Charles Ellicott Commentary Revelation 13:16-17

"And he causeth all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the free and the bond, that there be given them a mark on their right hand, or upon their forehead; and that no man should be able to buy or to sell, save he that hath the mark, [even] the name of the beast or the number of his name." — Revelation 13:16-17 (ASV)

And he causeth . . .—Better, And he [that is, probably, the second wild beast, and not the image, as in the latter clause of the last verse] makes all men, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the free and the slaves, that they should give them a mark upon their right hand or upon their forehead: (and) that no one should be able to buy or to sell but he who has the mark, the name of the wild beast, or the number of his name.

We have read of the sealing of the servants of God in their foreheads (Revelation 7:3); we will hear of it again (Revelation 22:4); the power of evil also has its mark or stamp. As slaves received a brand or mark in their flesh, signifying to whom they belonged, so in the spiritual conflict there is on the side of good and of evil a brand or mark. St. Paul spoke of such marks in his own body that proved him a slave of Jesus Christ (Galatians 6:17). In the same way the subtle false prophet, the abettor of world-power, seeks to impress a mark on all, on penalty of complete social exclusion.

It is utterly unnecessary to take this brand of evil literally, any more than we took the seal of Christ literally. That seal we understood as spiritual, in faith and character; this evil brand we must interpret in the same way. It surely means acquiescence in character and action to the principles of this tyrannical world-power: the right hand is the symbol of toil and social intercourse; the forehead is the symbol of character, as time is ever writing its awful tale upon men’s brows. There have been days when men’s faith has been read only too plainly by a hostile world, and when their simple trust in Christ caused Christians to be suspected, and when men cast out their name as evil, and when the mark of the beast was worn and gloried in everywhere.

We might cite from the history of the past countless such epochs. But are we sure that the days are gone? Are we sure that it is easy for simple, unaffected goodness and genuine faith to gain all it might gain? Are we sure that honesty, guilelessness, utter and strenuous truthfulness are not weighted in the race of life? The days of the future may bring more intense forms of this tyranny, as the days of the past have shown them; but the days of the present may provide us with illustrations of how readily men may lose, lose much and lose terribly, rather than succumb to fashions which violate honour and dishonour Christ. But we read of more than a mark here: we read of a “name,” and the “number of a name.” What are we to understand by these?