666 vs 616
America is BABYLON THE GREAT,
and
NEW YORK CITY is the GREAT CITY BABYLON
The newest volume of Oxyrhynchus Papyri
contains a fragmentary
papyrus of Revelation which is the earliest known witness to some
sections (late third / early fourth century)
The number that this papyrus assigns to the
Beast: 616, rather than the usual 666.
(665 is also found.) We knew that this variant existed: Irenaeus
cites (and refutes) it.
But this is the earliest instance that has so far been found.
The number — chi, iota, stigma (hexakosiai deka hex) —
is in the third line of the fragment shown
Irenaeus states: "Such, then, being the state of the case, and this number being found in all the most approved and ancient copies [of the Apocalypse], and those men who saw John face to face bearing their testimony [to it]; while reason also leads us to conclude that the number of the name of the beast, [if reckoned] according to the Greek mode of calculation by the [value of] the letters contained in it, will amount to six hundred and sixty and six; that is, the number of tens shall be equal to that of the hundreds, and the number of hundreds equal to that of the units (for that number which [expresses] the digit six being adhered to throughout, indicates the recapitulations of that apostasy, taken in its full extent, which occurred at the beginning, during the intermediate periods, and which shall take place at the end), ” I do not know how it is that some have erred following the ordinary mode of speech, and have vitiated the middle number in the name, deducting the amount of fifty from it, so that instead of six decades they will have it that there is but one. [I am inclined to think that this occurred through the fault of the copyists, as is wont to happen, since numbers also are expressed by letters; so that the Greek letter which expresses the number sixty was easily expanded into the letter Iota of the Greeks.]"
In this rather obscurely expressed passage, Irenaeus was proposing (even in the second century - a century BEFORE this oldest surviving copy!) that old, Greek copies of Revelation contained an error of copying in which the Greek letter xi with gematraic value 60 was wrongly copied into the Greek letter iota with number value 10. What Professor Parker seems to ignoring is that, just because the copy he has worked with happens to be the oldest one yet found, this does not make it free of errors and therefore reliable. PERHAPS THIS WORD ITSELF IN PARKER´S FRAGMENT WAS WRONGLY COPIED FROM AN EVEN EARLIER VERSION WE HAVE NOT (YET) FOUND? Just look at the form of the two Greek letters iota and xi and ask yourselves this: was it more likely that iota was misread and re-written as xi or that xi was wrongly copied as iota? As iota is far simpler looking than xi, why would anyone have turned a simpler letter into one looking more complicated?! Limitations in optical resolution, which makes the human eye see just a straight line when the object has actually a more complicated shape, makes the latter much less likely. This means that it is far, far more probable that the TRUE middle letter in the number text for the Beast was, indeed, xi (giving the number 666) and that this was then mistaken for the simpler looking iota, giving the number 616. Suppose that there was genuine confusion about the correct letters EVEN at the time when copies of the text were being made and passed around, so that some copies contained xi as the middle letter of the number text for the Beast, whilst others contained the letter iota? Just because Parker has found a copy that contains ONE version does not mean that this was the correct one. Perhaps an even earlier version will be discovered in the future that contains the version preferred by Irenaeus and which became the canonical form for translation into English! Irenaeus lived in the second century a hundred years before this fragment was written and knew that there was argument even THEN about the correct text.
So, Professor Parker´s discovery hardly amounts to proof. All it proves is that the error (whatever it was) did not come from translation of Latin texts, as some people thought. There is reason to suspect that the number 616 was not what St John intended. It is the number of the Greek phrase "Caesar God". Very likely, people in St John´s time were already trying to identify the Beast, much as people do on internet forums like this one, and so the word got miscopied into the form having the number 616 that readily identified as a well-known man the one whom they wrongly thought John had meant. The same process is going on 2000 years later!
In conclusion therefore, Professor Parker has drawn a non sequitur from his discovery in the fragment of the middle letter of the number text as iota, not xi. He may be right. But he could equally be wrong. For me, it is far more likely that xi was copied into iota than that iota was copied into xi, as well as there being a highly political motive for changing the text in this way for Christians living then, as just explained. For these reasons, I still think 666 is the correct number. Perhaps a still older copy of the New Testament will be discovered that confirms this. The jury is still out, despite Parker's misplaced sense of certainty.
