16 Also it causes all, both small and great, both rich and poor, both free and slave, to be marked on the right hand or the forehead, 17 so that no one can buy or sell unless he has the mark, that is, the name of the beast or the number of its name. 18 This calls for wisdom: let him who has understanding reckon the number of the beast, for it is a human number, its number is six hundred and sixty-six.
Verse 16 tells us that the beast marked his own people. Just as God marked his people in Chapter 7 to indicate that they were his, the beast marks his people in Chapter 13 for the same reason. God knows his people. Satan also knows his people. Everyone on earth then and everyone on earth today is wearing one mark or the other. Each of us belongs to someone.
Verse 17 tells us that no one could buy or sell without the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of its name. When we discussed the letters to the seven churches in Chapters 2-3, we discussed the economic persecution that Christians suffered at the hands of the pagan guilds. A confession that Caesar is Lord was often required before one was allowed to buy or sell. Those who refused to make that confession were perceived as unpatriotic and suffered severe economic hardships.
Verse 18 is one of the most famous verses in the Bible, ranking up there with John 3:16. It has entered the public consciousness to a greater degree than any other verse in this book. People who can’t even name the four gospels can still tell you more than you care to hear (from them, anyway) about 666.
Verse 18 begins with a call for wisdom, and yet that verse has spawned a great deal of foolishness. Did you know that the modern barcode is the mark of the beast and an indication that we are living in the end times? Some say so. The two bars that denote ‘6’ appear at the beginning, middle, and end of every barcode found on the back cover of most books. Terry Cook in his book The Mark of the New World Order writes that “the entire [UPC barcode] system is very deceptively designed around the infamous numerical configuration, Biblically known as 666, the mark of the Antichrist or devil.” Mary Stewart Relfe in her book The New Money System 666 writes that “the Prophet John identified this Cashless System of Commerce 1900 years ago as one in which business would be transacted with a ‘Mark’ and a Number; the Mark will obviously be a Bar Code; the Number will be ‘666;’ the combination of the two, about which you will read in this book, will be an integral part of the ‘666 System.” Ridiculous? Yes, extremely so, but sadly not uncommon when it comes to explanations of 666.
Verse 18 tells us that the number of the beast is 666, a human number. What does that mean? The number 7 means perfection. By contrast, the number 6 means imperfection. The number 6 denotes something that had fallen hopelessly short of perfection. Man was created on the sixth day, and he fell from perfection. The number 3 is the number of divinity. Thus, three 6’s depict something that has fallen hopelessly short of divine perfection. It had aspirations of being a 777, but it fell far short.
Does that symbol accurately describe this beast? Yes! No symbol could describe it any better! This beast represents the false perverted religious side of Rome. It represents the man-made Roman religion that worshiped the creature rather than the creator. God is 777! Rome is 666! It is a beautiful symbol that shows the stark contrast between God and his creation. Nothing man-made can ever be a 777.
Hailey: “666 stands for the complete and total failure of all human systems and efforts antagonistic to God and His Christ — all are doomed to ultimate and complete defeat and failure.”
But can this really be all there is to 666! Surely it must be something more than that! We need to view this symbol in the proper perspective. The 666 symbol is just another symbol in this book full of symbols. It may stand apart from the other symbols in modern consciousness, but it does not stand apart from them in the text. Yes, 666 is a wonderfully descriptive symbol, but there are many other wonderfully descriptive symbols in Revelation. We must remember that this book was primarily intended to provide comfort to the first century Christians who were suffering intense persecution by Rome. If our interpretation of the book ignores that fundamental fact, then our interpretation is almost certainly wrong. The church needed to know that Rome was a 666! (Let’s keep all of this in mind as we get closer to discussing the 1000 year reign with Christ in Revelation 20.)
And the church needs to understand today that there are many, many 666’s in our own world. We are surrounded by man-made churches, man-made religions, and man-made philosophies — and all of them are just 666. There are many so-called churches today that should have 666 printed on their signs out front because they are a man-made church proclaiming a man-made gospel. Nothing made by man can ever be a 777. And on that great last day, the last thing you want to rely on is a 666. “Neither is there salvation in any other: for there is none other name under heaven given among men, whereby we must be saved.” (Acts 4:12) That name is 777!
