Apocalisse 17:11 Commento

This chapter contains another representation of those things that had been revealed before concerning the wickedness and ruin of antichrist. This antichrist had been before represented as a beast, and is now described as a great whore. And here, I. The apostle is invited to see this vile woman (Rev 17:1, Rev 17:2). II. He tells us what an appearance she made (Rev 17:3-6). III. The mystery of it is explained to him (Rev 17:7-12). And, IV. Her ruin foretold (Rev 17:13, etc.).

INTRODUCTION TO REVELATION 17 This chapter contains a vision of a beast, and a woman on it, and the interpretation of it; one of the seven angels that had the seven vials proposes to John to show him the whore of Babylon, the Jezabel before spoken of, who sits on many waters, with whom the kings and inhabitants of the earth have committed fornication, being intoxicated by her, Rev 17:1 in order to which he carries him into the wilderness, and there he sees a woman, who is described by the beast she sat on, of a scarlet colour, full of blasphemous names, with seven heads and ten horns; by her array, in purple and scarlet, decked with gold, pearls, and precious stones; by a cup she had in her hand, full of abominable filth; by a name written on her forehead, given at large, and by the condition she was in, drunk with the blood of the saints; which sight filled John with great wonder and admiration, Rev 17:3 wherefore, to remove his astonishment, the angel proposes to explain to him the mystery of the woman, and the beast she sat on, Rev 17:7 and first the mystery of the beast is explained, by its several states, past, present, and to come; by its original and end, ascending out of the bottomless pit, and going into perdition; by the veneration it would be had in by the reprobate part of the world, Rev 17:8 its seven heads are interpreted of the seven mountains on which the city of Rome, designed by the woman, stood, and of seven kings, or forms of government, five of which had ceased, and one was in being in John's time, another was to come, which should not continue long, and the beast would be an eighth, Rev 17:9 its ten horns are explained of ten kings, described by their kingdom they had not as yet received, and which they should have one hour with the beast; by their agreement in mind and conduct; and by their war with the Lamb, the King of kings, and Lord of lords, and those that are with him, the called, chosen, and faithful, and the issue of it, Rev 17:12 the waters on which the whore sat are interpreted of a multitude of people, nations, and tongues, Rev 17:15 the hatred and destruction of her by the ten kings, and the manner of it, are declared, Rev 17:16 which is owing to the will of God, who put it into their hearts to agree to give their kingdom to the beast till the prophecies and promises were fulfilled respecting this matter, and now to destroy the whore that sat upon it, Rev 17:17 which woman is explained of the great city of Rome, that reigns over the kings of the earth, Rev 17:18.

And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth,.... That was in embryo in John's time, and yet was not come to its power and grandeur, is the eighth king; and this is the Papacy, which takes the name of the beast, because it is the head of the beast, and the only surviving head of the beast, or Roman empire, now become Papal: and is of the seven; one of the seven heads, and the last of them, and is an idolatrous one, as the rest were, requiring and encouraging the worship of angels, of the virgin Mary, and saints parted: the pope of Rome is the eighth king, and seventh head, the latter with respect to his temporal power, and the former with respect to his ecclesiastical authority; for his government is quite of a different sort from the rest, being of a mixed kind, partly civil, and partly ecclesiastical, and therefore is signified by two beasts in the thirteenth chapter: and goes into perdition; being the son of perdition, and is justly deserving of it; See Gill on Rev 17:8.

"And the beast which thou sawest is of the seven." Since before those kings Nero reigned. "And he is the eighth." He says only when this beast shall come, reckon it the eighth place, since in that is the completion. He added:- "And shall go into perdition." For that ten kings received royal power when he shall move from the east, he says. He shall be sent from the city of Rome with his armies. And Daniel sets forth the ten horns and the ten diadems. And that these are eradicated from the former ones,-that is, that three of the principal leaders are killed by Antichrist: that the other seven give him honour and wisdom and power, of whom he says:- "These shall hate the whore, to wit, the city, and shall burn her flesh with fire." Now that one of the heads was, as it were, slain to death, and that the stroke of his death was directed, he speaks of Nero. For it is plain that when the cavalry sent by the senate was pursuing him, he himself cut his throat. Him therefore, when raised up, God will send as a worthy king, but worthy in such a way as the Jews merited. And since he is to have another name, He shall also appoint another name, that so the Jews may receive him as if he were the Christ. Says Daniel: "He shall not know the lust of women, although before he was most impure, and he shall know no God of his fathers: for he will not be able to seduce the people of the circumcision, unless he is a judge of the law." Finally, also, he will recall the saints, not to the worship of idols, but to undertake circumcision, and, if he is able, to seduce any; for he shall so conduct himself as to be called Christ by them. But that he rises again from hell, we have said above in the word of Isaiah: "Water shall nourish him, and hell hath increased him; "who, however, must come with name unchanged, and doings unchanged, as says the Spirit.

And he says that "the beast which was, and is not." And it "is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goes to destruction." And he appointed the Devil first and last and a fellow counselor of the seven. For how would this one not also be a ruler who made even the seven utterly wicked?

