THE BEAST OF REVELATION Other books by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr. The Christian Case Against Abortion, 1982, rev. 1989 i’?z.e ChanLrrnatic Gij of Prophq: A &formed Response to Wap Gru&m, 1986, rev. 1989 7% Christian and Al~oholic Beoerages: A Biblical Perspective, 1986, rev. 1989 Be@re Jmalem Fed: Dating the Book of Revelation, 1989 House Divided: I’7ze Break-up of Dispensatwnal 17wology (with Greg. L. Bahnsen), 1989 7Ze Greatness of the Great Commisswn: 7%z Chtitian Enkr@se in a Fallen World, 1993 He Shall Haw Do~inwn: A Postmillennial Eschutology, 1992 Lord oftb Saved: Getting to the Heart of the Lordship Debate, 1992 God3 Law in the Modern World: l%e Continuing Relevance ~ Old T~tament Law, 1993 Contributions tcx David L. Bender, cd., i’h Weljare State: Opposing Viewpoints, 1982. Gary North, cd., Tkeonomy: An Inzrzwd Response, 1992 THE BEAST OF REVELATION Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr. Institute for Christian Economics Tyler, Texas Publisher’s Preface G 1989 by Gary North Copyright ‘1989 by Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr., Th.D. Second printing with corrections, 1994. All rights reserved, No part of this publication maybe reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior, written permission of the publisher. For itior- mation, address D minion Press, Publishers, Post OffIce Box 8204, Fort Worth, Texas 76124. Unless otherwise noted Scripture quotations are from the New American Standard Bible, ‘The Lockman Foundation 1960, 1962, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973. Published by the l:nstitute for Christian Economics Distributed by Dominion Press, Fort Worth, Texas Zjpesetting by Nhq; Pham Npyn Printed in the Uti ted States of America ISBN 0-930464-2 [-4 Library of Congress Catalog Card Numben 93-134579 Dedicated to the Congregation of the Reedy River Presbyterian Church which “endured to the end” through the several years of studies in Revelation that led to the writing of this book Second printing produced in memory of Mrs. Sylvia B. Duckner ftithful church organist for Reedy River Presbyterian Church 1962-1993 TABLE OF CONTENTS Publisher’s Preface by Gary North . ix PART 1: WHO IS THE BEAST? Introduction . 3 l. The Identity of the Beast . 9 2. The Relevance of the Beast . 21 3. The Number of the Beast . 29 4. The Character of the Beast . 40 5. The Warofthe Beast . 47 6. The Worship of the Beast . 57 7. The Revival of the Beast . 68 PART 2: WHEN WAS REVELATION WRITTEN? 8. The Importance of the Date of Revelation . 81 9. The Thematic Evidence . 88 10. The Political Evidence . ...102 11. The Architectural Evidence . 111 12. The Ecclesiastical Evidence . 129 13. The Historical Evidence (1) . 138 14. The Historical Evidence (2) . 149 15. Objections to the Early Date. 167 Conclusion. ...182 Scripture Index . ...189 General Index . ...197 vii PUBLISHER’S PREFACE by Gary North 1 will raise than up a Pro@et j?om among tlwir brethren, like unto .&e, and r.oillput my wor~ in hk mouth; and he shall speak unto them all that I shall command him. And it shall cow to jxzss, that whosoever will not hearken unto my words which b shall speak in my name, I will require it of him. But tlu prophet, which shall presun-u to speak a word in my WMW, which I have not commanded him to speak, or that shall speak in the nanw of otha gook, euen that proplut shall die. And #thou say in thirw heart, How shall we know the word which ttk LORD bath not spoken? W7WYZ a prophd speaketh in the na~ of the LORD, z~th thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the LORD kath not spoken, but the prophet bath spoken it @sumptu- ous~: thou shalt not be afraid of him (Deut. 18:18-22). “Oh, boy! A new book on Bible prophecy!” It certainly is. But it is not a book about the future. It does not make any predictions. It is not about Christian eschatology “the doctrine of last things.” This statement may initially confuse people. How can a book be about Bible prophecy but not be about eschatology? Easy. For example, a book on the subject of Old Testament prophecies regarding the coming ofJesus the Messiah can certainly be about prophecy yet not be about eschatology. “Yes, yes,” you may be thinking, “but what about a book on New Testament prophecy? Surely it has to be about the fiture. There was nothing of pro- phetic significance that took place in between the New Testament authors and today.” But there was: tfu fall ofJerusalem to tk Roman army in A.D, 70. That historic event was clearly prophesied by Jesus ix x 2%4 Beast ofl?evelatwn (Luke 21:20-24), yet it took