The Number of the Beast (Greek: Άριθμὸν τοῦ θηρίου, Arithmon tou Thēriou) is a term in the Book of Revelation, of the New Testament, that is associated with the first Beast of Revelation chapter 13, the Beast of the sea.[1] In most manuscripts of the New Testament and in English translations of the Bible, the number of the Beast is 666. In critical editions of the Greek text, such as the Novum Testamentum Graece, it is noted that 616 is a variant.[2]
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The Number of the Beast is described in the passage of Revelation 13:15–18 and the actual number is only mentioned once, in verse 18. In the Greek manuscripts, the number is rendered in Greek numerical form as χξϛʹ,[3] or sometimes literally as ἑξακόσιοι ἑξήκοντα ἕξ, hexakósioi hexēkonta héx, "six hundred and sixty-six".[4][5] There are several interpretations-translations for the meaning of the phrase "Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast" where the peculiar Greek word ψηφισάτω (psefisato) is used. Possible translations include not only "to count", "to reckon" but also "to vote" or "to decide".[6]
In the Textus Receptus, derived from Byzantine text-type manuscripts, the number 666 is represented by the final 3 letters χξς:
17καὶ ἵνα μή τις δύνηται ἀγοράσαι ἢ πωλῆσαι εἰ μὴ ὁ ἔχων τὸ χάραγμα, τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ θηρίου ἢ τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ. 18Ὧδε ἡ σοφία ἐστίν· ὁ ἔχων τὸν νοῦν ψηφισάτω τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ θηρίου· ἀριθμὸς γὰρ ἀνθρώπου ἐστί· καὶ ὁ ἀριθμὸς αὐτοῦ χξϛʹ.[7]
In the Novum Testamentum Graece, the number is represented by the final three words, ἑξακόσιοι ἑξήκοντα ἕξ, meaning "six hundred sixty-six":
17καὶ ἵνα μή τις δύνηται ἀγοράσαι ἢ πωλῆσαι εἰ μὴ ὁ ἔχων τὸ χάραγμα, τὸ ὄνομα τοῦ θηρίου ἢ τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ ὀνόματος αὐτοῦ. 18ὧδε ἡ σοφία ἐστίν· ὁ ἔχων νοῦν ψηφισάτω τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ θηρίου, ἀριθμὸς γὰρ ἀνθρώπου ἐστίν· καὶ ὁ ἀριθμὸς αὐτοῦ ἑξακόσιοι ἑξήκοντα ἕξ.[8]
In the Hebrew Bible, both 1 Kings 10:14 and 2 Chronicles 9:13 state that Solomon collected "six hundred threescore and six" talents of gold each year.[4]
Although Irenaeus (2nd century AD) affirmed the number to be 666 and reported several scribal errors of the number, there is still doubt by a minority of theologians about the original reading[10] because of the figure 616 being given in one of the best manuscripts: C (Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus, Paris), as well as by the Latin version of Tyconius (DCXVI, ed. Souter in the Journal of Theology, SE, April 1913), and by an ancient Armenian version (ed. Conybaere, 1907). Irenaeus knew about it [the 616 reading], but did not adopt it (Haer. v.30,3). However, Jerome had adopted it. (De Monogramm., ed. Dom G Morin in the Rev. Benedictine, 1903). "The number 666 has been substituted for 616 either by analogy with 888, the [Greek] number of Jesus (Deissmann), or because it is a triangular number, the sum of the first 36 numbers (1+2+3+4+5+6...+36 = 666)"[11] The NRSV translation for Rev 13:18 includes this translation note: "Other ancient authorities read six hundred and sixteen".
Around 2005, a fragment from Papyrus 115, taken from the Oxyrhynchus site, was discovered at the Oxford University’s Ashmolean Museum. It gave the beast’s number as 616. This fragment happens to be the oldest manuscript (about 1,700 years old) of Revelation 13 to date.[12][13]
Another manuscript attesting to 616, even before the P115 finding, is the later Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus (C, a palimpsest). This text has 616 written in full: ἑξακόσιοι δέκα ἕξ, hexakosioi deka hex (lit. "six hundred and sixteen").[14]
Papyrus 115 and Ephraemi Rescriptus has led some scholars to conclude that 616 is the original number of the beast.[15] If this variant is the original number of the Beast, it would be catastrophic to existing dispensational literature.[16] However, it cannot be proven that these scrolls actually contain the original text.
