And it was given him to give life to the image of the beast, and that the image of the beast should speak; and should cause, that whosoever will not adore the image of the beast, should be slain. And he shall make all, both little and great, rich and poor, freemen and bondmen, to have a character in their right hand, or on their foreheads.
And that no man might buy or sell, but he that hath the character, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. He that hath understanding, let him count the number of the beast. For it is the number of a man: and the number of him is six hundred sixty-six.
Some manuscripts, it is said, say 616 and not 666. I possess no textual (small-e) expertise and cannot comment. But I do understand our bias toward the beauty of the fuller, richer, more redolent number 666.
The point of this post is simple. Take any name, in any script, and you can find a mathematical function of that name in that script that comes to 666---or 616. Mathematicians will agree with this instantly, the proof being clear without having to state it. However, the rest of us will need some persuasion.
Take this example mailed to me. Start with A = 65, B = 66, and so on. The take the Latin script for BERGOGLIO, and add the value of the individual letters. 66 + 69 + etc. = 666.
Well, I can't say it's wrong, and neither can you. But I don't believe it. The man occupying the Vatican now does not, to my lights, possess any of the important qualities of the Antichrist. He certainly does not inspire universal devotion. He is too old. He has displayed no signs or wonders.
None of that is definitive either. I don't offer it as proof, but as reasons I don't buy him as the Antichrist, whatever else you may want to say about him, good or bad.
It will, of course, have struck you as odd that the sequence began with A = 65. Why not A = 1? Then, as is obvious without doing the arithmetic, we don't reach 666 (we get 83). Same thing if we start with A = 66: not 666. Or any other number.
Then we realize his name is not BERGOGLIO but JORGE MARIO BERGOGLIO, which if input into our function does not work, either. But if we let A = 28, B = 29, and so on, and also add 1 for every space, counting the last one that separates the name from other text, or three spaces, then we also get 666.
No fair adding the spaces? Why not? What's unfair about it? It is a legitimate mathematical operation. There is certainly nothing in the Biblical text that suggests the correct mathematical function, though there is historical evidence adding letters was not uncommon.
We certainly aren't married to decimal numbers. As Wiki says "NRON QSR", which is Nero name written in a traditional Roman way, "which when interpreted numerically represents the numbers 50 200 6 50 100 60 200, which add up to 666."
How about the illustrious WMBRIGGS, the name I use for all professional matters---and if being the AC isn't a profession, I don't know what is. If we let A = 71, B = 72, and ignore spaces, because you think them unfair, then we get 666.
Let's do the current White House occupant. Let A = 7, B = 8 and so on. Then adding JBIDEN gives 80. Next multiply the digits of JBIDEN. Gives 4,224,000. Then all we have to do is divide that by 80^2, to give the adding its historically important greater weight. This gives 660. Lastly, we add in the number of letters: 666 once more.
I take it my point is proved. A mathematical function can always be found to come to the desired total. It need not be so complicated as the last one; but, on the other, it can be more complicated, too. We can stick with just adding letters, giving them, in the positions of the name variable values, for whatever reasons we think we can get away with. For instance, first A = 1, second is 27, first B = 2, second is 28 and so on.
Here's a fun page showing how 666 is hidden in corporate logos, showing that the mathematical function can be graphic, too.
Do not come away from this with skepticism about the existence of the Antichrist, who I believe, along with Doctor of the Church St Robert Bellarmine, will be a real person.
But you should be skeptical of fanciful numeral tricks that show names equating to 666. It's been done at least hundreds of times, all wrong so far. It can be done with any name. It's like with that book The Bible Code which purported to find all kinds of hidden---read gnostic---prophecies and predictions hidden in the text of scripture, if you combined them in similar arcane ways as we just did with JBIDEN.
I'm guessing that until the real guy comes along, what that 666 means won't become apparent, for most, it's too late.
Buy my new book and learn to argue against the regime: Everything You Believe Is Wrong.
Visit me at wmbriggs.com.
The Book of Revelation seems to be taking form, but it has many times in the past, too, before being destroyed eventually. There's lots and lots of evil going on that must be opposed, and so it will be.
Bergoglio the anti-Christ? Nah, not him; the guy has "useful idiot" written all over him. Besides, more sophisticated purveyors of apocalyptic literature would send it back for a re-write. The anti-Christ as a Jesuit Roman Catholic?!? Too obvious...