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Why doesn't Revelation show three horns being defeated

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  • Why doesn't Revelation show three horns being defeated

    Daniel 7 includes a beast with eleven horns. The eleventh, small horn defeats three of the first ten horns. These horns are all said to represent kings or perhaps kingdoms.

    Revelation has two different creatures with ten horns, both a dragon (Revelation 12) and later a strange beast that is the combination of several animals (Revelation 13, 17, etc.). In Revelation 17, the horns are again said to be kings. (Seven heads are also said to be kings.) However, Revelation never seems to show three of these kings fighting against a little horn (or any alternative symbol) and being defeated by this enemy.

    Most people assume that these two passages are describing the same thing, in some way. I give up. Why doesn't Revelation include three horns being defeated by a smaller horn? Someone tell me the answer.

  • #2
    The Beast of Dan also doesn't have 8 heads with one recovered from a fatal wound. The logical conclusion is that they represent different things?

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    • #3
      Then what does each represent?

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      • #4
        Depends on who you ask. I could probably find at least a dozen different interpretations from the preterist camp as I could from the futurist camp.

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        • #5
          Your theory makes no sense. Do you think the fourth beast from Daniel plus the beast from Revelation are both in the future? If the future holds two such beasts for us and Revelation predicts the future, why doesn't Revelation have both instead of just one?

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          • #6
            I didn't offer a theory on what I believe they mean. You didn't ask. I merely stated that scripture makes it pretty clear that the two Beasts represent two different things. That's not a theory; it's really the only thing that can be accurately derived from the passages -- totally different characteristics = different Beasts = different representations.

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            • #7
              There are immense similarities. It makes no sense to claim that they represent different things unless you have a good explanation for why neither text contains two such beasts.

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              • #8
                Originally posted by Obsidian View Post
                There are immense similarities. It makes no sense to claim that they represent different things unless you have a good explanation for why neither text contains two such beasts.
                Immense similarities? There are more differences than similarites. There's nothing similar about the two other than the ten horns and the fact they're both called "beasts," and the beast of Dan actually has just eight horns in the end. To try and conflate the two beasts would take a monumental amount of extraneous additions that are not found in the text.

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                • #9
                  I think it's fair to compare the beasts from Daniel and Revelation. It's clear that the beast Daniel saw held sway--in varying forms--over the world until "the Ancient of Days came and delivered the kingdom to the saints."

                  In Revelation it is made clear that the ultimate power "behind the beast" in any of its forms is Satan, the dragon. This is crucial to interpreting the identity of the beast. Revelation also reveals that the beast was "born" in Babylon (Mother of Abominations). For those still woefully and damnably ignorant (my people perish for lack of knowledge) despite literal mountains of information detailing the origin and evolution of paganism and the mystery religions, I will offer here the condensed version. Nimrod, the first world dictator and "type" of the Antichrist, whose "base of operations" was in Babylon, was deified after his death along with his wife Semiramis (likely the namesake of the "Sumer" in the Bible) and their son Tammuz (also mentioned in the Bible as a false god), forming a pagan trinity which existed in varying forms in the subsequent world powers of history, i.e. Egypt, Assyria, Persia, Greece, Rome.

                  This "beast" of paganism, which at its core was Satanism, was responsible for the persecution of God's people throughout history. Up until the time of Daniel and for awhile thereafter, the concept of a "separation between Church and State" was incomprehensible, and so the "beasts" of Daniel were portrayed as empires, though it was really the pagan/Satanic religions these empires subscribed to that led to the persecution of God's people. After the Greeks and Romans introduced logical and systematic thinking to the world at large, the concept of a "secular" government was born, and this combined with the spread of Christian love would have made widespread persecution of the righteous a thing of the past had not Satan stepped up his game by synthesizing Christianity with paganism in the form of Catholicism and whitewashing paganism into monotheism in the form of Islam. These two institutions perpetuated the persecution of God's people after the time of Christ and will continue to do so until He returns. In fact, it is these two institutions that the beast is empowered by until in his unbridled, Satanic narcissism he betrays even them in his quest for utter domination. The beast will hate even the prostitute he allows to ride him for a time.

