“Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.”
Revelation 13:18
I opened my blog yesterday morning to find that I’ve had 6666 visitors since May 2005. I had a sudden and frightening sense of hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia. But since the feeling is equated to the number 666, it soon passed, and I decided to look into the myth and superstition surrounding the ‘mark of the beast’.
In reality the number 666 never really referred to the Devil, but instead lends itself to other less sinister interpretations.
In Hebrew writings the number 666 refers to the Roman Emperor Nero, whose name written in Aramaic, was valued at 666, using the Hebrew numerology of gematria, a manner of speaking against he emperor without Roman authorities knowing.
Old TestamentThe number 666 appears several times in the old testament, including in 1 Kings 10:14-22 as the number of talents of gold received by King Solomon in one year. “Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year was 666 talents of gold”.
Scholars such as Dr. Ellen Aitken, Dean of the Faculty of Religious studies at McGill University, have speculated that the reference to this passage was a way of speaking in code about then contemporary figures about whom it would have been politically dangerous to criticize openly.
InterpretationsOne interpretation is that 666 encodes the letters of someone’s name or title, identifying the Antichrist.
The German Protestant theologian Ethelbert Stauffer, arguing that gematria had been the most popular form of numerology not only among Jews but also in the Graeco-Roman world (Pergamon, Pompeii), conceived a Greek gematrical procedure to explain the number 666. Judging from the precise information that the Book of Revelation gives about the person behind the number 666, Stauffer concluded that the ‘Beast’ can in general only refer to a Roman Emperor and argued that this Emperor must be Domitian, because he had reigned during the proposed time of origin of the Apocalypse and supposedly was called ‘The Beast’ as a “secret derisive nickname” by Romans, Greek, Christians and Jews.
Some Protestant Bible commentators have equated the ‘Beast’ of Revelation chapter 13 with the Papacy. To this end, the letters of a title of the Pope, accepted as authentic from 18th – 16th century, Vicarius Filii Dei, are summed to total 666 in Roman numerals. The earliest extant record of a protestant writer on this subject is that of Professor Andreas Helwig in 1612 in his work Antichristus Romanus. The title was contained In the Donation of Constantine a forged document of Emperor Constantine the Great, by which large privileges and rich possessions were conferred on the pope and the Roman Church. Although occasionally found in Catholic publications as late as the 19th century, today the title is repudiated by the Vatican (Surprised?)
Mark of CommerceFuturist Christian eschatology typically holds that the “Mark of the Beast” is one way in which the Antichrist will exercise power over the Earth during the period of Tribulation, because of the prophetic statement in Revelation 13:16-17 that “the Beast” will require all people to receive the mark (“branded mark or character”) in their right hands or foreheads in order to buy or sell, making survival for those on the run much more difficult. A possible translation of the meaning of the number 666 may be: the number 666 will be the number that all currency will be based upon.
Some support the barcode theory through reference to the three elongated end and middle symbols found in some common barcode symbolisms; they appear identical to the symbol used to represent the number six on the right hand segment of a barcode – 666 is the template from which barcodes are read.
Alternatively, some who take a historical view of the Book of Revelation identify the “Mark of the Beast” with the stamped image of the emperor’s head on every coin of the Roman empire: the stamp on the hand or in the mind of all, without which no-one could buy or sell.
Other interpretations
Seventh-day Adventists believe that the “mark of the beast” (but not the number 666) refers to a future, universal, legally enforced Sunday-worship. “Those who reject God’s memorial of creatorship – the Bible Sabbath – choosing to worship and honour Sunday in the full knowledge that it is not God’s appointed day of worship, will receive the “mark of the beast”.
Iranaeus suggested that the number indicates that the beast is the sum of all apostasy committed over the course of six thousand years. Iranaeus also wrote that 666 refers to the name Lateinos: “Then also Lateinos has the number six hundred and sixty six; and it is a very probable solution, this being the name of the last kingdom of the four seen by Daniel. For the Latins are they who at present bear rule: “I will not, however, make boast over this coincidence”.
Robert Graves suggested that DCLXVI, 666 in Roman numerals, is an abbreviation for the Latin sentence “Domitianus Caeser Legatos Xti Violenter Interfecit”, or “ The Emperor Domitian violently killed the envoys of Christ”.
In Kabbalah (Jewish mysticism), the number 666 may be considered mystical and holy and may represent the physical universe.
Martin Luther wrote in a footnote to Rev 13:15-18: “Spirit means/ that it is active/ and not a dead image/ but that it has its rights and offices in its womb. There are six hundred and sixty six years. So long the earthy papacy remains”.
The number 666 is also believed to be symbolic, standing for imperfection. The number seven is interpreted as being a “perfect” or “complete” number based on the fact that it is used frequently in the Bible to signify completeness, for example Psalm 12:6 and the Genesis creation week. Just as six is one short of seven, imperfection is short of perfection, and hence six is interpreted as symbolizing imperfection. Six is repeated three times for emphasis, producing the number 666. (This is similar to Vines Expository Dictionary under “Sixty, Sixty fold,” which states: “The number is suggestive of the acme of the pride of fallen man, the fullest development of man under direct satanic control, and standing in contrast to ‘seven’ as the number of completeness and perfection.
In the writings of the Baha’I Faith, Abdul-Baha states that the numerical value given to the beast referred to the year 666A.D., when the Umayyad ruler Muawiyah I, who opposed the Imamate, arose.
The 6666 martyrs of the Theban Legion
The long-standing tradition of Christian hagiography regarding the Theban Legion – an entire Roman legion whose members had supposedly converted en masse to Christianity and were martyred together, in 286 – gives their number as precisely “six thousand six hundred and sixty six men”, which was not the normal number of soldiers in a Roman legion. This number is similar to the “Number of the Beast” though with an additional digit, but has precisely opposite connotations as the number of highly honoured and revered martyrs for the Christian cause.
And that folks is exactly what my 6666 visitors mean to this blog: Martyrs who suffered at the hands of the great Chihuahua, and who, hopefully will continue to place their needs beneath mine and continue to suffer towards the elusive 12121212 visits, long after my demise.
Title: The Martyrdom of Maurice and
the Theban Legion [c 1580-1582]
(Catholics say: Saint Maurice)
Artist: El Greco [Spanish, 1541-1614]
I raiseth my golden cup, (hic) to you all.
Cheers!
So far so good we still living today
