after the beast is the world bowing to Satan and receiving his power as though it were God's power, belonging to the final conflict in which Satan uses the promise of the kingdoms of the world to draw people into worship under his dominion and all take sides. Nearly the whole human creation bows before him, with kings and rulers of the earth and those called noblemen refusing the yoke of Christ yet willingly bowing at Satan's bidding, accepting him as God and Prince of heaven and becoming imbued with his spirit, while he works to the utmost to make himself as God and destroy all who oppose his power and confirms his claim by miracle-working power through every object in earth, air, and water, his agents working intensely to draw the world after the beast. Countless numbers worship him as a deceiver claiming to be Prince of heaven, receiving Satan's power in place of God's power, a fulfillment seen today when the whole human creation follows the beast.

That wondering is fulfilled in following papal authority in changing the Sabbath from the seventh day to the first, turning from a plain Thus saith the Lord to a thus saith the papacy that thought to change times and laws and acted as if changing God's law were its prerogative, exalting human authority above God and withholding God's holy time each week. Through Satan's working the people were turned from the true seventh-day Sabbath of the fourth commandment to the spurious first-day Sabbath, which human authorities accepted and presented to the Protestant world as the true Sabbath, an attempt to alter God's unchangeable law whose breach God's people are to repair. In the momentous period just before the great conflict the disloyal Protestant world wonders after the beast by following the man of sin in exalting this spurious sabbath that has not a word of authority in the oracles of God, while kingdoms confederate to sustain the false institution, call obedience to the Sabbath instituted by Jehovah disloyalty to the laws of the nations, and the world is corrupted under its inhabitants. The verse thus warns of a deceived company in the last days working counter to God amid perils before His people, for the papacy's deceptive work continues until the second advent.

Mark Worship and Sabbath

Revelation 13 shows that those who worship the beast receive its mark in the forehead or in the hand. The forehead stands for the mind and the hand stands for power, while in contrast God's servants are sealed in the mind, for compulsory worship is not acceptable to God. That mark stands opposed to God's sign, the Sabbath, as a counterfeit Sabbath kept on Sunday, the day of the sun, set against God's Sabbath.

The chapter concerns every person by setting before each one a choice between loyalty to God and worship of the beast. Loyalty to God is shown by keeping the seventh-day Sabbath as the memorial of creation, while worship of the beast is rendered through observance of a false sabbath instituted by human authority. That false worship will be enforced by decree by the beast and his image, with punishment, imprisonment, and death for those who keep God's commandments and refuse to comply. Against that enforced worship and its mark the third angel gives warning.

Those who refuse the beast's mark keep God's commandments, including the Sabbath, and for that faithfulness will face persecution. The full importance of the Sabbath as God's seal will become clear when judgment falls upon those who enforce the beast's mark.

Prophetic Sequence and Application

The verse stands in a connected chain of past, present, and future events involving the beast and its image, a chain that runs on to the complete redemption of the 144,000 who stand victorious over the beast and its image as shown in Revelation 14:1-5. It belongs to the prophecies of Revelation 12 to 18 that are now being fulfilled, and for that reason all are to hear the last message of warning. Its place is just before the very last call to the churches in Revelation 18, which is now to be given. After that comes the taking of the beast and the false prophet and their casting into the lake of fire described in Revelation 19, then the binding of the dragon who instigated rebellion against heaven in the bottomless pit for a thousand years, then the resurrection of the wicked and the final destruction of Satan and all the wicked, and then the final triumph and reign of Christ on this earth.

The leopard-like beast of this prophecy is bound up with the two-horned beast that will enforce its worship and its mark. The prophecy of Revelation 13 and 14 shows that all classes except the little flock will unite to exalt Sunday and enforce it upon all by stringent laws. It gives the description of the persecuting power in the last period of earth's history, when churches and the world unite in trampling upon God's commandments and threatening with death all who obey His precepts. This is the closing scenes of earth's history and the proclamation of the third angel's message, which combines the first and second messages in the great and last warfare between those who keep the commandments of God and those who make void the law of God.

The prophecy lays out in clear lines the position of the people of God for this time in regard to Sunday laws. It is given for all who live in the last days and must be read carefully and prayerfully to be understood. Those who love God and keep His commandments are to lift up the standard of truth and declare the last message of mercy against opposing fables.

The return of the papacy in power stands on the borders of the greatest event in the world's history and shows the time of trouble is near. At that time Satan works through church and state in opposition to God's work, and seeks power over the people of God to cause them to sleep on. Therefore the churches must be aroused, must awake and search the Scriptures, and must hear the last warning and not sleep under Satan's power. God will make known to His faithful ones what shall be in the last time, and His word by His appointment will come to His people in power and swell into a loud cry.