Homestar Runner Wiki Forum

Just came across an interesting article:

Beast's real mark devalued to '616'.

Fairly interesting article. Apparently they've had the number wrong all these years. Funny, my house number growing up was 616.

And interesting bit about Nero at the end, there.

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Your house number was 616, eh......I knew it!

But yeah, that is a pretty spiffy find there IJ.

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DCXVI
that you have dialed? like a phone number? my area code's 616! !!!LBLBLLBBGGGRRRAAA
oh well. at least it's a palendrome.

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Actually, Jones, there's a very simple and logical explanation for that phenomenon, one that many of the "Left Behind" fans won't like, but if you know your history, makes perfect sense.

You see, St. John writes in Greek, but tends to think in Hebrew. There's linguistic clues to this all over his writings, but I won't bore you with the details. Well, anyway. If you transcribe Nero's name into Hebrew, the numbers of the name (the Hebrews, like the Greeks, used characters from their alphabet to represent numbers) adds up to 666. Early Christians recognized this number as code for "Nero."

However, as copies of the manuscript of Revelation began to circulate, a few scribes mistakenly made it into 616. But, interestingly enough, the name Nero, when transcribed into Greek, adds up to 616.

My theory is that these later scribes did not know that St. John was using a Hebrew system of numbering, but recognized his number as a code for "Nero," and edited their copies to reflect this. Either that or they knew St. John's numbering system, but deliberately changed it so as to communicate the code to people who did not.

So what does this mean? To me it means that the early Church clearly understood the Beast to be Nero.

So is the number 666 or 616? Depends on whether you think in Greek or in Hebrew.

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Ok, I have no idea what any of you are talking about. None. The article is a 404'd and i see no significance in the number 616.

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very interesting Didymus. i didn't know that. but the article was 404'D. boo hoo hoo

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Extremejon:

CLICK HERE to see the variant reading.

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See, this is why I don't take the bible as a complete literal translation. What if they got it wrong? Maybe we're supposed to worship Dog and be afraid of Satin.. Ok, so that's a little extreme, but you get the point. Taking any document that's been translated over and over and over, like the bible, literally is just opening the door for trouble. That's not to say that there are things in there I don't take for what they're worth (thou shalt not, for example, cus pretty much every version I've seen has, more or lee, the same wording and whatnot).
This is the kinda thing that used to almost cause fistfights in religious studies (btw, if take one of those classes make sure you're in there with at least one person who is dead set against ANY religion and at least one religious fundamentalist).

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If you can't fix it with a hammer, you have an electrical problem.

StrongRad:

Textual variants of this sort are extremely rare, and account for less than 1% of the entire text of Scripture. And of those textual variants, the vast majority have absolutely no effect on the interpretation of those passages. To make the claim that this makes Scripture too unreliable would be similar to dismissing the entire United States Constitution because someone misspelled a single word.

And incidentally, the Bible has not been retranslated the way you describe. The original Greek and Hebrew texts remain intact, and there are plenty of ancient manuscripts available to testify to their accuracy. And the vast majority of modern translations are taken from these Greek and Hebrew texts. For this reason, I believe that not only can the texts be interpreted literally, in most circumstances they should be.

Even this example here. As stated above, this textual variant actually points to something in our interpretive approach which should be taken into account: that the early Christians understood the Number of the Beast to refer to the Roman Emperor, specifically Nero and his Emperor Cult.

So while your concern about impurity in the texts certainly a valid question, there really is no cause to doubt the Scriptures as a whole. Ivory brags that its brand of soap is 99.44% pure, yet no one ever seems to let that .56% prevent them from using it.

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Document not found Soundoff Error: Document not found.

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Didymus, it's not that I don't believe the Bible, nor am Isaying it shouldn't be depended upon. The only problem I have is with 100% literal interpretation of the Bible. I mean, people are free to believe what they like, there's nothing wrong with that, it's just that a 100% literal interpretation is not for me, at least until I learn ancient Hebrew and Greek and read the texts for myself..

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If you can't fix it with a hammer, you have an electrical problem.

