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Echoes of Revelation
Revelation never quotes the Old Testament outright, yet no New Testament book refers to it more. See both texts side by side, why they don’t match, and what John does with them.
Revelation 19:20, thrown alive into the lake of fire
The beast thrown into the burning lake of fire recalls Daniel 7:11, where the beast is slain and given to the burning fire, beside the river of fire before God's throne.
Revelation 19:20; Revelation 20:10; Revelation 20:14, in every translation this tool compares.
A sequel that ends with the villain falling into the same fire as the first story makes the link plain. In Daniel 7 the fourth beast is killed and its body handed over to be burned. A river of fire flows from God's throne. John's beast and false prophet are seized and hurled, still living, into a burning lake of sulfur. Daniel's beast meets its end again.
The beast (therion) given over to fire. The Greek of Daniel 7:11 has the beast destroyed and given eis kausin pyros, to the burning of fire. John has the beast thrown eis ten limnen tou pyros tes kaiomenes, into the lake of fire that burns. Daniel 7:10 has a river of fire before the throne.
Daniel's beast is killed first, then burned. John's beast is thrown in alive, with the false prophet. Daniel has a river of fire; John has a lake. John adds sulfur. Beale says John reads Daniel's brief burning in the light of the endless punishment of 14:10-11 and 20:10.
The beast of Daniel stood for kingdoms that crushed God's people. Its end is now carried out on the beast of Revelation. The devil follows in 20:10, and death and Hades in 20:14. Beale notes that the throne and the opened books of 20:11-12, also from Daniel 7, sit right beside that lake.
Not Daniel's scene retold word for word. In Daniel the beast is slain and its body burned. John has the beast and its false prophet thrown, still living, into the burning lake.
Beale says John highlights an allusion to Ezekiel 38 and especially Daniel 7:11, perhaps with Daniel 7:9-10. He suggests the lake that burns joins the beast's burning in Daniel 7:11 with the river of fire before the throne. A Greek variant of Daniel 7:9-10, a burning fire, a river of fire, may have helped. So may the burning furnace phrases of Daniel 3. The vault's Daniel (Theodotion) has 7:11 edothe eis kausin pyros. The NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible says in Daniel 7:11 the beast was slain and thrown into fire, and the NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible and Keener cite Daniel 7:11. Keener adds Isaiah 30:33. On 20:14 the NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible notes that a lake usually holds water, and points again to the river of fire from God's throne; the Aramaic of Daniel 7:10 is nehar di nur, a river of fire. The grade is drawn here: the beast handed to fire is traceable to Daniel 7, though the lake is new.
Heiser does not discuss Daniel 7 at this verse. In the Revelation 20 lecture he reports Justin Bass's suggestion that the lake of fire may be the river of fire of Daniel 7:9-10, where the beast is judged. Heiser treats this as a suggestion.
Beale reads the pair as all who play the part of beast and false prophet at the end. MacArthur reads the beast as the Antichrist and the false prophet as his religious partner, thrown in alive with changed bodies; since they are still there in 20:10, he says, annihilation is ruled out. Beale and the study Bibles read the lake as endless conscious punishment, citing 20:10. Heiser keeps open whether the second death means final destruction or endless torment. Wright hears the fate of Sodom and Gomorrah in the burning sulfur.
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- G. K. Beale, The Book of Revelation (New International Greek Testament Commentary), comment on 19:20
- NIV Cultural Backgrounds Study Bible, notes on Revelation 19:20 and 20:14
- NIV Biblical Theology Study Bible, note on Revelation 19:20
- Craig S. Keener, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, on Revelation 19:20-21
- N. T. Wright, Revelation for Everyone, comment on Revelation 19:11-21
- Septuagint, Daniel 7:10-11, Interlinear Greek-English Septuagint
- Aramaic text of Daniel 7:10, Miqra according to the Masorah (Sefaria)
- SBL Greek New Testament (MorphGNT), Revelation 19:20, 20:10 and 20:14
- Michael S. Heiser, Revelation 20: Satan's Final Defeat and the Great White Throne Judgment, video lecture (Naked Bible Revelation series)
- John MacArthur, The MacArthur Study Bible (ESV), note on Revelation 19:20
