A Little Trivia on that 666 Number!

People are making a big deal about the Dow making a low yesterday at 666. Below is a little trivia about that 666 number. The reference is from "Why Do Catholics Do That?" by Kevin Orlin Johnson, Ph.D., First Edition, Chapter 35 ("The Numbers Game"), Pg. 258.


"And, in fact, the Christian writers of the New Testament used the same kind of number code to carry meanings to members, sometimes with the added advantage of not letting unbelievers in on the story. Of course, a little classical education goes a long way toward keeping a sensible perspective on this, but some of these passages still confuse people who don't know how the number code strategy works. Take revelation 13:18 - the "number of the beast". That number, 666, is a reference to Nero, and you can prove it by the mistakes that were made in translating it."

"Of course, St. John wrote Revelation in Greek, not in Latin or Hebrew, but his use of numbers as names shows that they should be understood as collections of Hebrew letters. The Greek form of Nero's name, written in Hebrew letters, works out to be nrwn qsr. Numerically, that gives you the "six hundred threescore and six" that St. John mentioned. But by the second century, right after Revelation was written, translations of the book into Latin give the number of the beast as 616. That's because the Latin form of Nero's name in Hebrew letters is nrw qsr, without the extra n, and that adds up to 616. The early Christian Latinists knew that the reference was to Nero, and they translated the numbers accordingly. So, that number, whatever its fascination for supermarket tabloids and makers of horror movies, is fairly cut and dried. It means Nero, and that's that."

Charles