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“Then I saw a beast rising out of the sea. It had ten horns and seven heads; on the horns were ten diadems, and on each head was a blasphemous name” (Revelation 13:1). The Book of Revelation is full of alarming creatures that appeared to the author, John, in a vision during his exile on the Aegean island of Patmos. Particularly iconic is the seven-headed beast that aids Satan in his end-time bid for domination of the earth.

The beast, as depicted here in a 1393 fresco by the Florentine painter Giusto de Menabuoi, “resembled a leopard, but its feet were like a bear’s and its mouth like a lion’s” (Revelation 13:2). With its profusion of heads and horns, it resembles Satan himself—who appeared in the previous chapter as a seven-headed, ten-horned dragon menacing the infant Jesus and his mother. Yet despite their family resemblance, the beast from the sea is not the devil but the devil’s appointed earthly authority: “The whole world went after the beast in wondering admiration, and worshiped the dragon [Satan] because he had conferred his authority on the beast” (Revelation 13:3–4).