In Christian Eschatology, there is a guy who will rise on the scene and become the ruler over nations, ruling with an iron fist and turns his wrath on all Christians and Jews. This individual is identified as "The Anti-Christ" or "The Beast". The Beast is said to make war against the Lamb in the book of Revelation, with his end being destruction by the Lamb. The Lamb, of course being Yeshua. it is my goal to show that the identity of the Beast ultimately being the State. It is the State who alone has historically, and presently, passes laws prohibiting certain religious actions and even monetary transactions. It is the State that yields the power of death and have gotten away with their murders. No matter which state we are dealing with. Revelation isn't the only place where God takes issue with this beast. In Isaiah 46:10 God said that he has declared the end out of the beginning.
But before we go to the beginning, We should first take a look at a particular passage which helps us identify the beast.
Rev 13:16 And he requires everyone--small and great, rich and poor, free and slave--to be given a mark on his right hand or on his forehead,
Rev 13:17 so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark: the beast's name or the number of his name.
Rev 13:18 Here is wisdom: The one who has understanding must calculate the number of the beast, because it is the number of a man. His number is 666. (HCSB)
Much has been written concerning this mark, but I'll just note, that the command is to count, or to calculate the number (arithmos) of the beast, and it give us the sum to be arrived at, which sum is 666. We are also told that this arithmos is also referred to as "the number of his name". This tells us that the Identification of the beast is in the use of Gematria and adding up the value of the guy's name. it happens to turn out that the Emperor at the time of the writing of Revelation was the man by the name of Nero Cesar. His name in Hebrew (קסר נרון) is 666. The phrase "Roman Cesar" in Hebrew also is 666, which means that it really doesn't matter who the individual person is, as long as they wer the head of the Roman government (Ceasar), then that individual would be The Beast.
If it is true that the End has indeed been declared from the beginning, then there should be a guy in the beginning of the book with the same number. In other words, the Beast should have been alive then, as well as in the end.
According to Genesis, a period of time after the Flood of Noah, his great grandson rose to power and established an kingdom in the Land of Shinar. "Cush fathered Nimrod, who was the first powerful man on earth. He was a powerful hunter in the sight of the Lord. That is why it is said, "Like Nimrod, a powerful hunter in the sight of the Lord." His kingdom started with Babylon, Erech, Accad, and Calneh, in the land of Shinar. From that land he went to Assyria and built Nineveh, Rehoboth-ir, Calah, and Resen, between Nineveh and the great city Calah." --Gen 10:8-12 csb
According Jewish tradition, Nimrod became so powerful than the kings of the earth recognized and submitted to his rule, and that he was the one that led humanity into an act of defiance against God by setting down in one place and building a city, namely Babel and conspired to make a tower that reached the sky, so as to make a name for themselves. Jewish tradition also states that Nimrod declared himself as a god and demanded to be worshiped, a character that Paul in 2nd Thessalonians states the Man of Sin does as well. Like the End time Beast, Nimrod's kingdom came to an end with the direct intervention by the Divine.
"Then the Lord came down to look over the city and the tower that the men were building. The Lord said, "If, as one people all having the same language, they have begun to do this, then nothing they plan to do will be impossible for them. Come, let Us go down there and confuse their language so that they will not understand one another's speech." So the Lord scattered them from there over the face of the whole earth, and they stopped building the city. Therefore its name is called Babylon, for there the Lord confused the language of the whole earth, and from there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth." -- Gen 11:5-9 csb
The title "Nimrod son of Cush" in hebrew (נמרד בן כש) total the number 666, God's first act of judgement following the flood, was a judgement against the establishment of a Nation State and one guy's attempt to rule his fellow man, and in the end, his last judgement will be one upon a Tyrannical Empire seeking to rule over the men of the earth. In Daniel Chapter 7 and in 1 Corinthians 15, the coming of the Messiah marks the abolition of all human rule, their subjection to the dominion of the Messiah, and then ultimately, the Messiah giving up his dominion over to God, where "God will be all in all".
The theme of the Biblical Tradition really the Divine warring against human attempts to rule their fellow man. In short, the Eschatology of the Bible, is an Anarchist Eschatology.