“Then I saw another beast coming up out of the earth, and he had two horns like a lamb and spoke like a dragon.” Revelation 13:11.

Just as we have had a beast rising up out of the sea in Revelation 13:1, so now we have one coming up out of the earth. If the sea represents the Gentile nations, then the earth has to mean something different. There are two plausible theories.

The first, many Bible teachers translate the word earth as land; which in many cases can refer to the actual land of Israel. If you accept this, then it means that the false prophet will arise out of the land of Israel.

The other theory is that the word earth is in contrast to heaven. The thought here is that the Holy Spirit came down from heaven, but the false prophet who represents the unholy spirit in this satanic trinity is of the earth, hence the difference.

In this case you could actually select either theory without fear of doing violence to Scripture, and it may be possible to accept them both since they may represent two very real aspects of the false prophet both as a Jew and as a man of the earth.

A lamb is meek and mild which is why Jesus is typified as the Lamb of God.

“Behold, My Servant whom I have chosen, My Beloved in whom My soul is well pleased; I will put My Spirit upon Him, and He will declare justice to the Gentiles. He will not quarrel nor cry out, nor will anyone hear His voice in the streets. A bruised reed He will not break, and smoking flax He will not quench, till He sends forth justice to victory. And in His name Gentiles will trust.” Matthew 12:18-21.

How often have you passed a house and heard people quarreling so loudly that it could be heard from the sidewalk outside? How often have you heard a screaming match over religion or politics?

Unfortunately, how often have we been guilty of such behavior, or have been embarrassed by our parents in this manner?

It says of Jesus that He did not quarrel or cry out; this even while constantly being harassed by the scribes and the Pharisees. This is an aspect of Jesus’ personality that we do not often consider; yet it is a trait that we could all benefit from.

A lamb is also the sacrifice for sins; the Lamb of God is the complete sacrifice for sin once and for all.

“For it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats could take away sins.” Hebrews 10:4.

“For by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.” Hebrews 10:14.

The Lamb of God is meek and mild and a sacrifice for sin; the dragon’s lamb has the outward appearance of humility, but he has two horns, something which lambs do not have.

The horns tell us a different story. Horns are a symbol of power, and the number two is one of witness, which it turns out is what he is to the dragon and the beast.

This is the false prophet, the trinity is now complete, the dragon, the beast, and false prophet. Speaking as a dragon his false humility is merely a facade to hide the arrogance of power which this person will have as he commits monstrous acts against those who will not worship the beast.

“And he exercises all the authority of the first beast in his presence, and causes the earth and those who dwell in it to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed.” Revelation 13:12.

Both of these men seem focused, and work as a team to attain the goal of world domination and worldwide worship of the beast and dragon; without jealous competition.

“He performs great signs, so that he even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do in the sight of the beast, telling those who dwell on the earth to make an image to the beast who was wounded by the sword and lived.” Revelation 13:13-14.

The significance of this word “signs” must not be overlooked. These signs were intended to counterfeit the miracles which Jesus did to confirm that He was the Messiah.

By ignoring the signs that Jesus did the Jews were made manifestly guilty when they gave up their Messiah to be crucified.

For instance in the gospel of John, God selected seven signs to highlight in that book. While they were not all of His miracles they should have awakened some curiosity on the part of the Jewish leadership.

The first of these signs was the turning of water into wine in John chapter two, at the end of the account, it says this.

“This beginning of signs Jesus did in Cana of Galilee, and manifested His glory; and His disciples believed in Him.” John 2:11.

Again when He healed a nobleman’s son, it says this of Him.

“This again is the second sign that Jesus did when He had come out of Judea into Galilee.” John 4:54.

After healing a paralytic things got so out of hand that the Jews sought to kill Jesus. Part of His defense is as follows.

“But I have a greater witness than John’s [John the Baptist]; for the works which the Father has given Me to finish – the very works that I do – bear witness of Me, that the Father has sent Me.” John 5:36.

In reference to these attesting miracles, a great multitude shows that some believed.

“Then a great multitude followed Him, because they saw His signs which He performed on those who were diseased.” John 6:2.

There are many other references, but these should suffice.

“And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.” John 21:25.

The seven signs in the gospel of John are: water to wine, 2:1-11, nobleman’s son, 4:46-54, paralytic, 5:1-18, feeding of multitude, 6:6-13, walking on water, 6:16-21, giving sight to a man born blind, 9:1-7, raising of Lazarus, 11:1-45. And if you were to count His rising from the dead, an eighth sign.

So signs are important, and the false prophet will have no lack of them, to fool if possible, even those who belong to the Lord.

“For false christs and false prophets will rise and show great signs and wonders, to deceive, if possible, even the elect.” Matthew 24:24.

See also Mark 13:22 where this warning is repeated.

This is where having the false prophet to be of Jewish descent would come in handy, for many of the Jews are looking for Elijah.

“Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the earth with a curse.” Malachi 4:5-6.

Elijah also brought fire down from heaven during his ministry; an account that would be well known in Israel.

During the reign of King Ahab, Elijah told him to gather the priests of Baal the demon god whom they were worshiping and the people of Israel, to once and for all, determine who was God of Israel, Baal or the Lord.

