Days of Vengeance - The Preterist Archive

13:18
At the same time, however, he tells them that it will
not be as easy as they might think: it will require
someone “who has understanding.” For St. John did not
give a number that could be worked out in Greek,
which is what a Roman official scanning Revelation for
subversive content would expect. 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:
n = 50 r = 200 w = 6 n = 50
q = 100 s = 60 r = 200
thus:
r _sqe nwro ne = 666
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
embodiment of the “666-ness” of the Empire, and – Lo
and behold! – his very name spells out 666. 37
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.” 38 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.
TABLE OF NUMERALS IN USE DURING THE BIBLICAL PERIOD
Nº Hebrew Greek
1 a a
2 b b
3 g g
4 d d
5 h e
6 w v
7 z z
8 j h
9 f q
10 y i
20 k k
30 l l
40 m m
Nº Hebrew Greek
50 n n
60 s x
70 [ o
80 p p
90 x f
100 q r
200 r s
300 c t
400 t u
500 qt ø
600 c
700 y
800 w
37. 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.
38. F. W. Farrar, The Early Days of Christianity (Chicago and New York: Belford,
Clarke & Co., 1882), p. 541. See, e.g., Sulpitius Severus (A.D. 363-420),
who clearly cites Rev. 13 in his description of Nero: Sacred History, in A
Select Library of Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church (Grand
Rapids: Eerdmans, 1973 reprint), pp. 110f.
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