Interpreting the identity and the number of the Beast falls into three categories:[1]
Here is wisdom. Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666. (Rev.13:18-NKJV)
In Greek isopsephy and Hebrew gematria, every letter has a corresponding number. Summing these numbers gives a numeric value to a word or name. The use of isopsephy to calculate "the number of the beast" is used in many of the below interpretations.
Preterist theologians typically support the numerical interpretation that 666 is the equivalent of the name and title, Nero Caesar (Roman Emperor from 54-68).[17][18][19][20][21][22][23] Charagma is well attested to have been an imperial seal of the Roman Empire used on official documents during the 1st and 2nd centuries.[24] In the reign of Emperor Decius (249–251 AD), those who did not possess the certificate of sacrifice (libellus) to Caesar could not pursue trades, a prohibition that conceivably goes back to Nero, reminding one of Revelation 13:17.[25]
However, others believe the Book of Revelation was written after Nero committed suicide in AD 68. The Catholic Encyclopedia has noted that Revelation was "written during the latter part of the reign of the Roman Emperor Domitian, probably in A.D. 95 or 96".[26] Additional Protestant scholars are in agreement.[27][28] Because some believe Revelation 13 speaks of a future prophetic event, "All who dwell on the earth will worship him, whose names have not been written in the Book of Life of the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world." (Revelation 13:8 NKJV), some have argued that the interpretation of Nero meeting the fulfillment is an impossibility if Revelation was written around 30 years after the death of Nero.[29] [30] [31] However, rumors circulated that Nero had not really died and would return to power.[32] It has also been suggested that the numerical reference to Nero was a code to imply but not directly point out emperor Domitian,[33][34] whose style of rulership resembled that of Nero and who put the people of Asia (Lydia), whom the Book of Revelation was primarily addressed to at the time, under heavy taxation.[35]
An Aramaic scroll from Murabba'at, dated to "the second year of Emperor Nero", refers to him by his name and title.[36] In Greek it is Nrwn Qsr (Pronounced "Nerōn Kaisar"). In Latin it is Nro Qsr (Pronounced "Nerō Kaisar").
The Greek version of the name and title transliterates into Hebrew as נרונ קסר , and yields a numerical value of 666,[36] as shown:
| Resh (ר) | Samekh (ס) | Qoph (ק) | Nun (נ) | Vav (ו) | Resh (ר) | Nun (נ) | Sum |
| 200 | 60 | 100 | 50 | 6 | 200 | 50 | 666 |
The Latin version of the name drops the second Nun (נ), so that it appears as Nro and transliterates into Hebrew as נרו קסר , yielding 616:[17]
| Resh (ר) | Samekh (ס) | Qoph (ק) | Vav (ו) | Resh (ר) | Nun (נ) | Sum |
| 200 | 60 | 100 | 6 | 200 | 50 | 616 |
Protestant Reformers and historicist expositors have equated the Beast of the earth, of Revelation chapter 13, with the Papacy.[37] Using Hebraic gematria, the letters for a title of the Pope, Vicarius Filii Dei (Vicar of The Son of God), are summed to total 666 in Roman numerals. The earliest extant record of a Protestant writer on this subject is Andreas Helwig in 1612 in his work Antichristus Romanus. The title was contained in the Donation of Constantine,[38] by which large privileges and rich possessions were conferred on the pope and the Roman Church.[39]
Various documents from the Vatican contain wording such as "Adorandi Dei Filii Vicarius et Procurator quibus numen æternum summam Ecclesiæ sanctæ dedit",[40] translated as "As the Vicar and Caretaker of the worshipful Son of God, to whom the eternal divine will has given the highest rank of the Holy Church".