The test was simple, altars were to be built and sacrifices were put on them and the god Baal was to send fire down to burn up the sacrifice on his altar. Likewise God was to send fire on His sacrifice.

After a day of whooping and wailing the priests of Baal were unable to get him to respond.

Around 3 pm it was Elijah’s turn, he had the people drench the sacrifice, the wood and altar with water, and he then uttered a simple prayer.

“Then the fire of the Lord fell and consumed the burnt sacrifice, and the wood and the stones and the dust, and it licked up the water that was in the trench [around it].” I Kings 18:38.

Fire is a sign of great significance.

There can be little argument that he will deceive the earth dwellers, so much so as to have them make an image to the beast.

And, notice this, twice within the last three verses the deadly wound is mentioned, giving testimony that this was no small event when the beast rose from the dead.

“He was granted power to give breath to the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak and cause as many as would not worship the image of the beast to be killed.” Revelation 13:15.

The verse states that the false prophet was given power to bring this image to life. It should be noted here that the word power in the New King James Version quoted above, is in italics so the word was inserted to clarify the verse.

Some versions seem to indicate that permission is given by God:

“And there was given to him to give breath to the image of the beast…” Revelation 13:15a, New American Standard Version.

However this power does come from Satan, so ultimately God has to grant Satan some sort of right to do these extraordinary things. He in turn gives the false prophet the ability to perform this miracle.

The term breath or spirit seems to indicate some sort of life or animation. Two true statements we can make are; science has not created life in the laboratory. And this is not a cyborg or robot.

These will be true miracles in the sense that science will not be able to explain them away. Yet they are not miracles of God as Jesus’ were.

The intent is always to deceive as it stated in verse 14 earlier:

“And he deceives those who dwell on the earth by those signs which he was granted to do…” Revelation 13:14a.

One fascinating, and simple, way of giving life to the image is for it to be infested with an evil spirit (demon) who then animates it. Whether the word spirit or breath gives enough latitude for this to happen is questionable.

However, all idolatry, and false religions for that matter, is demonic in origin and power. And there is power do not let anyone deceive you.

“They [Israelites] shall no more offer their sacrifices to demons, after whom they have played the harlot. This shall be a statute forever for them throughout their generations.” Leviticus 17:7.

“What am I saying then? That an idol is anything, or what is offered to idols is anything? But I say that the things which the Gentiles sacrifice they sacrifice to demons and not to God, and I do not want you to have fellowship with demons.” 1 Corinthians 10:19-20.

“Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons…” 1 Timothy 4:1.

What demon would not fall all over himself to volunteer to indwell an image that is to be worshiped and also have the ability to have innocent people killed for not doing so?

“And he causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on their foreheads, and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 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.” Revelation 13:16-18.

Class distinctions are ignored at this point and the gauntlet is thrown down, one will have to make a stand for or against the beast, and without the ability to buy or sell, food and shelter become a near impossibility without the mark.

The mark has variously been called, the mark, a brand, or a character, so it is difficult to nail down what we are looking at here. Is it visible or invisible?

Is it a bar code or an implant like the ones folks are getting for their pets, some people are having such implants put in for scanning to get into night clubs; social security and medical records are being considered for implants too.

Is there anything wrong with this? Not likely, but it is conditioning people’s thinking to accept the real deal and that is wrong and dangerous.

There are kids running around with their head shaved and a bar code tattooed on the back; others have the number 666 on them somewhere. Is this wrong? No, it is foolishness, if not stupidity.

The mark of the beast will mean nothing until it is mandated by the false prophet and an official mark is introduced.

The idea of a cashless society has been around for a number of years; one reason for this is that it costs money to mint and maintain money, so this could be eliminated right away.

Another reason is that it would give government greater control over its citizens. Banks would have greater control over people’s money, and banks are the ones who will profit from this control.

All this from men who have never opened a Bible, much less studied the book of Revelation.

“Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast…” Many of us, me included, have wanted to figure out who this malevolent person is.

The problem is that he will not be revealed until after the rapture of the church, and since many guesses have gone from Ronald Reagan to Henry Kissinger (who is part of the New World Order) it can be stated that our success rate is dismal.

The truth is that this verse is for Israelites of understanding who during the tribulation want to confirm whether the beast is the Messiah or not.

And the process is not for the novice; the Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters and each letter represents a certain number, so the first letter would be number one and the second, number two and so on. The first ten letters are numbers one through ten, the eleventh and twelfth letters are 20 and 30, the next series of letters are: 40, 50, 60, 70, 80, 90, and 100, the last three letters are, 200, 300, and 400. Knowing this, you then need to have the name in Hebrew before totaling up the letters to get 666.

“For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work; only He [Holy Spirit] who now restrains will do so until He is taken out of the way. And then the lawless one [the beast] will be revealed, whom the Lord will consume with the breath of His mouth and destroy with the brightness of His coming. The coming of the lawless one is according to the working of Satan, with all power, signs, and lying wonders, and with all unrighteous deception among those who perish, because they did not receive the love of the truth, that they might be saved.” 2 Thessalonians 2:7-10.

Revelation 13:11-18 taken from godisrevealed.com updated on 1-12-17, reposted on 8-28-22.

Scripture taken from the New King James Version, copyright 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc. Used by permission, all rights reserved.