Philosophical Vegan Forum

I unfortunately am unsure of the source of the following information, but if I or someone else is able to find it, I'd love for it to be posted here.

The number "666" is deemed "the number of the beast" due to a connection that was believed to exist between numbers and letters, meaning that every letter had a numerical value oriented with it. Thus, every name has a numerical value. Nero Caesar has a numerical value of, you guessed it, 666. Nero Caesar, for those of you who don't know, was the Roman Emperor from 54 AD to 68 AD and is well-known for blaming the Christians for the Great Fire of Rome (or whatever it was called), and had them crucified in his garden. Because he so despised the Christians, it is believed that he must have been influenced greatly by the Devil, and thusly we get 666 to have a great connection with him. I'm fairly certain that it's believed that Nero will have his form taken by the "beast" during the rapture, apocalypse, doom of mankind, etc. I'm unsure of the last sentence, so do some extra research and take it with a grain of salt.
The number of the beast is a very man-made concept with a thread of a connection to religion. If we used the dozenal number system (base 12 - we use base 10), then the number of the beast could be 476 (according to the Greeks) or 434 (according to Latin), but if we used the decimal system, we would have it be 666 and 616 respectively. This last bit isn't necessarily important, I just find it interesting.

AustinGulotta wrote: The number of the beast is a very man-made concept with a thread of a connection to religion.

I'd say all religious concepts and all of theology fall into that category. It's all man made; created through a series of accidents, stories, and misunderstandings.

I'm not sure about the Nero link, that sounds like people trying to make things fit to justify prophecy; I thought it came from 7 as the perfect number, where 6 is worldly (YHWH created the Earth in six days and rested on the seventh, which is holy).
777 is a reflection of the trinity, whereas 666 would be considered profane in Christian theology.
Although, references to 666 go back further than Christianity.

Interesting, I haven't heard either of those points. Where could I find information regarding that with more specificity?

Wiki is a good place to start:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/666_(number)#In_religion

Apparently the Nero thing comes from Preterists. I think those are those people who are always trying to come up with ad-hoc explanations rationalizing how Biblical prophecy has been fulfilled.

More info here:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_the_beast

You can find a lot of numerology in kabbalistic traditions, so that would also be a good place to look, but the likelihood of finding anything consistent is slim.

"What has Christ got to do with an energy drink, let alone the name MEWNSTER?"

Only a toddler would see their favourite symbols and shapes everywhere AND care about what they are seeing. What does Christ have to do with airplanes and medicine then? Who gives a shit if there's foul language on the can? Pretty much all Christians swear from time to time. Also one can't have the word "Beast" on their product or some stupid-head Christian like this would judge them and their product to be the work of some red dude who pokes bad folks in some burning realm of suffering. The "short-top-long-tails" are supposed to represent claw marks, not some Hebrew letters.

Funny how a few simple coincidences can bring so much stupedity out of one being. This is one of the primary reasons I've gone Athiest.