| V | I | C | A | R | I | V | S | F | I | L | I | I | D | E | I | TOTAL |
| 5 | 1 | 100 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 50 | 1 | 1 | 500 | 0 | 1 | 666 |
In 1866, Uriah Smith supported this numeric interpretation and promoted it in his teachings to the Seventh-day Adventist Church. He maintained this interpretation in various editions of Thoughts on Daniel and the Revelation,[41] which was influential in the Adventist church and some still continue to adhere to this identification.[42]
The Adventist view had taken a turning point with Adventist scholar, Samuele Bacchiocchi, who was awarded a gold medal by Pope Paul VI for the distinction of summa cum laude, Latin for "with highest praise".[43] Bacchiocchi documented the pope using the title, VICARIUS FILII DEI.[44][45] He states:
"We noted that contrary to some Catholic sources who deny the use of Vicarius Filii Dei as a papal title, we have found this title to have been used in official Catholic documents to support the ecclesiastical authority and temporal sovereignty of the pope. Thus the charge that Adventists fabricated the title to support their prophetic interpretation of 666, is unfair and untrue." - Samuele Bacchiocchi[46]
Bacchiocchi then concedes, "It has been wise for our Adventist church to abandon the traditional numeric interpretation of VICARIUS FILII DEI which lacks both exegetical and historical support."[47]
Gematria has also been used with the Greek word Maometis. In Quia Maior, the encyclical calling for the Fifth Crusade, Pope Innocent III identifies Muhammad with the beast of Revelation (however later popes do not). A leading exponent of the Maometis interpretation was Charles Walmesley, the Roman Catholic bishop of Rama. He observed that the name Muhammad was spelled Maometis or Moametis by Euthymius Zygabenus and the Greek historians Zonaras and Cedrenus.[48][49] Other proponents include Charles Montagu, Gilbert Genebrard, Francois Feuardent, and Rene Massuet.[48] Maometis in Greek gematria totals 666:
| M | A | O | M | E | T | I | S | TOTAL |
| 40 | 1 | 70 | 40 | 5 | 300 | 10 | 200 | 666 |
A preterist view of the Mark of the Beast is 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.[51] New Testament scholar Craig C. Hill says, "It is far more probable that the mark symbolizes the all-embracing economic power of Rome, whose very coinage bore the emperor's image and conveyed his claims to divinity (e.g., by including the sun's rays in the ruler's portrait). It had become increasingly difficult for Christians to function in a world in which public life, including the economic life of the trade guilds, required participation in idolatry."[52] A similar view is offered by Craig R. Koester. "As sales were made, people used coins that bore the images of Rome's gods and emperors. Thus each transaction that used such coins was a reminder that people were advancing themselves economically by relying on political powers that did not recognize the true God."[53]
The passage is also seen as an antithetical parallelism to the Jewish institution of tefillin – Hebrew Bible texts worn bound to the arm and the forehead during daily prayer. Instead of binding their allegiance to God to their arm and head, the place is instead taken with people's allegiance to The Beast.[51]
A futurist view of the mark of the Beast is the rise of a supranational currency could be a hallmark of the End Times and that the mark of the beast will be a sign on the forehead and/or upper side of the hand.[54]
Religious difficulties with a supranational currency currently exist (see World currency – Political difficulties). According to the Futurist view, to overcome the extant difficulties the Antichrist will use forced religious syncretism[55] (i.e. in the name of counterterrorism and world economic stability) to enable the creation of the supranational currency. Some interpret the mark as a requirement for all commerce to mean that the mark might actually be an object with the function of a credit card, such as subdermal RFID tags.[56]
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 honor Sunday in the full knowledge that it is not God's appointed day of worship, will receive the 'mark of the beast.'"[57] "The Sunday Sabbath is purely a child of the Papacy. It is the mark of the beast."[58]
In the writings of the Bahá'í Faith, `Abdu'l-Bahá states that the numerical value given to the beast referred to the year[59] when the Umayyad ruler Muawiyah I, who opposed the Imamate, according to the beliefs of the Shi'ites, took office as Caliph in 661 AD – see also the scholarly accepted year of birth of Jesus about 666 years before as well as the concept of Mawali who were non-Arab Muslims but not treated as other Muslims – who continued to pay the tax required of nonbelievers and were excluded from government and the military, and thus bore a social "mark".[60]
Jehovah's Witnesses believe that The Beast for which 666 stands symbolizes many unified governments, harmonizing with the symbolic depiction of past governments (denoted as "kings") in the Book of Daniel as wild beasts. The Beast is said to have "a human number" in that the governments that the beast symbolizes are all of a human origin, they aren't made up of spirit or demon entities. Furthermore, the number 666 "itself all point to one unmistakable conclusion—gross shortcoming and failure in the eyes of Jehovah," thus imperfection (7 is used by God in many ways to indicate perfection such as days in the week, hence 6 is the number of imperfection, falling short of 7).[61]
In Kabbalistic Judaism the number 666 represents the creation and perfection of the world. The world was created in 6 days, and there are 6 cardinal directions (North, South, East, West, Up, Down). 6 is also the numerical value of one of the letters of God's name.[62]
