Posted on 05/06/2005 9:22:56 AM PDT by KidGlock
Beast's real mark devalued to '616'
Revelation fragment
Chris Wattie National Post
May 4, 2005
Satanists, apocalypse watchers and heavy metal guitarists may have to adjust their demonic numerology after a recently deciphered ancient biblical text revealed that 666 is not the fabled Number of the Beast after all.
A fragment from the oldest surviving copy of the New Testament, dating to the Third century, gives the more mundane 616 as the mark of the Antichrist.
Ellen Aitken, a professor of early Christian history at McGill University, said the discovery appears to spell the end of 666 as the devil's prime number.
"This is a very nice piece to find," Dr. Aitken said. "Scholars have argued for a long time over this, and it now seems that 616 was the original number of the beast."
The tiny fragment of 1,500-year-old papyrus is written in Greek, the original language of the New Testament, and contains a key passage from the Book of Revelation.
Where more conventional versions of the Bible give 666 as the "number of the beast," or the sign of the anti-Christ whose coming is predicted in the book's apocalyptic verses, the older version uses the Greek letters signifying 616.
"This is very early confirmation of that number, earlier than any other text we've found of that passage," Dr. Aitken said. "It's probably about 100 years before any other version."
The fragment was part of a hoard of previously illegible manuscripts discovered in an ancient garbage dump outside the Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus. Although the papyrus was first excavated in 1895, it was badly discoloured and damaged. Classics scholars at Oxford University were only recently able to read it using new advanced imaging techniques.
Elijah Dann, a professor of philosophy and religion at the University of Toronto, said the new number is unlikely to make a dent in the popularity of 666.
"Otherwise, a lot of sermons would have to be changed and a lot of movies rewritten," he said with a laugh. "There's always someone with an active imagination who can put another interpretation on it.
"It just shows you that when you study something as cryptic and mystic as the Book of Revelation there's an almost unlimited number of interpretations."
The book is thought to have been written by the disciple John and according to the King James Bible, the traditional translation of the passage reads: "Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six."
But Dr. Aitken said that translation was drawn from much later versions of the New Testament than the fragment found in Oxyrhynchus. "When we're talking about the early biblical texts, we're always talking about copies and they are copies made, at best, 150 to 200 years after [the original] was written," she said.
"They can have mistakes in the copying, changes for political or theological reasons ... it's like a detective story piecing it all together."
Dr. Aitken said, however, that scholars now believe the number in question has very little to do the devil. It was actually a complicated numerical riddle in Greek, meant to represent someone's name, she said.
"It's a number puzzle -- the majority opinion seems to be that it refers to [the Roman emperor] Nero."
Revelation was actually a thinly disguised political tract, with the names of those being criticized changed to numbers to protect the authors and early Christians from reprisals. "It's a very political document," Dr. Aitken said. "It's a critique of the politics and society of the Roman empire, but it's written in coded language and riddles."
Hmmmmm . . . and many people have shouted at me that the KJV of the Holy Bible is perfect with no errors and is the absolute sum total of the Word of God.
Oh, well, I guess we were right after all . . . "as far as it is translated correctly".
You are right and "777" or "666" represents a holy or unholy trinity, respectively.
ping
Oh well, there you go. A beast by any other name, er...number...would still be the beast!
HAH!!!! Beauty!!!
My grandparents live there, and I always feel kinda nervous when I write letters to them. ;)
You're going to have to change your screenname.
Isn't that true of ANYTHING that supposedly has an ancient origin? And many Mormons have told me that the Book of Mormon is "the most perfect book" on earth and contains the "fulness of the gospel", yet the LDS church teaches and believes all sorts of things not found in or contrary to the Book of Mormon. Hmmm...I guess they are just following the parts they think were "translated correctly".
Try being born on January 16, 1966.....
And I thought all rap artists were the anti-christ.....
So what does "Allah" get you?
Irenaeus, writing in the second century, and having a direct line of teaching to the Apostle John (Irenaeus's mentor Polycarp was John's disciple) notes that the number 616 was floating around in his time, and confirms that the correct number is 666 in Against Heresies.
Whoever wrote this article, naturally enough, doesn't know what he is talking about.
well said.
Did you really think the omniptent God would allow his word to be lost from his people for nearly 2,000 years? That's why I rely on the KJV, even if he (King James) was a horrible pediphile or whatever..... God has a funny way of using the most unlikely people to acomplish things....
"As the bear market continues the number of the beast lost 7% closing at 616 from it's previous high of 666. Abby Joseph Conan chief investment strategist of Golden Calf Insestments is still bullish. She says "look we were at the previous high for nearly 2000 years, this is just a temporary correction. Ralph Makeyapoora of J.P.Morganchasem concures. But the man on the street is not reassured. We asked Palm Beach retieree Damien (last name witheld) was quoted as saying "on my fixed income I can't take anymore risk. I'm getting out before things turn Apocolyptic." Gold bugs also welcome the instability in the market saying now gold really is the only sure thing.
This has been your market update from CNBS financial news."
HAHAHA! Well played!
That was very clever!!!
That may explain why this manuscript was in the dump.
Just another thought...
Not at all. Joseph Smith translated the book correctly. There were clerical and printers errors. Other differences in our religion are simply the result of revelation through our prophets. See, it all fits in the bigger picture.
Now, wrong numbers, that's pretty interesting.
There is more than one rap artist? How can you really tell?
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