I interrupt the progress of chapter 14 for a couple of days. I have just done a little further work on the 666 and thought Id share that now even though that topic was covered months ago. There are two ancient attempts to understand Revelation 13:18 that I failed to mention the first time through. The first is by Irenaeus. The earliest known interpreter of the 666 was Irenaeus, the bishop of Lyons in the latter half of the second century (150-200 AD). He wrote a book called Against Heresies about 80 years after John received the Revelation. Although written in Greek, it has survived in a Latin translation. At several points in the fifth volume he deals with Revelation 13:18. Irenaeus seems to highlight the threeness of the number by pointing out that it is “six times a hundred, six times ten and six units.” (5.28.2) He later repeats the idea indicating that the number of the tens is equal to the number of the hundreds and the number of the hundreds equal to the units, the digit six “being adhered to throughout.” (5.30.1) In 5.29.2 he notes that the number of the beast contains the 600 from the age of Noah at the start of the Flood (Gen 7:6), the 60 from the height of Nebuchadnezzar’s image and the 6 from the width. He also attempted to connect the full number 666 to specific names or titles in recent history (he favored “teitan” [from Titan] and “lateinos” [referring to Rome–“Latin”]), but with limited success. So from Irenaeus we learn that the ancients were interested both in the threeness of the number and the reference point for the number as a whole, as we have sought to do here.
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 13:20:25 +0000
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