Journal: Tyndale Bulletin
Volume: TYNBUL 42:1 (NA 1991)
Article: The Mark Of The Beast, Revelation 13:16
Author: Edwin A. Judge

TynBul 42:1 (1991) p. 158

The Mark Of The Beast, Revelation 13:16

Edwin A. Judge

The mark on the right hand (=wrist?) or the forehead gives one admission to the market (Rev. 13:16). Is this an imaginary scene symbolic of something else, or can one envisagean actual practice of market control based on marks?

A symbolic meaning is not hard to find. The redeemed are sealed upon their foreheads (Rev. 7:3). Those who conquered at Pergamum were promised a white stone with a new name on it (Rev. 2:17). The devotee of Asclepius, Aelius Aristides, seems to have worn a secret symbol of his god, to which he attributed his rhetorical success, and had received a new name.1 Revelation repeatedly refers to the name of God written on the forehead of believers (3:12, 14:1, 22:4).

This may reflect the golden rosette fixed to Aaron's turban (Ex. 28:36-38) engraved 'Holy to the Lord'. Every Israelite could claim to 'bear God's name' (Dn. 9:19, cf. Nu. 6:3, Dt. 28:10, Is. 43:7; 63:8, and Jas 2:7). In Ezekiel 9:2-4 man clothed in linen puts a mark with ink on the foreheads of those who are to be spared. As for the combination of hand and forehead, one may compare the literal binding on of the law (Ex. 13:9, Dt. 6:8, Mt. 23:5). The mark of the beast may therefore be conceived simply as the visionary counterpart to this tradition of a public sign of commitment to God.

But the visions of Revelation keep disconcertingly coming down to earth. The woman clothed with the sun and the great red dragon are both explicitly 'in heaven' (12:1, 3). But their struggle soon ends up on earth (12:16), and the beast's arrival by sea is viewed from the beach (12:17, 13:1). The second beast deputizes for the first, and imposes his cult on people (