And when they shall have finished their testimony,.... For Christ, his truths and ordinances; when they are about to finish it, and almost concluded it, even towards the close of the 1260 days or years, in which they must prophesy in sackcloth: or else their testimony and their prophesying may be considered as two distinct things, and the one be finished before the other; their open public testimony, as witnesses, so as to be heard, attended to, and received, will be finished before the last war of the beast against them, in which they will be killed; but their prophesying will continue to the end of the beast's reign, these two being contemporary, of equal date, beginning and ending together; for they will prophesy when they are dead; being dead they will yet speak, and their very death will be a prophesying or foretelling that the ruin of antichrist is at hand; and upon their resurrection and ascension, that will immediately come on. But when their testimony is finished, by a free and open publication of the Gospel,

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The beast (θηρίον)

Wild beast. See on Revelation 4:6. A different word from that wrongly translated beast, Revelation 4:6, Revelation 4:7; Revelation 5:6, etc. Compare Revelation 13:1; Revelation 17:8, and see Daniel 7.

Bottomless pit (ἀβύσσου)

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And when they shall have finished their testimony - Prof. Stuart renders this, "And whenever they shall have finished their testimony." The reference is undoubtedly to a period when they should have faithfully borne the testimony which they were appointed to bear. The word rendered here "shall have finished" - τελέσωσιν telesōsin, from τελέω teleō means properly to end, to finish, to complete, to accomplish. It is used, in this respect, in two senses - either in regard to time or in regard to the end or object in view, in the sense of "perfecting it," or "accomplishing it." In the former sense it is employed in such passages as the following: "Till the thousand years should be fulfilled," Revelation 20:3. "Ye shall not have gone over the cities of Israel (Greek, ye shall not have finished the cities of Israel) until the Son of man be come," Matthew 10:23; that is, ye shall not have finished passing through them. "When Jesus had made an end (Greek, finished) of commanding his twelve disciples," Matthew 11:1. "I have "finished" my course," 2 Timothy 4:7.

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The beast that ascended out of the bottomless pit - This may be what is called antichrist; some power that is opposed to genuine Christianity. But what or whence, except from the bottomless pit, i.e., under the influence and appointment of the devil, we cannot tell; nor do we know by what name this power or being should be called. The conjectures concerning the two witnesses and the beast have been sufficiently multiplied. If the whole passage, as some think, refer to the persecution raised by the Jews against the Christians, then some Jewish power or person is the beast from the bottomless pit. If it refer to the early ages of Christianity, then the beast may be one of the persecuting heathen emperors. If it refer to a later age of Christianity, then the beast may be the papal power, and the Albigenses and Waldenses the two witnesses, which were nearly extinguished by the horrible persecutions raised up against them by the Church of Rome. Whatever may be here intended, the earth has not yet covered their blood.

{10} And when they shall have {c} finished their testimony, {11} the beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit shall make war against them, and shall {12} overcome them, and kill them.

(10) That is, when they have spent those 1260 years mentioned in Re 11:2,3 in publishing their testimony according to their office.

(c) When they have done their message.

(11) Of which after Chapter 13, that beast is the Roman Empire, made long ago of civil, ecclesiastical: the chief head of which was then Boniface the eighth, as I said before: who lifted up himself in so great arrogancy, (says the author of Falsciculus temporum) that he called himself, Lord of the whole world, as well in temporal causes, as in spiritual: There is a document of that matter, written by the same Boniface most arrogantly, shall I say, or most wickedly, Ca. unam sanctam, extra de majoritate & obedientia. In the sixth of the Decretals

(which is from the same author) many things are found of the same argument.

(12) He shall persecute most cruelly the holy men, and put them to death, and shall wound and pierce through with cursings, both their names and writings. That this was done to very many godly men, by Boniface and others, the histories do declare, especially since the time that the odious and condemned name amongst the multitude, first of the brethren Waldonenses or Lugdunenses, then also of the Fraticels, was pretended, that good men might with more approbation be massacred.

11:7 When they shall have finished their testimony. The thought is, When they shall have made their testimony complete.

The beast that ascendeth out of the bottomless pit. The coming up of the beast out of the abyss is named here, in Re 13:1 17:03 The powers that come from the abyss are satanic. Compare Re 9:2 9:11 The beast, therefore, represents some devilish power or influence. The Greek word therion, rendered beast here, in Re 13:1 17:03 denotes a savage wild beast of prey. The beast from the abyss should be distinguished from the beast coming up out of the sea (Re 13:1), and from the beast coming up out of the earth (Re 13:11). They are all malign powers, but the power of evil manifested in different forms.

Shall... kill them. Whatever the beast represents, that power shall assail the witnesses, and shall slay them for a time.

11:7 And when they shall have finished their testimony - Till then they are invincible. The wild beast - Hereafter to be described. That ascendeth - First out of the sea, Rev 13:1, and then out of the bottomless pit, Rev 17:8. Shall make war with them - It is at his last ascent, not out of the sea, but the bottomless pit, that the beast makes war upon the two witnesses. And even hereby is fixed the time of treading the holy city, and of the two witnesses. That time ends after the ascent of the beast out of the abyss, and yet before the fulfilling of the mystery. And shall conquer them - The fire no longer proceeding out of their mouth when they have finished their work. And kill them - These will be among the last martyrs, though not the last of all.

7. finished their testimony-The same verb is used of Paul's ending his ministry by a violent death.

the beast that ascended out of the bottomless pit-Greek, "the wild beast … the abyss." This beast was not mentioned before, yet he is introduced as "the beast," because he had already been described by Daniel (Da 7:3, 11), and he is fully so in the subsequent part of the Apocalypse, namely, Re 13:1; 17:8. Thus, John at once appropriates the Old Testament prophecies; and also, viewing his whole subject at a glance, mentions as familiar things (though not yet so to the reader) objects to be described hereafter by himself. It is a proof of the unity that pervades all Scripture.

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