The Mark of The Beast

It's funny how our- er- more interesting commenters can inspire a post.

I guess I've always been one of those people who don't like having unanswered questions.

I must admit, it's something I sometimes think about. I have this feeling that the main thoughts on my deathbed will be 'Damn. Never DID find out the answer to that'.

I hate not knowing something. It seems to me that the main quest of my life is finding answers. I just want to know. I want to know how and why.

And where it gets most interesting is those edges where no one knows. Where I get to push it and use my own mind to think 'Ah, but is it THAT?'

And I guess this post is about one of those. It's a question that as far as I know, only exists in my mind. Yet I'm pretty damn sure it's a real question and when I've demonstrated to people why it is a question, they concede I'm probably right.

And the funny thing is, with this question, I'm not actually interested in the answer. I think my basic hypothesis is correct. I'd just like for one day someone to go 'Oh yes! He was right. That IS what it is. It actually means ....'

And it concerns the so-called Mark of the Beast.

666.

It first occurred to me watching the Omen.

I remember sitting forward and shouting to my mate 'But it's not though is it? It can't be. John can't have seen 666. Not in Arab numerals. If he ACTUALLY saw what you and I call 666, he'd have written it as 'The mark of the beast is three tadpoles.' Because that's what HE'D have seen. What is shown there, wasn't something he'd have interpreted as a number. In his dream, he didn't see '666'.'

He couldn't have done. What appears in the manuscripts can only be DCLXVI.

That is what was copied down and transmitted in every copy of the manuscripts. DCLXVI.

So, what John said he saw looked like that.

But is that really what he saw? He says a mark. Not a number.

Let me state now, I don't for one moment believe it matters in the sense it actually predicts the future.
But it does matter, in terms of understanding the document.
He states he had a dream. What's he trying to tell his readers?

Now, an interesting point about this number is some manuscripts have the 'mark' as 616.
Not an easy mistake to make in Arab numerals, but easier in Roman numerals. DCXVI.

A missing L.

And this got me to pondering the reason why there might be an L in one version, but not another.
What if the number didn't make sense? What if the number in question was this? DCIXVI.

Not a number. And scribes had been faced with two choices. Make the I into an L or, scrap it.

But maybe the mark wasn't a number at all. Maybe what he depicted was this; I)(I)(I/I.



It doesn't come across very well using a keyboard. I mean each symbol to touch and the curves on the brackets to curve as a C does. And all with a running bar across top and bottom.
But I think it represents a word, and I think it was written in maybe cuneiform, or some eastern alphabet only someone adept in arcane symbolism could read.

The book of Revelations has a profoundly Gnostic feel in many ways and it wouldn't surprise me if that's exactly what it is; a Gnostic puzzle.

I'm pretty sure the mark of the beast isn't a number, it's an actual word written in a non-latin, non-greek alphabet.

And at a guess?

It says 'Adonai'.