The most thought provoking and debated topic of The Book of Revelation is probably the number of the beast. This writing will not be much different, but I hope it brings a new perspective that you haven’t seen before.
17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 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 NKJV
The part that threw me off was “Here is wisdom”. We see that many translations write it this way. I just didn’t understand how this sentence made sense. Wisdom isn’t simply obtained from reading these verses, its given to you by Yah.
5 If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of Elohim, who gives to all liberally and without reproach, and it will be given to him.
James 1 NKJV
Proverbs 2 NKJV
6 For Yahuah gives wisdom;
From His mouth come knowledge and understanding;
7 He stores up sound wisdom for the upright;
So I decided to take a look at these verses in the original Greek to see how they were originally interpreted. To do this is simple, you do not need to know Greek to use a interlinear translation tool. You can use BlueLetterBible.org or Scripture4all.org. I chose Scripture4all, because its a friendlier layout of the verses. Here is a direct link to the Chapter 13 Greek interlinear PDF with the beast number verses.
Take a look at the screenshot below, take note how I simply blur out the word “here” and place it at the end of the previous verse. In this time period, punctuation was not used when writing. So the translators of the Scriptures did not know if the word “here” belonged in verse 17 or 18. We also see how the translators moved the word “is” and removed the word “the” to create the sentence “Here is wisdom”.
Without adding, removing or moving words around we have an alternate translation:
17 and that no one may buy or sell except one who has the mark or the name of the beast, or the number of his name here. 18 The wisdom is the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man: His number is 666.
Rev 13 Alternate Translation
Lets work with verse 17 alone. After placing “here” in verse 17, it became clear to me that the number was a potential arrival date of the beast: “here”. If you translate this verse using Strong’s Concordance you can also get this acceptable version of this verse: “the name of the beast or the number of its named hither.”.
The blue letter bible allows for translating name to named: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g3686/nkjv/tr/0-1/
It also allows for translating here to hither: https://www.blueletterbible.org/lexicon/g5602/nkjv/tr/0-1/
So if we can accept for a moment that the beast number is a potential arrival date, we can move on…
Verse 18 says “for it is the number of a man” which I believe is referring to the man made calendar. The calendar that is used by ALL the world except 4 countries. This calendar is called the Gregorian calendar. It was created by a Pope name Gregory and instituted by the Roman Catholic Church.
The true calendar which Yah created was based off the moon cycles (some debate that its based off the sun). Yah told His people to count the days based on the new moon, modern translations do not make this obvious.
4 ‘These are the appointed times of יהוה, set-apart gatherings which you are to proclaim at their appointed times. 5 ‘In the first new moon, on the fourteenth day of the new moon, between the evenings, is the Pĕsaḥ to יהוה .6 ‘And on the fifteenth day of this new moon is the Festival of Matzot to יהוה – seven days you eat unleavened bread.
Lev 23 TS2009
If I believe this is an arrival date, it is really hard to pin point a time using 666 . So it was brought to my attention that another number, is considered as a potential beast number. Some newer translations will place it in the footnotes as a consideration to the reader. See the foot note on this translation: (TS2009 Link)
The Beast Number 616
There are 2 historical witnesses or documents that attest to this number. We know that the Bible states there should be 2 or more witnesses to claim anything against another person (2nd Corinthians 13:1, Deuteronomy 19:15). We should be able to claim this for historical documents as well.
Document 1: Oxyrhynchus Papyri 115 (Source 1) (Source 2)
Document 2: Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus (Source 1)
Research these 2 documents and see how they are considered legitimate documents of their time. Here is what my research revealed as to the reason why our translations decided to use 666 instead of 616.
I also found a research article, for which I paid access to, that describes how a particular North African church ascribes to this number. It also lists early Latin manuscripts as other witnesses to this number 616 (Source Link)
From this study:
The Number of the Beast in Revelation 13 in Light
of Papyri, Graffiti, and Inscriptions
( take with a grain of salt, as you would with this website)
We find that there is one person standing in the way of the alternative number being accepted among believers very early on in 130 AD – 202 AD.
Irenaeus is a Greek Bishop and consider a “saint” in the Roman Catholic Church. He refutes that the number is 616 in his time and calls the people that speak that number, in his time, lazy in speech.
“yet he said ‘some have erred following the ordinary mode of speech, and have vitiated the middle number in the name, deducting fifty from it, so that instead of six decades they will have it that there is but one’”
Study linked above
Example of how 616 was spoken back then: “hexakosiai deka hex”
Example of how 666 was spoken back then: “hexakósioi hexēkonta héx”
The Date of Beast Arrival
It wasn’t hard to find that Donald Trump announced his presidency on 6/16 or June 16th, 2015.
Another correlation, consider it a stretch if you want: his birthday is 6/14 he “rose” as the beast on the 3rd day: 6/14, 6/15, and 6/16.
What about 666?
It has me thinking that there is a possibility that Yah knew this would happen and that both numbers would exist. Thus he would potentially allow both numbers to be fulfilled.
Trump’s father is from Germany. What if Trump retained his German name? Donald Johann Drumpf. His original name has 6 letters in each name. It’s also interesting that he is of German dissent as one of the worst antichrist’s in history, Hitler, the anti Jew hater/killer. Just something to think about. Here are some calculations from another believer:
616 Coincidences/Clues?
NEXT:
Lets take a look at the Signs in the Heavens for our next confirmation.
My Youtube video covering the above article.