Last week we considered several possible reasons why there are two beasts in Chapter 13. There is an additional possibility that we should consider as well. According to Roman mythology, Rome was founded by the twin brothers, Romulus and Remus. That same mythology tells us that Romulus was the first king of Rome, and that shortly after their birth the twins were ordered to be killed by exposure, but they survived and were nursed by a wolf — which is often depicted in Roman art and Roman coins.
Because Romulus was raised by a wolf, one early source called him “the son of the beast.” It is possible that the two beasts in Revelation 13 are pointing all the way back to the two mythological founders of Rome.
With regard to verse 18, one commentator has noted that “no verse in Revelation has received more attention than this one with its cryptic reference to the number of the beast.”
Last week we discussed the famous number 666 in verse 18, and we concluded that it depicts something that has fallen hopelessly short of divine perfection, which would be denoted by 777. As Lenski explained about 666:
In other words, not 777, but competing with 777, seeking to obliterate 777, but doing so abortively, its failure being as complete as was its expansion by puffing itself up from 6 to 666.
There is another possible significance for 666 that we should discuss, and it stems from something called gematria. Gematria refers to the representation of words by their numerical equivalents so that the number conveys a message.
We know that the use of gematria was common at the time. At Pergamum, inscribed stones have been found containing numerical riddles based on gematria. Graffiti from the ruins of Pompeii reads “I love her whose number is 545” and “Amerimnus thought upon his lady Harmonia for good. The number of her honorable name is 45.” A difficult passage in Suetonius is explained by noting that Nero is there numerically resolved into “matricide.” One commentator states that “gematria was widely used in apocalyptic [literature] because of its symbolic and enigmatic quality.”
Here are the questions we need to consider: (1) Is the reference to 666 in verse 18 an example of gematria? (2) If so, then to what or to whom does it refer? (3) And, again if so, is that meaning the primary meaning of the symbol or a secondary meaning?
Let’s start with the third question first. Earlier we discussed the symbolic meaning of 666 as something that has fallen hopelessly short of the divine 777, and we saw how that symbol perfectly depicted the second beast from the earth. That fit is so perfect and is explained so well in terms of the symbol 7 (around which this entire book is constructed), I am convinced that this symbolic understanding of 666 is the primary meaning behind the symbol. And so, if we determine that gematria is in use in verse 18, I submit it must be a secondary meaning of the symbol. And there is some additional evidence for that view — the verse itself begins with a call for wisdom, which may be an indication that a dual meaning is involved here. We have discussed before how difficult it is to determine secondary meanings for prophecies absent being explicitly told by God. There is no such explicit statement here, but there may nevertheless be a suggestion.
So, that leaves us with two questions — was gematria used, and, if so, to what or to whom does it refer?
Before we answer those questions, we should pause to consider an important warning. One has to be very careful when heading off into this direction in the Bible because right near the edge there is a very steep slope heading straight down into sheer speculation and utter nonsense. Those going down this road sometimes find themselves trying to read some numerical significance into every word of the Bible. Many books have been published that claim to have discovered a secret code in the Bible that predicts the names, locations, and dates of future events. What those books fail to tell you is that those same methods could be applied to almost any book to obtain similar secret messages.
We need to be particularly careful with gematria because, as we know, it is possible to prove anything with numbers if one is willing to twist the facts while ignoring the context and all other evidence to the contrary. Some people treat numbers and statistics in the same way that a drunk treats a lamppost — for support rather than for illumination!
Here are two quick examples: Here’s a numerical “proof” that Hitler was the antichrist. Let A = 100, B = 101, C = 102, etc. and note that 107 (H) + 108 (I) + 119 (T) + 111 (L) + 104 (E) + 117 (R) = 666! Or, consider the following numerical “proof” that Shakespeare translated the King James version of the Bible: How old was Shakespeare in 1611 when the King James version was published? 46. The 46th word in Psalm 46 is “shake.” The 46th word from the end of Psalm 46 is “spear.” Coincidence? Certainly. Silly? Yes. More silly than most of the crazy notions people have about 666? No. People need to quit looking for secret messages in the Bible and start obeying the message that is clear for all to understand.
