Revelation 12:4

The symbolism is a reminiscence of an ætiological myth in astrology (cf. the cauda of the constellation Scorpio) and of the primitive view which regarded the dark cloud as a snake enfolding the luminaries of heaven in its hostile coils (Job 3:8; Job 26:13, with A. B. Davidson's notes). Thus the Iranians (S. B. E. iv. p. lxxiii., Darmesteter) described the fiend as a serpent or dragon not on the score of craftiness but “because the storm fiend envelops the goddess of light with the coils of the cloud as with a snake's fold”. The same play of imagination would interpret eclipses and falling stars, and, when the pious were compared to stars (as in Egyptian theology, Plut. de Iside, 21), it was but a step to the idea of Daniel 8. (cf. Sib. Or. ver. 512 f., the battle of the stars), where Antiochus Epiphanes does violence to some devout Israelites who are characterised as stars flung rudely down to earth (i.e., martyred, 1 Maccabees 1.) Originally, this description of the dragon lashing his tail angrily and sweeping down a third of the stars probably referred to the seduction of angels from their heavenly rank (so 8 9) to serve his will (Weiss). But John, in recasting the tradition, may have thought of the Danielic application, i.e., of the devil succeeding in crushing by martyrdom a certain number of God's people. In this event, they would include at least, if they are not to be identified with, the pre-Christian martyrs of Judaism (cf. Hebrews 11:32 f. Matthew 23:35). ἕστηκεν, a conventional posture of the ancient dragon cf. e.g., Pliny, H. N. viii. 3, “nec flexu multiplici ut reliquae serpentes corpus impellit, sed celsus et erectus in medio incedens”; ibid. viii. 14, for serpents devouring children. The mother of Zoroaster had also a vision of wild beasts waiting to devour her child at its birth. This international myth of the divine child menaced at birth readily lent itself to moralisation, or afforded terms for historical applications, e.g., the abortive attack on Moses, the prototype of messiah (Baldensperger, 141, 142) at his birth (Acts 7:20 f.) and the vain efforts of Herod against the messiah. The animosity of Pytho for Leto was due to a prophecy that the latter's son would vanquish him.