What is of particular historical significance is the punishment these predominantly gentile communities of believers received when they abandoned their "first love" and developed the various branches of early gentile Christianity. Quite a number of gentile Christian sects evolved in the early centuries. As early as the year 187, the Christian Bishop Iraneus counted twenty different varieties of Christianity. By the year 384, Epiphanius counted eighty.5 (Thus falling into the trap Paul warned about in Ephesians 4:14.)
My copy of Nestle-Aland (27th ed.) at Revelation 13:18
lists for the variant reading "616" only "C; Ir mss" (the
5th century uncial manuscript C and some manuscripts cited by Irenaeus). A 3rd
or 4th century papyrus containing this reading would be extremely significant,
although probably not enough to outweigh the many witnesses for "666."
As Bruce Metzger points out in his Textual Commentary on the Greek New
Testament (1971), the numerical value of "666" is derived from the
Hebrew/Aramaic values for the letters comprising the name
נרון קסר, "Nero Caesar" (in
Greek Νρων Κασαρ)
The variant "616" results from the alternate spelling
נרו קסר.
For those of you unfamiliar with the numerical values of the Hebrew alphabet,
the values in the above name are
nun = 50, resh = 200, waw = 6, nun = 50, quph =
100, samekh = 60, resh = 200. Add 'em up!
The name "Nero Caesar" (נרון
קסר) actually appears in a scroll from the Judean Desert,
Murabbaat 18,
dated to the "second year of Nero Caesar" (55/56 CE).
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Delbert Hillers, "Revelation 13:18 and a Scroll from
Murabbaat," BASOR 170 (1963), p. 65.
UPDATE: The fragment (P.Oxy. LVI 4499) can be viewed here.
Although it is pointed
out that the numerology does not work with the Greek letters, the Hebrew
values are not discussed.
FROM: http://ralphriver.blogspot.com/2005/04/number-of-beast-616.html
Numerologists can devise clever ways of assigning numbers to letters. Letters of a name will sometimes add up to this symbolic number. Probably the best-known is A=100, B=101, and so on. With this code, the name "HITLER" adds up to 666.
compiled by Dee Finney
| 10-19-05 - Yesterday, I listened to a radio interview,
done by Steve Quayle of Stewart Best who has the
website True Insight. The discussion was that 616 is being promoted as
the number of the Beast rather than the 666 we have always been told was
the number we were to be afraid of. The gist of the discussion was
to say that Christians are being led astray, to think that everything
that is going on in the world with numbers right now, considering we are
all being given various identification numbers, with more coming in the
future.
The mark of the Beast is to be given to each man and woman and no one will be able buy, sell, or trade without the mark of the Beast embedded in their hand or their forehead. Some Christians think they don't have to worry about it because they will be raptured off the earth before the mark of the Beast is given to people. Obviously, some Christians are going to be wrong on this issue. So, what is the real truth? This is what Stewart posted on his website since the interview: "I was on the Steve Quayle program this evening (October 18th), and we talked about the MARK OF THE BEAST and the GREAT SEAL OF THE UNITED STATES. Americans need to know the TRUE IDENTITY OF AMERICA IN SCRIPTURE, as it has GRAVE RAMIFICATIONS TO US ALL. You need REAL AMERICAN PROPHECY, not the garbage handed out by the vast majority of prophetic people in America. As usual, our phone system seems to go down when we speak of the occult and the AGENDA for America by them, and we had a number of calls that we could not connect with - so please call again tomorrow if you wish the free report "STATE OF THE WORLD -2005" and catalogs of our many DVD/Videos. If you cannot reach us, write us at Best Video Productions, P.O. Box 190, Menomonie, WI 54751." Stewart's website is at: http://www.truinsight.com/ |
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| Rev 17:4-5 4 And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet colour, and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication: 5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH. KJV 1 Kings 10:14-15 Rev 13:16-18 |
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| Stewart Best states: THE
ACTUAL NUMBER OF THE BEAST IS THIS: 600-60-6. We simply have
added it all together to get 666. But the ACTUAL NUMBERS GIVEN are 600,
60 and 6. There is an important reason for that sequence, and it has to
do with THE NUMBERS GAME. It also has to do with MYSTERY and the SYMBOLS
OF MYSTERY, such as you find on the GREAT SEAL OF THE UNITED STATES,
complete with the NUMBER 600-60-6, the VERY MARK OF THE BEAST, which is
not at all surprising because America is MODERN BABYLON, and its SEAL is
the SEAL OF ANCIENT BABYLON, and modern Babylon is the world power that
brings the MARK OF THE BEAST TO THE ENTIRE WORLD.
