But Nero, again, if you pick one of the alternate spellings for Nero,
you can get his name to match 616 as well. So he's like a favorite candidate.
But a lot of scholars feel that it's kind of cheating to just pick,
"pick your language and get your name,"
you know, like that's essentially what you're doing.
In verse 18: «This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding
calculate the number of the beast,
for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.»
Okay, we know that. My commentary here talks about how, and sometimes we've said
"Well, 666 is kind of like less than 777, the perfection."
But I have in my commentary, here, it says,
to calculate this number, however, suggests the use of Gematria.»
Gematria.
That's the way you say that; «an ancient code using numerical values of letters.
Both "Beast" and "Nero Caesar," written in Hebrew characters add up to 666.
Many interpreters expect a future greater fulfillment.»
So my question around this is; what does this really mean when it says
"to calculate the number"?
Is this something that we should be doing for the future?
Did this already happen? You know, or is it one of those already-but-not-yet?
Yeah. Let's talk about the thing with Nero first... I know, you instigator you.
It depends on the way you spell Nero's name, which actually gets different spellings
in Hebrew, Aramaic, and Latin. And Nero has been a popular candidate for the Antichrist,
not only because with one of those that you just mentioned,
you can calculate the number of his name. By the way, Gematria is the practice,
and lots of languages used it, where you would take the letters of the alphabet,
like the first 10 letters of the alphabet in Hebrew, are numbers 1 through 10,
you assign numbers to the letters of the alphabet, and so on, and so forth,
for all your alphabetic numbers. And then when you read, when you see a name or a phrase,
you can do the math, you can just put the numerical equivalents in there.
And you come out with a number and it may mean something or may not.
But with Nero, he's a popular candidate,
because there are some manuscripts of Revelation 13:18, that do not read 666.
They read 616.
Let me see if ESV has done its job here. Ah, look at that «some manuscripts 616.»
So, I don't know the editor here, but good job, whoever you're.
But Nero, again, if you pick one of the alternate spellings for Nero,
you can get his name to match 616 as well. So he's like a favorite candidate,
but a lot of scholars feel that it's kind of cheating to just pick,
"pick your language and get your name,"
you know, like that's essentially what you're doing.
You know, other commentators like Bill will make the comment that
you can take this phrase «number of a man»,
and you could translate it «human number.»
And then that takes you down the other road that you mentioned about
the significance of a number less than 777. Okay, and 888 Is Jesus, 777 is God.
And, I mean, there were different numbers that meant
a standard of holiness or perfection. And if you're thinking,
"you know, these people were just crazy. I mean, first we get this astronomy stuff.
And now this number symbolism."
Okay, they were serious about this in the first century,
because they had different reasons, but some wanted to encrypt ideas into names
and numbers for their own safety.
There's some speculation that Revelation does some of that.
If you think especially that Revelation is a book that was written
before the destruction of the temple. And it's a polemic on Rome,
even if you don't have to be a preterist and think it's all fulfilled,
you can still be something of a futurist.
But if you think that there are things in the book that are directed against the Emperor
and the Romans, you would probably encrypt that, rather than just put it in the text
and then take the consequences;
now the Romans are knocking at your door the next day.
So, there's a certain logic to it, and it was used for secrecy.
Some of it was esoteric, mystical thinking, trying to communicate theological ideas
with numbers and stuff like that. Lest you think it's really strange,
I mean, we do this Same thing with Number 3.
What do we associate 3 with? The Trinity.
You know, I mean, they're just things like this that are somewhat familiar to us.
But in their culture there was just more of it. More of that kind of thing going on.
So, I don't... is it an already-but-not-yet?
I don't really see the number itself as fitting into really the "already" category,
because I'm not sold on the book of Revelation a) being written early.
To view this as fulfilled, like the number already existed in real time,
you'd pretty much have to commit yourself to an early date of authorship,
because then you would go to Revelation 11. And you'd say,
"see, there's the courts of the temple mentioned there. The temple must still be standing.
And so, this has to be written before 70 a.d., and then the outcome of this is 70 a.d.
And, you know, it's no longer prophecy." Then you could take that and say,
"well, Daniel 11 talked about this Antichrist figure who now we think is Nero,
because Revelation's written before 70." But see, Daniel could have said,
“well, you know, the fulfillment of this has already happened with Antiochus,
but now we know it's Nero. And so maybe it'll ripple out again, in the future.
Maybe there will be a 'not-yet'. Maybe there'll be somebody else down the road
who will be a new Nero, or a new Antiochus."
You know, they're just ways to, no matter what system you adopt,
you can say it's either all fulfilled or it's all future. It's a little bit of both.
I just don't see anything in the text that helps answer that question,
specifically with the number.
Because the answer to it is going to hinge on really what you think about the authorship.
And I'm still a late dater, you know, the mid 90s I think that's the best date explanation,
but it's not secure by any means. There's a couple Church Fathers mentioned it,
but there are a couple church fathers that thought it was early too.
I mean, there's no way you can really pull anything conclusive out
about the date of the book.