Revelation 17:11

‘And the beast that was and is not, is himself also an eighth and is of the seven and goes into perdition.'

But the Beast who arises is the eighth (not the same Beast as chapter 13, for he came out of the sea while this one is to come out of the abyss, which in Revelation is the prison of spirit beings - Revelation 9:1; Revelation 9:9). We have seen that this beast is ‘of the red monster', the embodiment of Satan's forces. Thus he will come as an eighth when the time comes, in a time beyond the sequence of emperors, yet he will be of the seven for he will reign over the kings of the earth and will seek worship and adoration for Satan as they do, (indeed it is possible he may even claim to stand in the place of Roman emperors, but this is not essential. We are here dealing with symbolism). So John clearly sees ahead one who will not be a Roman emperor like the others (he is not one of the seven) and yet will have the same power and proclivities. He is ‘of the seven'. That this is towards the end of time is suggested by the fact that he then goes into ‘destruction' (perdition). Compare here Revelation 19:19. So this is John's way of moving from a recognised empire to the end time empire.

It is a favourite position with commentators to argue that ‘of the seven' means that he is a reincarnation of a previous emperor. But this is to be over-literalistic. As with the Elijah who was coming, whom Jesus confirmed as John the Baptiser (Matthew 11:14; Matthew 17:12), what is required is someone who will behave in a similar way and have similar attributes, someone who will be the ‘reincarnation' of the whole empirate. But just as some will demand a literal Elijah in spite of our Lord's words, for they will not receive Christ's own words, so others will demand a literal Roman emperor.