The Great Seal of United States was established on
June 20, 1782. The back of the Great Seal was barely known until the
1930s when it became a part of the dollar bill under Masonic United
States President Franklin D. Roosevelt On the reverse side of the Great
Seal are an eye and a pyramid. Over the eye and pyramid is an
inscription, "Annuit Coeptis," Latin for "He favors our
undertakings." "Undertaking" means a venture, a promise,
of the profession or duties of a funeral director. The Masons would like
to believe that God favors their duties as funeral directors. The Masons
become funeral directors by first directing whose body will at the
funeral, and where that life will be taken. If a life is taken close to
the northern 33rd Parallel, this fits with the Masons' demonic mythology
in which they demonstrate their worldly power by spilling human blood at
a predetermined locale.
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OTHER PROPHECIES Dan 7:7-8 Zech 5:1-7 |
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Latin is the official language of the
Roman Catholic Church. Church Documents are usually published first in
Latin, and then translated from the Latin into other languages. The
association of "Lateinos" with 666 was first suggested by Irenæus
(ca. 130-202 A.D.) who proposed in his Against Heresies that it
might be the name of the fourth kingdom in Daniel 7:7.
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| Revelation
Chapter 16 1 I heard a loud voice speaking from the temple to the seven angels, "Go and pour out the seven bowls of God's fury upon the earth." 2 The first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth. Festering and ugly sores broke out on those who had the mark of the beast or worshiped its image. 3 The second angel poured out his bowl on the sea. The sea turned to blood like that from a corpse; every creature living in the sea died. 4 The third angel poured out his bowl on the rivers and springs of water. These also turned to blood. 5 Then I heard the angel in charge of the waters say: "You are just, O Holy One, who are and who were, in passing this sentence. 6 For they have shed the blood of the holy ones and the prophets, and you (have) given them blood to drink; it is what they deserve." 7 Then I heard the altar cry out, "Yes, Lord God almighty, your judgments are true and just." 8 The fourth angel poured out his bowl on the sun. It was given the power to burn people with fire. 9 People were burned by the scorching heat and blasphemed the name of God who had power over these plagues, but they did not repent or give him glory. 10 The fifth angel poured out his bowl on the throne of the beast. 4 Its kingdom was plunged into darkness, and people bit their tongues in pain 11 and blasphemed the God of heaven because of their pains and sores. But they did not repent of their works. 12 The sixth angel emptied his bowl on the great river Euphrates. Its water was dried up to prepare the way for the kings of the East. 5 13 I saw three unclean spirits like frogs 6 come from the mouth of the dragon, from the mouth of the beast, and from the mouth of the false prophet. 14 These were demonic spirits who performed signs. They went out to the kings of the whole world to assemble them for the battle on the great day of God the almighty. 15 ("Behold, I am coming like a thief." 7 Blessed is the one who watches and keeps his clothes ready, so that he may not go naked and people see him exposed.) 16 They then assembled the kings in the place that is named Armageddon 8 in Hebrew. 17 The seventh angel poured out his bowl into the air. A loud voice came out of the temple from the throne, saying, "It is done." 18 Then there were lightning flashes, rumblings, and peals of thunder, and a great earthquake. It was such a violent earthquake that there has never been one like it since the human race began on earth. 19 The great city 9 was split into three parts, and the gentile cities fell. But God remembered great Babylon, giving it the cup filled with the wine of his fury and wrath. 20 10 Every island fled, and mountains disappeared. 21 Large hailstones like huge weights came down from the sky on people, and they blasphemed God for the plague of hail because this plague was so severe. |
