Revelation12chapter 12

A woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, twelve stars on her head, in labor — and a great red dragon waiting to devour her child the moment it is born.

Readers in Asia Minor had a story shaped like this one already. In the widely known Greek myth, a pregnant goddess is pursued by a great serpent, escapes to an island, and her son grows up to kill it. Cities in Asia told versions of it, and Roman propaganda liked to cast the emperor as the divine child who brings in a golden age. John's readers would have recognized the shape and heard it corrected: the true child is the one who was born, snatched up to God, and will rule the nations.

The dragon is identified in plain words — the old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, who deceives the whole world. He is thrown down and loses his place as accuser, and the response in heaven says how he was beaten: by the blood of the Lamb, by the word of their testimony, and because they loved not their lives unto the death.

Then, cast down, he goes after the woman, and when she is protected he goes to make war with "the remnant of her seed" — those who keep God's commandments and hold the testimony of Jesus. That is the congregation reading the letter.

The chapter ends with the dragon standing on the sand of the sea, which is where the next chapter begins.