Then what would be an adequate hermeneutic? That's my question. An allegorical approach wouldn't do justice to the accuracy of the texts themselve.

If it'll help, I will point out that most modern translations will at least point out the textual variants for you. If you were to do some text critical studies based on one such documented translation, you can see for yourself how the theology might be changed by a particular textual variant (which, for the vast majority of them, would be not at all).

If it is your ambition to learn Greek and Hebrew, I say go for it. It never hurts to be able to study the original languages. Believe me, I know.

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That is something I really haven't figured out for myself, yet. I mean, I don't feel completely comfortable taking all of the Bible with an attitude of "that's absolutely the way it happened, every other possibility is complete bupkis!". That's my definition of a literal interpretation. I am closer to a literal interpretation than to an allegorical one, but I do believe that there are things that (at least my knowledge of the Bible) the Bible doesn't really explain. Most of which are, more or less, not really all that important, except to answer some of those "If God is REAL, how do you explain...?" questions. I really think that there are some things we were left to figure out for ourselves. Things like Dinosaurs and evolution come to mind. Truthfully, I DO believe in some form of evolution, and I don't see that it goes against creationism in the least (ok, I'm starting to steer this towards Creationism v. Evolution, and that's not my goal).

And now, before I wander even further from topic, and risk a "toastpaint", I end this post.

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If you can't fix it with a hammer, you have an electrical problem.

Ah! So what you're really talking about are the mysteries of the cosmos, and not necessarily central things. I can understand that. I still haven't quite worked out all the details in my own theology of creation, other than "I believe in one God, Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth." There are clues in Genesis One which, to my mind, testify that a literal interpretation of that first chapter is not entirely necessary. The first clue is that Genesis One is written in an epic poetic style; it may have been intended as an introduction to the historical accounts that follow. The main point there is that Adonai Elohim created the universe, not the pagan gods of the other nations.

However, because the New Testament points back the the first human ancestors, I am wary of dismissing them as allegorical. Adam is considered the father of all humanity.

And then there's the Book of Revelation itself (the topic of this thread). The book itself was not written to be interpreted literally. That is, unless you believe the fate of humanity will be decided by battles between giant Godzilla type monsters. That, I think, is where the "Left Behind" theology is flawed: it tries to impose a literal reading on a text that was so obviously encoded so that only those who were intended to receive it could understand it. Apocalyptic literature is like that. The "decoder ring" for Revelation seems to be Daniel (most scholars agree, but differ as to what extent), as well as contemporary history of that time. Furthermore, the book was intended as a warning to the Seven Churches in Asia about trials that they were about to endure (in particularly, persecution from the Romans).

That's why modern interpretations are mostly flawed. They look to contemporary history for their understanding. 20 years ago, people saw Russian tanks, nuclear bombs, and credit cards as the interpretive key. Today, people see Iraq, terrorists, and the Internet. But the people of St. John's time (i.e., the original recipients) would have seen Roman armies and the Emperor Cult.

My thoughts? In the case of Revelation, the interpretive key should be the understanding of the original recipients, the first century church. The variant reading (616 vs. 666) makes perfect sense if you factor in Nero. And if you factor in Nero, then that, at least to me, is very strong evidence of an early Christian understanding that the events of Revelation were unfolding around them.

Anyway, that's my rant for today. I think I understand a little more where StrongRad is coming from.

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"document not found"

bugger. Ah well, i'll just have to listen to Iron Maiden's "Number Of The Beast" instead. top album.

Yes, everyone. It was a news article. It's expired now, and it's no longer on the site.

here are a couple other articles I've seen

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_b ... ory=634679
http://www.religionnewsblog.com/11134
http://www.unexplained-mysteries.com/fo ... opic=39556

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what are you talking about whats a beast number??? because there is none no beast number no nothing.

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What idiot thought the idea of putting the hole on the BUTT of them?Take a look one day!Notice those holes on top?Well thats where the Salt come out right?Well if you put the opening on butt guess what!When you go to fill them it is is going to spill and make a freaking mess all over myfloor!-Didy

Please make sense, please!
He means the number of the devil: 666.

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