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It is not that any of these other world nations agree with each other. More that they share a deep hatred for the United States. In our attempt to keep the peace by being a police officer over the remainder of the world, we are perceived as a powerful and dangerous bully. Could this conflict be the prelude to the Biblical battle of Armageddon? That chip, believe it or not, is called MARCC (Multiple Automated Readout Computer Chip). America is the target of a nuclear attack conspiracy by Russia & China & the Islamic Arab world, leading to World War III. National security and foreign policy by military experts and top investigative journalists, about international defiance (e.g. communist and rogue/terrorist states) to U.S. hegemonism and U.N. sanctions, and prophetic dreams, visions and prophecies by the Holy Spirit provide overwhelming evidence that the Bible's book of Revelation will soon be fulfilled ... Please consider this vision indicating that Arafat's removal is THE Sign that immediately precedes the rise of the works of Antichrist... Before being diverted by wild speculations about the book of Revelation's (chapter 13) first "beast" (also commonly referred to as "Antichrist"), it is vital to understand that the generation we live in is more rational, skeptical, and well-informed than ever before. It is highly unlikely that a charismatic spiritual-political leader will suddenly "pop-up" out of nowhere and quickly convince the world to follow him by the appeal of charisma and even signs and wonders. The first "beast" of Revelation 13 must be equally influential both spiritually and politically, for we know from Revelation 17:12-18 that ten nations will come under the geopolitical influence of this "beast" in order to attack the "harlot" (see Why did God name America "Mystery Babylon?"). This Antichrist is likely a man who has achieved greatness during a lengthy spiritual-political career, being gradually vindicated by a succession of past, present and future supernatural prophetic signs, which will peak at the opportune time (see Revelation 13:13-15). Although there are plenty of celebrity figures with great social or symbolic (e.g. Prince Charles, King Hussein) and even spiritual (e.g. Dalai Lama, Deepak Chopra) influence, they have little or no geo- (i.e. worldwide) political influence. As the leader of the world's greatest superpower, President Bush's spiritual influence hardly seems to go beyond his personal faith -- all his attempts to do so would are dismissed as politically motivated, and in violation of Church-State separation. However, as of 2004, President Bush appears to be on a Holy Crusade (mission from God) to 'free' all the rest of the countries in the world to a "New World Order" in a huge democratic coalition. He is in mental control of millions of people who think just like him. If he wins the election in 2004, he will be even more powerful that he was in 2000 - following in his Daddy's footsteps - and will feel justified that he was 'right' and continue in his quest to control how the rest of the world thinks along with his secret/hidden Illuminati controllers. |
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| Texts
with 616 and their significance were documented by Iraneus in the second
century AD. Hebrew numerals are, like Roman numerals, denoted by letters. A Hebrew transliteration of the latin "Cesar Neron" apparently has the letters: kaph(100), samech(60), resh(200), nun(50), resh(200), waw(6) and nun(50). Add them up, you get 666. Use the more familiar "Cesar Nero" and you get 616. |
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| There is more than one interpretation of who/what the
10 horns represent: This is one of them:
The 10 horns / kings were the Kings which were responsible for the 10 great Christian persecutions between an estimated time fram of 100 AD. to 324 AD. These kings were "from the east". That is, the eastern empire of Rome. During the Barbarian wars and crusades, Rome was split into three regions, primarily east and west. The capital of Rome was moved to the Eastern side of Rome because the Western side was won over by the Barbarian wars. Rome's tax surplus was reduced so dramatically that their economy could no longer afford a strong military. Thus, the Roman Empire expanded itself so far beyond their ability to maintain itself. That, plus the multiple plagues and diseases, along with the destruction of Pompeii via volcano, weakened the Roman Empire. Trajan was very crude and issued a Nation wide edict to have all Christians tortured and killed. Without getting into much detail, I challenge all to read the writings of Iraneus, Barnabas, Polycarp, and a few others. The most interesting are some passages of Iraneus. Iraneus doesn't liberally attempt to interpret the exact meaning of "The number of the Beast", but he does say something which gives much proof to the early church mindset. (Note: Iraneus was a disciple of John who wrote Revelations) This he says: Let us first wait the dividing of the Kingdom into 10.......