Beast, Number of the
David Chilton (1987)
The unexpected element in the computation was that it had to be worked out in Hebrew, a language that at least some members of the churches would know. His readers would have guessed by now that he was speaking of Nero, and those who understood Hebrew probably grasped it instantly. The numerical values of the Hebrew letters in Neron Kesar (Nero Caesar) are:
As I mentioned earlier, the point is not that Nero’s name is the primary identification of 666. The point is, instead, what the number meant to the churches. St. John’s Biblically informed readers will have already recognized many clear indications of the Beast’s identity as Rome (indeed, they already knew this from reading the Book of Daniel). Now Nero has arrived on the scene as the first great persecutor of the Church, the embodi-ment of the "666-ness" of the Empire, and – Lo and behold! – his very name spells out 666. It is significant that "all the earliest Christian writers on the Apocalypse, from Irenaeus down to Victorious of Pettau and Commodian in the fourth, and Andreas in the fifth, and St. Beatus in the eighth century, connect Nero, or some Roman emperor, with the Apocalyptic Beast ." There should be no reasonable doubt about this identification. St. John was writing to first-century Christians, warning them of things that were "shortly" to take place. They were engaged in the most crucial battle of history, against the Dragon and the evil Empire which he possessed. The purpose of the Revelation was to comfort the Church with the assurance that God was in control, so that even the awesome might of the Dragon and the Beast would not stand before the armies of Jesus Christ. Christ was wounded in His heel on Friday, the sixth day, the Day of the Beast – yet that is the day He crushed the Dragon’s head. At his most powerful, St. John says, the Beast is just a six, or a series of sixes; never a seven. His plans of world dominion will never be fulfilled, and the Church will overcome through her Lord Jesus, the 888, who conquered on the Eighth Day.".
It is charged by some that Neron Kesar is merely a convenient "misspelling" of Nero’s name in Hebrew. This objection overlooks the fact that before the modern introduction of dictionaries the world was simply not as concerned as we are about uniformity in the spelling of names. Alternate spellings were common (e.g. "Joram" and "Jehoram" in the Old Testament), especially in the transliteration of words into a foreign tongue. But the allegation of misspelling is wholly wrong anyway. The form Neron Kesar (1) is the linguistically "correct" Hebrew form, (2) is the form found in the Talmud and other rabbinical writings, and (3) was used by Hebrews in the first century, as archaeological evidence has shown. As F. W. Farrar observed, "the Jewish Christian would have tried the name as he thought of the name-that is in Hebrew letters. And the moment he did this the secret stood revealed. No Jew ever thought of Nero except as ‘Neron Kesar,’ and this gives at once . . . 666" (The Early Days of Christianity, Chicago and New York: Belford, Clarke& Co., 1882, p. 540). Of some related interest is the fact that if Nero’s name is written without the final n (i.e., the way it would occur to a Gentile to spell it in Hebrew), it yields the number 616 — which is exactly the variant reading in a few New Testament manuscripts. The most reasonable explanation for this variant is that it arose from the confusion over the final n."
Eusebius (A.D. 325)
"5 He states these things in the third book of his above-mentioned work. In the fifth book he speaks as follows concerning the Apocalypse of John, and the number of the name of Antichrist:129
"As these things are so, and this number is found in all the approved and ancient copies,130 and those who saw John face to face confirm it, and reason teaches us that the number of the name of the beast, according to the mode of calculation among the Greeks, appears in its letters. ..."131
6 And farther on he says concerning the same:132
"We are not bold enough to speak confidently of the name of Antichrist. For if it were necessary that his name should be declared clearly at the present time, it would have been announced by him who saw the revelation. For it was seen, not long ago, but almost in our generation, toward the end of the reign of Domitian."133
130 Rev. xiii. 18. Already in Irenaeus' time there was a variation in the copies of the Apocalypse. This is interesting as showing the existence of old copies of the Apocalypse even in his time, and also as showing how early works became corrupted in the course of transmission. We learn from his words, too, that textual criticism had already begun."
131 The sentence as Eusebius quotes it here is incomplete; he repeats only so much of it as suits his purpose. Irenaeus completes his sentence, after a few more dependent clauses, by saying, "I do not know how it is that some have erred, following the ordinary mode of speech, and have vitiated the middle number in the name," &c. This shows that even in Irenaeus' time there was as much controversy about the interpretation of the Apocalypse as there has always been, and that at that day exegetes were as a rule in no better position than we are. Irenaeus refers in this sentence to the fact that the Greek numerals were indicated by the letters of the alphabet: Alpha, "one," Beta, "two," &c.(Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History Book 5)
Dr. F.W. Farrar (1885)
"Beyond all shadow of doubt or uncertainty, the Wild Beast from the sea is meant as a symbol of the emperor Nero. Here, at any rate, St. John has neglected no single means by which he could make his meaning clear without deadly peril to himself and the Christian Church. He describes this Wild Beast by no less than sixteen distinctive marks, and then all but tells us in so many words the name of the person whom it is intended to symbolize." (Early Days of' Christianity, 5.28.5)
D. R. Hillers (1963)
"It may now be pointed out that in an Aramaic document from Murabba’at . . . , dated to the "second year of the emperor Nero," the name is spelled rsq !yrn as required by the theory (i.e., that 666 signifies Nero). The last two consonants of rsq are damaged, but enough is preserved to show that no vowel-letter was written between the q and s." (Revelation 13:18 and A Scroll from Murabba’at. The evidence can be seen by consulting the French work edited by P, Benoit, J. T. Milik, and R. DeVaux, Discoveries in the Judean Desert of Jordan II (Oxford, 1961), p. 18, plate 29.
Theologians that identify Nero with the Beast:
James Stuart Russell, Parousia, p, 557.
Shirley Jackson Case, The Revelation of John: A History of Interpretation (Chicago, 1919), p. 319.
George Edmundson, The Church in Rome in the First Century (London, 1913), pp. 165-166.
B. W. Henderson, Five Roman Emperors (Cambridge: University Press, 1927), p. 45.
Arthur S. Peake, The Revelation of John (London: Joseph Johnson, 1919), p. 326.
Martin Kiddie, The Revelation of St. John (New York: Harper, 1940), p. 261.
Charles C. Torrey,
The Apocalypse of John (New Haven: Yale, 1958), p. 60.
John Bright, The Kingdom of God (Nashville Abingdon, 1963), p. 240.
Austin Farrer, The Revelation of St. John the Divine (Oxford: Clarendon, 1964), pp. 158f
T. G. Driver, The Judean Scrolls (Oxford: Blackwell, 1965), p. 374.
Hillers, "Revelation 13:18," p. 65. See J. P. M. Sweet, Revelation.(Philadelphia, 1979) p. 218, note u.
Bruce M. Metzger, The Text of the New Testament, 2nd ed. (Oxford, 1968), p. 752.
John A. T. Robinson, Redating the New Testament (Philadelphia: Westminster, 1976), p. 235.
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