Revelation Now :
Daily Devotional Bible Studies in Revelation
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The Saints Give Testimony to Jesus : Day 61 
I saw that the woman was drunk with the blood of the saints, the blood of those who bore testimony to Jesus. When I saw her, I was greatly astonished. Then the angel said to me: "Why are you astonished? I will explain to you the mystery of the woman and of the beast she rides, which has the seven heads and ten horns. The beast, which you saw, once was, now is not, and will come up out of the Abyss and go to his destruction. The inhabitants of the earth whose names have not been written in the book of life from the creation of the world will be astonished when they see the beast, because he once was, now is not, and yet will come. (Revelation 17:6-8)
Roman Persecution of the Saints
The way in which John describes Roman persecution is very significant. He says that Rome is "drunk with the blood of the saints" and the martyrs. The implication is that Rome did not simply persecute the Christians as a legal necessity but took delight in hounding Christians to death. This is a reference to the persecution of the Christians in the Roman Empire. But it does more than simply stamp Rome as the great persecutor. She is glutted with slaughter; and she has revelled in that slaughter as a drunken man revels in wine.
Nero's persecution
No doubt John is thinking of the persecution which took place under Nero. The Neronic persecution sprang from the great fire in A.D. 64 which burned for a week and devastated Rome. The people of Rome were convinced that the fire was no accident; they were also convinced that those who tried to extinguish it were hindered and that when it died down, it was deliberately rekindled; and they were also convinced that the instigator of the fire was Nero. Nero had a passion for building, and the people believed that he had deliberately burned down the city of Rome in order to rebuild it.
Scapegoat
Nero had to find a scapegoat to divert suspicion from himself, and so he fixed on the Christians. This was the first great persecution and in many ways the most savage of all.
Nero Blames the Christians
"All human efforts, all the lavish gifts of the emperor (Nero), and the propitiations of the gods, did not banish the sinister belief that the conflagration was the result of an order. Consequently to get rid of the report, Nero fastened the guilt and inflicted the most exquisite tortures on a class hated for their abominations, called Christians by the populace. Christus, from whom the name had its origin, suffered the extreme penalty during the reign of Tiberius, at the hands of one of our procurators, Pontius Pilatus, and a most mischievous superstition, thus checked for the moment, again broke out not only in Judaea, the first source of the evil, but even in Rome, where all things hideous and shameful from every part of the world find their centre and become popular."(1):
"Accordingly, an arrest was first made of all who pleaded guilty; then, upon their information, an immense multitude was convicted, not so much of the crime of firing the city, as of hatred of mankind. Mockery of every sort was added to their deaths. Covered with the skins of beasts, they were torn by dogs, and perished, or were nailed to crosses, or were doomed to the flames and burned, to serve as a nightly illumination when daylight had expired. . . . Even for criminals who deserved extreme and exemplary punishment, there arose a feeling of compassion, for it was not, as it seemed for the public good, but to glut one man's cruelty that they were being destroyed." (2)
Tacitus's description is one of the few passages in pagan literature where the name of Christ occurs
Words to meditate on
Could you give your life for Jesus?
Words to pray
"For all the saints who from their labours rest
Do Thee, by faith, before the world confessed
Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blessed. Alleluia."(3)
Notes
(1) Tacitus: Annals 15:44 (2) Tacitus: Annals 15:44 (3)
"The revelation of Jesus Christ, which God gave him to show his servants what must soon take place."