(Referring to Rome) and again in reference to 666, Latinois also equals 666, for they indeed are the ones in charge now....also in reference to Rome. You should find that Christian persecution was given in much detail with some of the early church writings. There is NO WAY that Christians of today suffered the invented torture techniques brutally applied to the early Christians. This "war" against Christians ended in 324 AD when Constantine declared Christianity to be the official religion. There were surely some persecutions going on, but not to the same degree as 10 Roman Emperors did on up until Constantine, who abolished public Christian torture. Going back to a posted comment regarding the "1000 years", I believe it may be possible that this 1000 years of piece was for the church; not the world. Keep in mind that for nearly the first 250 years, give or take a few, of church existence, there were millions tortured and killed with techniques you and I couldn't even handle....I WILL NOT get into those techniques. Let's just say that there were not quick deaths...they were all slow, agonizing, and painful! In any case, the mulitiple deaths almost wiped Christians off the face of the earth. Thus Christ says, "For the sake of the elect, those days would be numbered"....and again, "If those days had not been cut SHORT, no one would have survived"! It's quite clear that nearly 250 years of Christian Torture almost exterminated Christianity. This was the time of testing which Christ warned the seven churches about, where in he says, "This calls for the patient endurance on the part of the saints". Afterwards, the Church was "refined by fire" (fire meaning persecution to burn out impurities) and proven faithful and genuine. Now that the product (Church) had been proven and thoroughly cleansed, it's now ready for a worldwide delivery. And what I'm about to say should keep a few protestants in check. If it were NOT for the Romans, Christianity would not have survived as long as it has. Why do I say this? Because the Empire which once tried to destroy Christianity was responsible for it's spread throughout the rest of the world as we see it today. Granted there may have been corruptions which took place, just as there will always be, yet truth will always abound. It wasn't until the 13th century (nearly 1000 years after the last major Christian persecution around 312 AD) that the Spanish Inquisition took place, leading to many more tortures. This COULD be the time where Satan is released from the pit to go out and deceive the Nations again. Excerpted from: http://www.greenspun.com/bboard/q-and-a-fetch-msg.tcl?msg_id=00CNig
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616: number of the beast
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/th...sp?story=634679
(found via warren ellis' blog)
A newly discovered fragment of the oldest surviving copy of the New Testament indicates that, as far as the Antichrist goes, theologians, scholars, heavy metal groups, and television evangelists have got the wrong number. Instead of 666, it’s actually the far less ominous 616. The new fragment from the Book of Revelation, written in ancient Greek and dating from the late third century, is part of a hoard of previously unintelligible manuscripts discovered in historic dumps outside Oxyrhynchus in Egypt. Now a team of expert classicists, using new photographic techniques, are finally deciphering the original writing. Professor David Parker, Professor of New Testament Textual Criticism and Paleography at the University of Birmingham, thinks that 616, although less memorable than 666, is the original. He said: “This is an example of gematria, where numbers are based on the numerical values of letters in people’s names. Early Christians would use numbers to hide the identity of people who they were attacking: 616 refers to the Emperor Caligula.” …Satanists responded coolly to the new “Revelation". Peter Gilmore, High Priest of the Church of Satan, based in New York, said: “By using 666 we’re using something that the Christians fear. Mind you, if they do switch to 616 being the number of the beast then we’ll start using that.” |
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Superstition vs. Science One of my first interests in Theomatics was to find what Washburn had discovered in regard to the number 333 and my study was by no means disappointing. Critics of the New Covenant Church had accused us of being a satanic counterfeit based on the fact that 333 was exactly half the number 666 and that the vision which I saw represented, as it were, the "writing on the wall" for us. (In some Bible MSS, the number of the Beast of Rev.13:18 is 616 and not 666). It was certainly a serious accusation and one we took seriously, more especially as we were aware of the fascination that the numbers 3, 33, and 333 held for occultists, and its various multiples (6, 66, 666, 9, 99, 999, etc.). But the fact that a particular number holds a special fascination for an occultist, who may use it for divination or other purposes, does not mean that that number is in itself "satanic". Were it to be so, then we would surely be under obligation to rip out every page 666 in our Bibles! Numbers themselves are neither good nor evil, any more than pictorial symbols: it is what they represent to the prophet or the Satanist that is significant. Indeed, we have been criticised for using the hexagram or Star of David in our symbology because it is also used by occultists (though contained within a circle by the latter). Occultism is so full of symbols