Translation
In the spirit he carried me away into the desert, then I saw a woman
sitting
Go to footnote numberon a scarlet beast
Go to footnote numberwhich was full of blasphemous names,
it had seven heads
and ten horns.
Paraphrase
In the spirit he carried me away to the place of hardship and death,
then I saw a woman who had control over
a terrible thing that showed evidence of having shed the blood of many people; it had no reverence for God, but had a reputation for mocking God at every opportunity; it also
had all the decision-making power to do whatever it wanted to do and all the legal authority to quell any opposition.
Footnotes
1: “sitting on”
Usually this would mean that she is in control of the beast of burden that bears her and takes her where she wants to go. This verse and also verses 7 and 8 give us some hints that this beast is very powerful and might be the one in control, not the woman, however, at the end of verse 8 we see that she has much control also. The text does not actually say who is in control of whom, the woman or the beast, but it is clear that both have power and both use their power to exercise control over whatever they can dominate.
2
Scarlet was often seen as the color of blood, and blood was the taking of life. The fact that this beast was the color of scarlet means that it was covered in blood, i.e. had taken many lives.