It should be noted that John cannot
have thought Daniel 7:14 fulfilled in the redemption of people from all nations
in the church (5:9), for in his exegesis of Daniel these are ‘the holy ones’
whom the horn (Revelation’s beast) fights and conquers (Daniel 7:21, to which
Revelation 13:7a alludes), while still ruling the nations (13:7b). This persecution
is that form which the people drawn from all nations emerge victorious in 7:9.
But reading Daniel 7:14 as John must have read it, we are led to expect
something more: the transfer of dominion over the nations themselves from the
beast to Jesus Christ (cf. perhaps also Isa 66:18: ‘I am coming to gather all nations
and languages.’ This verse is quoted in 2 Clem 17:4 in a way that assimilates
it to the Danielic threefold phrase for the nations: ‘Ερχομαι συναγγειν παντα τα εθνη, φυλας και γλωσσας). (Richard Bauckham, “The
Conversion of the Nations,” in The Climax of Prophecy: Studies in the Book
of Revelation [London: T&T Clark, 1993], 330)