place long ago. It took place after the New Testament writings were finished but long before you or I appeared on the :;cene. The fact is, tile vast majority of prophecies in the New Testa- ment refer to this crucial event, the event which publicly identified the transition fro m the O1d Covenant to the New Covenant, and which also marked the triumph of rabbinic Judaism over priestly Judaism, Pharisee over Sadducee,] and the synagogue system over the temple. So cmtral was the destruction of the temple to the future of both Christianity and Judaism that Jesus linked it sym- bolically to His dt;ath and resurrection: Then answe]ed the Jews and said unto him, What sign shewest thou unto us, seeing that thou doest these things? Jesus answered and said unto them, Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up. Ther said the Jews, Forty and six years was this temple in building, and wilt thou rear it up in three days? But he spake of the temple of his body (John 2: 18-21). Dating The Book of Revelation “But,” you may be thinking to yoursel~ “John wrote the Book of Revelation (ths Apocalypse) in A.D. 96. Everyone agrees on 1. The Sadducee sect ofJudaism disappeared, since it had been associated with the priests who oilicia .ed at the temple. Herbert Danby, whose English translation of the Mishnah is still considered authoritative by the scholarly world, both Jew and gentile, commented on the undisputed triumph of Phansaism after the fall ofJerusa- Iem (which lives on as Orthodox Judaism). “Until the destruction of the Second Temple in A.D. 70 they had counted as one only among the schools of thought which played a part in Jewist national and religious lif~ after the Destruction they took the position, naturally and almost immediately, of sole and undisputed leaders of such Jewish life as survived. Judaism aa it has continued since is, if not their creation, at least a faith and a reli #ous institution largely of their fmhionin~ and the Mishnah is the authoritative record of their labour. Thus it comes about that while Judaism and Christianity alike venerate the Old Testament as canonical Scripture, the Mishnah marks the passage to J ~daism as definitely as the New Testament marks the paasage to Christianity.” Herb wt Danby, “Introduction,” 7%z Miduurh (New York: Otiord University Press, [1933] 1987), p. xiii. The Mkhnah is the written version of the Jews’ oral tradition, while the rabbis’ comments on it are called Gemara. The Talmud contains both Mishna h and Gemara. See also R. Travers Herford, 7?u Phurisea (Londorx Geo~e Allen & Unwin, 1924). Publtihd Preface xi this. Thus, John could not have been prophesying events associ- ated with the fall of Jerusalem, an event that had taken place a quarter of a century earlier.” This is the argument of Dallas Theological Seminary professor Wayne House and Pastor Tommy Ice in their theologically creative but highly precarious revision of traditional dispensationalism.2 It is also the intellectual strategy taken by best-selling dispensational author Dave Hunt, who writes in his recent defense of Christian cultural surrender to humanism that “the Book of Revelation was written at least 20 years after A.D. 70, most likely about A.D. 96. This one fact destroys this entire theory” about the fall of Jerusalem being the prophesied event that many today call the Great Tnbulation.3 But like so much of what Dave Hunt has written,4 this “fact” is not a fact. John did not write the Book of Revelation in A.D. 96. When did John write the Book of Revelation? This technical academic question must be answered accurately if we are ever to make sense of New Testament prophecy. Establishing the date of John’s Ap oca 1ypse and the events that followed within a few months of this revelation is what The Beast of Reuelatwn is all about, as is Dr. Gentry’s larger and far more detailed study, Be&e Jerusalem Fell: Bating the Book ofllevelation (Institute for Christian Economics, 1989). If his thesis is correct, then the “last days” are not ahead of us; they are long behind us. And if the “last days” are behind us, then all “futurism” – dispensationalism, most contem- porary non-dispensational premillennialism, and the more popular forms of amillennialism — is dead wrong. Anyone who says that “dark days are ahead of the church because the Man of Sin is surely coming” is a futurists Thus, this book is not simply an 2. H. Wayne House and Thomas D. 1.., Dominion lleologx Curse or Blessing? (Portland, Oregom Multnomah, 1988), pp. 249-60. 3. Dave Hunt, Whatevsr Hap@ted to Heawm? (Eugene, Oregon Harvest House, 1988), p.