Lest we should think him of a different kind, it adds that the one whom it calls the eighth is from the seven and goes to perdition. In this way it shows that he is of the same evil genus, and by going beyond the number seven, it indicates that he is even a worse hypocrite. As the Lord was speaking of one unclean spirit and mentions seven, he suddenly adds, “And he brings with him seven other spirits more evil than himself.” So in this passage, beginning with seven it indicates the other seven in one of the same genus, that is, in the eighth. Therefore, it says that he is from the seven and goes to perdition, in order to show that he merits the same punishment due to his singular genus.

The “beast” is the antichrist. He is the “eighth” because he arises after the seven kingdoms for the deception and devastation of the earth. He is “from the seven” because he arises from one of these. For he will not come forth from a nation other than those mentioned before, but as a king of the Romans for the defeat and destruction of those who believed in him. And after this he will go into the destruction of Gehenna.

And the beast that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, etc. The Antichrist, who is to rule at the end of the world, because of the unity of the same body of the wicked, of which he is the head, belongs to the number of the kingdoms of the world; but because of the singular power of his wickedness, he is also contained in the order of his own proper place.

And the beast, that was, and is not, even he is the eighth, and is of the seven, and goeth into perdition - That is to say, the Latin kingdom that has already been, but is now no longer nominally in existence, shall immediately follow the dissolution of the seventh form of Latin government; and this dominion is called ογδοος, an eighth, because it succeeds to the seventh. Yet it is not an eighth head of the beast, because the beast has only seven heads; for to constitute a new head of the beast the form of government must not only differ in nature, but also in name. This head of the beast is, therefore, εκ των ἑπτα, One of the seven. Consequently the form of government represented by this head is the restoration of one of the preceding seven. The restored head can be therefore no other than the regal state of the Latins, or in other words the Latin kingdom, (Ἡ Λατινη βασιλεια), which followed the patriciate or seventh head of Latin government. But the beast in his eighth state, or under his first head restored, goeth into perdition. No other form of Latin government shall succeed; but the beast in his last or antichristian condition shall be taken together with the false prophet that wrought miracles in his sight, "and cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone." It is observable that the eighth Latin power is called by the angel the beast, and also one of his heads. This apparent discordance arises from the double signification of the heads, for if we take the beast upon which the woman sits to be merely a representation of that secular power which supports the Latin Church, then the seven heads will represent the seven electorates of the Germanic empire; but if by the beast we understand the general Latin empire from first to last, then what is, according to the angel's first interpretation of the heads, called the beast, is in this case only one of his heads. See on Rev 17:18 (note).

THE HARLOT BABYLON'S GAUD: THE BEAST ON WHICH SHE RIDES, HAVING SEVEN HEADS AND TEN HORNS, SHALL BE THE INSTRUMENT OF JUDGMENT ON HER. (Rev. 17:1-18) unto me--A, B, Vulgate, Syriac, and Coptic omit. many--So A. But B, "the many waters" (Jer 51:13); Rev 17:15, below, explains the sense. The whore is the apostate Church, just as "the woman" (Rev 12:1-6) is the Church while faithful. Satan having failed by violence, tries too successfully to seduce her by the allurements of the world; unlike her Lord, she was overcome by this temptation; hence she is seen sitting on the scarlet-colored beast, no longer the wife, but the harlot; no longer Jerusalem, but spiritually Sodom (Rev 11:8).

beast that . . . is not--his beastly character being kept down by outward Christianization of the state until he starts up to life again as "the eighth" king, his "wound being healed" (Rev 13:3), Antichrist manifested in fullest and most intense opposition to God. The "he" is emphatic in the Greek. He, peculiarly and pre-eminently: answering to "the little horn" with eyes like the eyes of a man, and a mouth speaking great things, before whom three of the ten horns were plucked up by the roots, and to whom the whole ten "give their power and strength" (Rev 17:12-13, Rev 17:17). That a personal Antichrist will stand at the head of the Antichristian kingdom, is likely from the analogy of Antiochus Epiphanes, the Old Testament Antichrist, "the little horn" in Dan 8:9-12; also, "the man of sin, son of perdition" (Th2 2:3-8), answers here to "goeth into perdition," and is applied to an individual, namely, Judas, in the only other passage where the phrase occurs (Joh 17:12). He is essentially a child of destruction, and hence he has but a little time ascended out of the bottomless pit, when he "goes into perdition" (Rev 17:8, Rev 17:11). "While the Church passes through death of the flesh to glory of the Spirit, the beast passes through the glory of the flesh to death" [AUBERLEN]. is of the seven--rather "springs out of the seven." The eighth is not merely one of the seven restored, but a new power or person proceeding out of the seven, and at the same time embodying all the God-opposed features of the previous seven concentrated and consummated; for which reason there are said to be not eight, but only seven heads, for the eighth is the embodiment of all the seven. In the birth-pangs which prepare the "regeneration" there are wars, earthquakes, and disturbances [AUBERLEN], wherein Antichrist takes his rise ("sea," Rev 13:1; Mar 13:8; Luk 21:9-11). He does not fall like the other seven (Rev 17:10), but is destroyed, going to his own perdition, by the Lord in person.