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There are two beasts and one dragon in the Book of Revelations, aka the Apocalypse. Dürer depicts the two beasts of the Apocalypse in the same print. The first Beast, mentioned in Rev 11:7, comes out of the sea, out of the “abyss.” In Rev 13:1-10, we find out what the first beast looks like. It has the appearance of a leopard, the mouth of a lion and feet are like bear paws. This description was co-opted from the Hebrew Book of Daniel, where four beasts come out of the sea in the forms of a lion, bear, leopard and a beast with ten horns, so essentially the origin of this dragon beast concept is Jewish. The first beast has seven heads with blasphemous names written on them and ten horns, each having a crown. One of the heads of the beast appears to have a fatal wound but the wound is healed causing people to wonder and follow the beast. In Revelation chapter seventeen we learn that the beast is scarlet in color. The seven heads of the Beast represent both seven mountains and seven kings, and the ten horns are ten kings who have not yet received kingdoms. Of the seven kings we are told that five have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come. We are also told that the beast itself is an eighth king who belongs to the seven but is going to his destruction. We are also told that this beast “once was, now is not, and yet will come. THE SECOND BEAST The second beast is primarily described in Revelation chapter thirteen. This second beast comes out of the earth, whose overall appearance is not described, other than having two horns like that of a lamb and speaking like a dragon. His purpose is to promote the authority of the first beast with the ability of performing great signs, even making fire come down out of heaven. This second beast is also called the false prophet. He speaks like a dragon commanding the people of the Earth to make an image of the beast from the sea and to worship him. It is declared that anyone who does not worship the Beast or its image would be killed, even beheaded. The lamb-horned beast from the earth also ensures that everyone under this power bears the mark of the Beast on either the right hand or forehead. THE MARK OF THE BEAST- 666 The name of the second beast is never revealed, however scholars derived a numerical value for the beast, that being 666, although it can also be derived as 616. This is where the whole myth that the sign of the Beast was 666 derives. If you’d like to know more about what is really said about the mark of the beast see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_the_Beast THE BEAST WITH TWO HORNS Let’s take a really close look at how Dürer depicted this Beast with Two Horns. The Beast with Two Horns like a Lamb, The Beast of the Earth, the Beast who had a Mark In previous versions of bible that had been printed in Germany, the beast with two horns was depicted as “a sitting ewe,” (Quentelle Bible Apocalypse) or a winged dragon (Bamberg Apocalypse and Gruninger Bible). Dürer’s beast with two horns is clearly a lion with horns. MORE THAN TWO HORNS? But does Dürer’s beastly lion with the horns of a lamb have only two horns? Maybe, maybe not. If one really studies how Dürer depicted the lamb horns on this lion, what one finds is that Dürer is depicting FOUR HORNS, not two. What kind of sheep had four horns? A sheep known as a Jacob sheep. The most distinguishing features of the Jacob sheep are their four horns, although they may have as few as two or as many as six. The Jacob sheep is indeed a unique breed of antiquity. Slight of build, with the narrow, lean carcass typical of some of the ancient British breeds, they are immediately noticeable due to their black and white fleeces and prominent horns. Both males and females are horned, sporting two, four and occasionally six horns. Most striking to many people are four-horned rams with two vertical center horns as much as two feet long, and two side horns curling down along the side of the head. Two-horned rams develop the more familiar classic double curl. Horns on the ewe are always shorter and more delicate than the rams’ horns. WHO IS “JACOB”? So why might Dürer be depicting a “beast” with four horns known as a Jacob sheep? Could he be referring to someone by the name of Jacob in this image? And why did he specifically put this two or four horned image on the body of a lion? If we look very closely we can see that this Beast has a body of a lion emerging from the sea, even though the second beast is the Beast of the earth. Has anyone spotted the problem yet? Dürer has depicted the first beast, the one from the sea, as coming from the earth, and the second beast, which comes from the earth as coming from the sea. In other words, the beasts are BACKWARDS, staring at everyone in plain sight. Why did he depict the story backwards? The second beast is definitely a sea lion, a lion’s body coming from the sea. There was one very famous Patrician family in Nuremberg who had a coat of arms of the Sea Lion-the Imhofs. And guess who had a family member named Jacob? http://www.albrechtdurerblog.com/
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