666 and general theology (split from How old are you?)

[Rob Zombie]

I hated all the hyp around it, how people said it was a day of hell...idiots.

I just thought it was a semi-cool thing, and an excuse to sing to Number of the Beast with my mates.
Still, it'd be a cool birthday party...

[Tom Failur]

If anyone is interested the number of the beast is actually 616. Someone just decided 666 sounds cooler and it's stuck ever since.

[Kurtz]

"aracaic"? Do you mean Aramaic? In any event the New Testament was written in Greek, and the numbers mentioned in Revelation are almost certainly derived from the Gematria, part of the Jewish Qabbalah, a pseudo-mystical numerology game giving number values for certain letters in an attempt to read 'hidden significance' into Biblical passages.

There are various versions of the number of the 'Beast' given, including 666, 665 and 616. There's a reference here. Probably they all refer to Emperor Nero, who institutionalised persecution of early Christians, and the different numbers probably depend on which version of his name you work from (he was actually Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus, so he could be 'Nero', 'Nero Caesar', 'Nero Caesar Imperator' etc etc).

Revelation is a coded attack on the Roman Empire written in the style of Jewish Apocalyptic writings from 200-100BC, and contained within is a very cogent attack on the way that Rome rested on the twin pillars of 'hard' (military) power - symbolised by The Dragon, and more seductive 'soft' (commercial/cultural) power, represented (in Revelation) by the Whore of Babylon. The 'Beast' directs the Dragon, and so probably represents the Emperor, who would have been Nero, or possibly Vespasian (responsible for the destruction of the Temple of Solomon in Jerusalem - of which all that remains is the Wailing Wall) at the time of writing of Revelation.

Edit: PS, I am 41 tomorrow, if anyone's counting.

[Rob Zombie]

I'm an arsehole for spelling mistakes. expecialy on a laptop. so fi yu se ayn onw then you shoulding, because i'm on a proper keyboard.

And everything you just said was basicaly shrugged off as coincidence when i told it to a priest. Gods, i hate them.

[Rabies - man's worst friend]

Kurtz seems to know his biblical stuff!  Hat's off to you, sir, although it's not exactly my bag.

I was particularly impressed with your reference to the "(book of) Revelation" - as revealed to John the Divine, as opposed to the "Book of Revelations", as so often misquoted.  Mary Hopkin also suffers from the same misconception!

A word of credit - much of the above post was influenced by Half Man Half Biscuit (or Nigel at least).

[Kurtz]

Apologies to Tom Failur (maybe a mod can threadsplit or something) for continuing this. I have a sideline in Ancient and Medieval history, and I did a course on 'Outsiders' views on the Roman Empire' as part of my history BA, for which the New Testament was a major source. It was an interesting experience to tackle the Bible as a historical source, especially Revelation, which I had mostly only encountered via 'The Omen' previously. Which was why I was a bit surprised by:

And everything you just said was basicaly shrugged off as coincidence when i told it to a priest.

I thought that the reading of Revelation (or at least the main chunk of it) as an attack on Rome was fairly conventional these days, but I guess it depends on where you live. But Revelation is pretty specific in places. 17,18: "The woman you saw is the great city that rules over the kings of the earth."
And 17,9: "This calls for a mind with wisdom. The seven heads are seven hills on which the woman sits." Rome, famously, is built on seven hills.

The suggestion in my course was that Rome is represented as a woman (the Whore of Babylon) because she was represented as a woman by the Romans, as the goddess 'Roma', which formed part of the Imperial Cult (which also included the cults of the deified Emperors, most of whom were worshipped as Gods after their death). Christians objected to the Imperial Cult as blasphemous, and refused to worship the Imperial Cult. This the Romans regarded as treasonous, and was one reason why Christians were persecuted.

[Jhelai]

Oooh, good to have some serious discussion on the subject here. Wasnt expected, but any increased knowledge towards learning more about things closely related to religions than the "worshippers" themselves know is interesting to me. After all, to know your enemy is to better know how to dismantle it through its own flaws.

Still, have yet to read the so-called b**le, since I get frustrated enough just passing by those ancient cross-bearing pimples dotted across the city, and doubt the book would give me more than a sour aftertaste and more spite than would be healthy for me towards what it has done to people throughout history.

*hrm* As for the number and date in question, I found it quite interesting, due to the atheistic sites where one could read of the various tragically drastic reactions people over the world showed for something so very simple.

[Malice]

I was expecting some guy to cleanse the world of all the people he thought evil. Or good.

[Captain Jacobi]

I, personally, don't think religion is overly plausible, so thats why I never really cared for it.

[Rob Zombie]

Best to believe in a religion that reflect you, i think. and build yourself a belief about the stuff you believe in, rather than follow a set religion. its like building flatpack wardrobes as opposed to the greatness of going into the woods, cutting, sawing, hacking and nailing your own wardrobe together.