But with that said, anyone who studies 666 and the history of its interpretation must be struck some strange curiosities. For example, we all know the six Roman numbers: I(1), V(5), X(10), L(50), C(100), and D(500). What do you get when you add up the values of the five Roman numbers? 666. Take the first seven primes numbers (2, 3, 5, 7, 11, 13, and 17) and sum their squares: 4 + 9 + 25 + 49 + 121 + 169 + 289. What do you get? 666. Spooky! (and irrelevant!)
So, going back to the text, is gematria used in verse 18? Possibly. We know that gematria was common at the time, and we know that some of the earliest commentaries on Revelation have turned to gematria to explain this verse.
But then what could 666 denote? There are a number of words and names that could be represented as 666, depending on the language we choose (Hebrew, Greek, Latin) and how we then associate letters in that language with numbers. Having this many variables makes it very difficult to determine which (if any) was the word or phrase that God intended for us to associate with 666.
We should probably not expect a perfect fit. Why? Because in my view the primary meaning of 666 does not rely on gematria but rather relies on the symbolic meaning of 666 as falling short of 777. That is, the number 666 was not chosen to represent a name but was chosen for its symbolic significance. It may also represent a name, but if it does we should probably not expect the same perfect fit we would have had if the number had been chosen solely on that basis.
There is evidence that some have tried to change the text to make what they consider a better fit. Some of your Bibles may have a footnote that says some early texts have 616 in verse 18 rather than 666. Lenski describes that textual issue:
This is not a faulty transcription but a deliberate alteration that was made very early and against which the strongest protest was at once raised. The alteration was made so that by gematria the number would fit the emperor [Caligula]. This was the man who made the effort to have his image erected in the Temple at Jerusalem...
Thus, those early texts that show 616 in place of 666 most likely represent someone’s attempt to make the number 666 a better fit for someone’s name by changing it to 616. The correct value is 666.
But those early manuscripts with 616 do tell us something important. Those changes from 666 to 616 confirm that from very early in its history commentators have understood verse 18 to include an example of gematria. We should not be too quick to discount viewpoints that are closely related in time to the original readers of this book.
So what could 666 represent? There are numerous candidates, but, not surprisingly, the leading candidate is Nero, whose name could also be said to denote Domitian as Nero Redivivus. Various numerical representations will give you 666 from either Nero Caesar or Neron (the Latin form of his name that appears, for example, in the subscript in the KJV at the end of 2nd Timothy), but other names can be made to fit as well. In short, no one can be certain that gematria is used, and if it is used, no one can be certain who is represented, but Nero is a likely candidate because of the context of verse 18.
Let’s next consider the other side of the argument. A very good case can be made for the proposition that no gematria at all is involved in verse 18. For example, verse 18 omits a definite article before “man,” which may indicate that no particular man is in mind. Also, as one commentator notes, “what is not generally stressed is that [the most commonly given] solution [pointing to Nero] asks you to calculate a Hebrew transliteration of the Greek form of a Latin name, and that with a defective spelling.” Lenski gives us other objections as well:
It is surprising to note how many men think that “666” is the product of gematria. ... Yet nowhere is Scripture, nowhere in Revelation do we meet with another case of gematria. ... A number that is produced by gematria would remain an insoluble conundrum; yet the very title of this book is “Revelation.” ... Take some name and set down the value of each of its letters, add these, write the sum. A hundred other names may produce the same sum.
Those are all good objections, and some of them are even compelling. But with those objections stated, I still believe it is possible that 666 has a secondary significance based on gematria, and I would point to verses 17-18 for support as well as the view of ancient commentators on that subject.
So, in summary, my opinion is that the primary significance of 666 is that it falls hopelessly short of the divine perfection denoted by 777. That idea fits perfectly with the context of this second beast representing the false perverted religion of Rome. I also think there is possibly a secondary meaning in which 666 denotes Nero.
What then is the setting at the end of Chapter 13? A terrible dragon has given his authority to a seven headed beast that has arisen from the sea. The beast is killed but comes back to life. A second beast arises and looks like a lamb but sounds like a dragon. The second beast performs signs and wonders and causes the earth to worship the first beast. The chapter ends with the whole earth in the spell of the dragon and the beasts.
What does the church need at this point? The church needs comfort and assurance, which is exactly what Chapter 14 provides.
Please visit ThyWordIsTruth.com for free audio lessons on Revelation, for a unique daily Bible reading calendar, to read about God's plan of salvation, to read the answers to hundreds of questions submitted by our readers, and for much, much more.
Posts
