There are those who claim Domitian was ruling at the time of Revelation to John. Others hold it was Nero.
Writings of one of the early Church fathers reveal it was Domitian.
The view of Egypt, Assyria, Babylon, Medo-Persia, and Greece - requires that the words of Revelation 17:10 be changed from "kings" to "kingdoms", and some additional twisting to say one particular king over each one - to account for the 7th king to be one person... as it says when "he" cometh, in the text.
In Rev.17, both Rev.13 ideas of a beast kingdom, and a beast king, are being described. Some have difficulty distinguishing the difference. In all the old beast kingdoms of OT history, they each had a beast king over them, which the Book of Daniel covers those too, especially the king of Babylon Nebuchadnezzar.
Daniel 7 starts with Babylon, then Medo-Persia, then Greece, then the Roman Empire as the fourth kingdom. It doesn't start back with Egypt and Assyria..
A 5th beast kingdom is suggested in Daniel 2, the final beast of feet of ten toes of iron mixed with clay. That was not the Roman empire. The Roman empire was the legs of iron. The ten toes beast is to be manifest at the end of this world when Jesus returns to smite it upon its feet, as shown in Daniel 2. That is what the 7th beast king will reign over at the end.
It is not Satan. Satan is roaming free right now, seeking who he can destroy. And Satan in Revelation 9, cannot be given the key to open the bottomless pit, if he himself is in the bottomless pit.
Sure it is. Do you know of anyone else that has already been judged and sentenced to perdition into the "lake of fire" so far?
Even Judas Iscariot who betrayed our Lord Jesus has not been judged yet. And if you believe in a God that has already judged and sentenced to perish any flesh born man today, then you and I do not believe in the same God. God's great white throne judgment is not until after Christ's future "thousand years" reign, as written. And even if you don't believe in that future "thousand years" reign of Rev.20, that future judgment is still not until after His second coming.
Satan is free to roam in the abode of hell also; it belongs to him. When he is bound at our Lord Jesus' return, he will be bound in chains in the very prison of the pit that he is king over. Revelation 9 told you who he was, a king and angel of the bottomless pit, even giving his name in Hebrew and in Greek. His name Apollyon in the Greek is where the idea of perdition assigned to him originates.
Rev 17:8
8 The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.
KJV
Davy, that wording means the person was alive, but has died, and is not alive any more. He is in the bottomless pit as now a disembodied spirit. Who it is - is controversial. But it is not Satan. It is someone who was alive, but has died.
It can refer to a beast king that was once in power, and then lost it, and then is in power again.
Don't forget the "and yet is" phrase in that verse. Because of that last phrase, it shows it cannot be about a dead king of history. It even shows it can't be any other than Satan, because there won't be any beast king of past history resurrected from the dead to be over the final beast kingdom at the end of this world. And some men's speculations today on the 'deadly wound' in association with a resurrection of a dead beast king is totally ludicrous.
John was told by the angel who the scarlet beast, which is Satan, agreed, represented. John himself could not see into the bottomless pit, but instead saw the beast in the wilderness with the woman riding him. So he would not have known that there was further representation by the scarlet colored beast - other than being Satan - unless told by the angel.
Like I said, some have difficulty in keeping the two beast ideas separated in Rev.17.
The "woman" (Babylon harlot) of Rev.17, we are shown at the very end of the chapter, is a city. It is not... a beast king. It is pointing to Jerusalem in a fallen worship condition for the end, a la Rev.11:8. The scarlet symbol is used to represent a kingdom. Jerusalem will be beast kingdom central when Satan is cast out of the heavenly. In Rev.18:7, she says of herself, "I sit a queen, and am no widow, and shall see no sorrow." If she's the queen, then who's the king married to her then? It points back to Ezekiel 16 about Jerusalem and God's usage of the marriage vs. harlot metaphors. Satan is coming to marry Jerusalem, spiritually, for he has always wanted to be God, and worshiped as God, coveting God's place He chose also, i.e., Jerusalem.
In fact, for the remainder of Revelation 17, everything is being told to John by the angel what the heads and horns represented.
Not really true. Read the very last verse. And in verses 12, 13, and 17, the beast king is also being referred to, for that is who the ten kings give their power to (i.e, the "little horn" of the Book of Daniel). In verse 15, the beast of Rev.13:1-2 coming out of the sea is being defined, basically the peoples and multitudes of all the world, all nations, a system over the whole earth.
In Revelation 12, John sees the dragon, Satan - with the 7 heads and 10 horns. The actual beast was apparently already dead and in the bottomless pit at the time Jesus was born into the world.
In Rev.12:3-4, John sees the dragon in association with a 7 crown beast system, which is not the one of Rev.13:1, since the one in Rev.13 has 10 crowns instead of 7. Surely you can count. Furthermore, the Rev.12:1-5 verses pose a short summary, the time when the dragon sought to devour the Child of the woman is about Satan trying to taint the Seed of the woman that Jesus would be born of. That began when Cain murdered Abel. And before that was when Satan first rebelled against God, drawing a third of the angels into rebellion with him.
And your idea about the beast being already dead is really an idea way... out in left field. It has no Biblical alignment, since we are told the beast that was and is not, "and yet is".
At the beginning of the 7 years, which those 7 years are in chapter 12, the actual beast is still in the bottomless pit. Differently, in Revelation 13, the actual beast has come out of the bottomless pit.
Rev.12:10 with Satan being able to accuse us before God's Throne in Heaven shows that even up to the future time of his casting down to this earth, he is able to roam like he did in the time of Job. Rev.12:7 forward, because of the war in heaven in the future, that is when Satan will be cast out of the heavenly down to our earthly dimension, with his angels. He is coming, like our Lord Jesus warned in John 14:30.
Satan - the dragon, the scarlet colored beast, is not seen coming out of the sea. But the beast, (and John actually sees him this time and doesn't have to be told about him) because with 42 months left, and king 7 having being killed and come back to life - the disembodied spirit has ascended out of the bottomless pit - to possess former king 7.
Again, Satan is not the scarlet beast. That is about the 'woman' (a city). And just as God said He married Jerusalem in Ezekiel 16, that is what Satan wants to do with Jerusalem.
There's that resurrected dead king coming back life baloney. Satan's servants here on earth will create anything they can to try and disguise that 7th beast king being anyone other than Satan himself. And that's all you're doing, is pushing their falsehoods on that.
