Revelation 13:11-18

New Testament for Everyone

A second monster

¹¹ Then I saw another monster coming up from the earth. It had two horns like those of a lamb, and it spoke like a dragon. ¹² It acts in the presence of the first monster and with its full authority, and it makes the earth and those who live on it worship the first monster, whose fatal wound had been healed. ¹³ It performs great signs, so that it even makes fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of people, ¹⁴ and it deceives the people who live on earth by the signs which it has been allowed to perform in front of the monster, instructing the earth’s inhabitants to make an image of the monster who had the sword-wound but was alive. ¹⁵ It was allowed to give breath to the monster’s image, so that the monster’s image could speak, and it could kill anyone who didn’t worship the monster’s image. ¹⁶ It makes everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slaves, receive a sign from it, marked on their right hands and on their foreheads, ¹⁷ so that nobody can buy or sell unless they have the mark of the name of the monster or the number of its name.

¹⁸ This calls for wisdom. Anyone with a good head on their shoulders should work out the monster’s number, because it’s the number of a human being. Its number is Six Hundred and Sixty-Six.