Revelation Chapter 17 Verses 9-11

9 This calls for a mind with wisdom: the seven heads are seven mountains on which the woman is seated; 10 they are also seven kings, five of whom have fallen, one is, the other has not yet come, and when he comes he must remain only a little while. 11 As for the beast that was and is not, it is an eighth but it belongs to the seven, and it goes to perdition.

We have already discussed these verses at great length in our comments on Chapter 13. The five kings who have fallen are Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, and Nero. Galba, Otho, and Vitellius (who followed Nero and who all ruled and died within about one year) are ignored in Revelation (but not in Daniel, which describes them as three uprooted horns). The king “who is” is Vespasian, which means the book was written during his reign. The one who will come and reign only a short time is Titus who ruled for only 2 years. (And no one would have guessed that Titus would reign only a short time. He was only 39 when he became emperor, and the people all expected him to reign for a very long time. But God knew otherwise, and soon Titus’ younger brother, Domitian, was emperor in his place.) The eighth king is Domitian, who began where Nero left off with regard to persecuting the church.

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