                  The explanation for that is easy enough to understand. Catholicism and Islam, wicked as they are at their core, still harbor huge amounts of people attempting to do what they think is right. "Come out of her, My people, so that you will not share in her sins!" The beast and those "pure" Satanists who are like him and support him, cannot abide any amount of righteousness. In the end, Satan's kingdom will be a divided one and that is part of why it will not be able to stand, aside from the folly of warring against the Lamb.

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                  • #10
                    I have read The Two Babylons, and your post is interesting, but there are two problems with your post. One, you do not clearly explain what you think the two beasts are. And two, you don't really answer the question that I raised in the thread. Who are the ten horns, and why doesn't Revelation show the horns fighting each other?

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                    • #11
                      Originally posted by Obsidian View Post
                      Who are the ten horns[?]
                      From The Days of Vengeance, by David Chilton:
                      12.... The ten horns which St. John saw on the Beast are ten kings. The number 10 in the Bible, as we have noted on other occasions, is related to the concept of "manyness," of quantitative or numerical fullness. That these "kings" are associated with the Beast, adorning his heads as "crowns," and that they receive authority with the Beast (i.e., by virtue of their relationship with him) indicates that they are rulers subject to, or allied with, the Empire. Rome actually had ten imperial provinces, and some have read this as a reference to them.* It is not necessary, however, to attempt a precise definition of these ten subject kings; the symbol simply represents "the totality of those allied or subject kings who aided Rome in her wars on Judaism and Christianity.** The burden of the text is to point to these kings, with whom the Harlot has plied her trade (verse 2), as the instruments of her eventual destruction (verses 16-17).
                      *These were: Italy, Achaia, Asia, Syria, Egypt, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Germany. See F. W. Farrar, The Early Days of Christianity (Chicago and New York: Belford, Clarke, & Co., 1882), p. 532).
                      **Milton S, Terry Biblical Hermeneutic: A Treatise on the Interpretation of the Old and New Testaments. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1974), page 433

                      Originally posted by Obsidian View Post
                      ... why doesn't Revelation show the horns fighting each other?
                      Because that is not what was revealed to John, whose prophecy is not the same as that of Daniel.

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                      • #12
                        At least a few major problems with that view:

                        1. It's a bit of a stretch to refer to a governor as a king. Even the Persian empire had governors, but Daniel didn't describe it as having ten kings.

                        2. At what point did the Roman Empire attack three of its own provinces?

                        3. Revelation 17:12 says that the kings had not yet received their kingdom, whereas the provinces already had governors.

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                        • #13
                          #2 If we assume the fourth beast in Dan is the Roman Empire (which I personally believe is a good interpretation) and the ten horns are Caesars, then the eleventh horn would be Vespasian who uprooted Galba, Otho and Vitellius, that were all ruling simultaneously.

                          #3 Exactly. Which is why it doesn't fit the ancient Roman Empire.

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                          • #14
                            Originally posted by Obsidian View Post
                            It's a bit of a stretch to refer to a governor as a king.
                            From BDAG:
                            βασιλεύς, έως, ὁ
                            1. one who rules as possessor of the highest office in a political realm, king, generally of a male ruler who has unquestioned authority (exceptions are client rulers who owe their power to the grace of Rome) in a specific area

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                            • #15
                              @John Reece

                              Esther 1:3
                              In the third year of his reign, he made a feast unto all his princes and his servants; the power of Persia and Media, the nobles and princes of the provinces, being before him


                              Then how come the Bear didn't have any horns, to refer to these princes of the provinces?

                              @Sean

                              Vespasian would be either the ninth or the tenth, depending on whether you count Julius Caesar. Not the eleventh.

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