that were this thesis to be true we would be forced to relinquish control of the triangle, circle, square and hundreds of other basic symbols to the power of evil, something which is plainly absurd. Symbols, like numbers, are spiritually neutral - it's how you use them that counts. The occultist uses numbers for magic and divination but the Bible student uses them to understand the mind of God. The Significance of 666 and 616 When the topic of Deity is scrutinised by theomatics one thing becomes very evident: the number 13 and its multiples is intimately associated with God. The Name of the Father, Yahweh, adds up to 26 (13 x 2) in Hebrew, and Jesus Christ adds up to 2366 (13 x 13 x 7 or 91 x 13 x 2) in Greek. Other interesting Greek words are Lord, 650 (130 x 5) in Greek, and 65 (13 x 5) in Hebrew, with the Lord Jesus being 130 x 13. You will find that practically every concept to do with God in the Old and New Testaments is a multiple of 13. Relevant to us as New Covenant Christians in particular is the value of Yahweh-God in Hebrew which corresponds to the number 117 (13 x 9). This is doubly interesting because not only is the multiple of 13 the value 9 (3+3+3) but gematrically 117 (1+1+7) adds up to 9 (3+3+3) also. Apart from the well known 666, other triple numbers figure importantly in theomatics. For instance, the number 222 and its multiples repeatedly appear in connection with the antichrist or antichrists in general (2+2+2 = 6). The number 666 does not, in fact, necessarily refer to a particular individual but it, and its multiples, can refer to such things as the Kingdoms of the World (666 x 2 - Lk.4:5), the Ruler of this World [Satan] (666 x 7 - Jn.12:31), Merchants of the Earth (666 - Rev.18:3), etc.. It is not, however, a general number for wickedness at all, and is not universal in its application as 13 is, for example. Indeed, what is fascinating is that the Greek for "the Beast" adds up to 616, not 666. This makes much better sense because we read in Rev.13:18, "Here is wisdom, Let him who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of man, and its number is 616". The evidence strongly suggests that the original number was 616 but was later substituted by 666, for reasons that I will not discuss here, other than to quote Dr. Paul Lewes Couched in his book, A Key to Christian Origins (Watts & Co., London, 1932, p.140):
Virtually every reference to the "beast" in the Hebrew Old Testament is a multiple of 616 and appears throughout the New Testament in connection with related topics (e.g. the Greek for "deceived", "the harlot", "evil", "wickedness", is 616 or a multiple thereof). The idea that 666 is the "number of the beast" could well be a myth, therefore, unless both numbers are appropriate. Since Nero in Hebrew adds up to 666, the appearance of this number may well be accounted for in the later manuscripts as Christians sought to identify this antichrist with the end-time Beast.. The triplet 777 appears in the Scriptures and signifies "the love of God", as contrasted with 666 which renders "the wrath of God". FROM: http://www.nccg.org/359Art-333.html
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The Exact Location of the City of Jerusalem
LATITUDE & LONGITUDE
 Latitude is shown as a horizontal line and is the angular distance, in degrees, minutes, and seconds of a point north or south of the Equator. Lines of latitude are often referred to as parallels. Longitude is shown as a vertical line and is the angular distance, in degrees, minutes, and seconds, of a point east or west of the Prime (Greenwich) Meridian. Lines of longitude are often referred to as meridians. Distance
between Lines If you divide the circumference of the earth (approximately
25,000 miles) by 360 degrees, the distance on the earth's
surface for each one degree of latitude or longitude is just over 69
miles, or 111 km.Minutes
and Seconds For precision purposes, degrees of longitude and
latitude have been divided into minutes (') and seconds (").
There are 60 minutes in each degree. Each minute is divided into 60
seconds. Seconds can be further divided into tenths, hundredths, or
even thousandths.
The exact center of the city of Jerusalem (Yerushalayim) is 31° 47' 00 N by 35° 13' 00 E. If we add the numbers we get: 31° 47' 00 N This, of course, may simply be a coincidence, but the probability of this happening is over 99,999,999 to one. You can check to location yourself at: MapQuest : Latitude/Longitude Map Search
FROM: http://www.thenazareneway.com/666_the_number_of_the_beast.htm
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METAPHYSICALLY SPEAKING OF 616 Pythagorus followed strict rules of initiation, which kept their most potent doctrines shrouded in secrecy, we might expect that the Pythagorean Theorem that is accessible to sophomores would not rank high on their scale of powerful knowledge. Rather, it would be the “elementary” lesson taught to novices in order to point them toward some much deeper mystery. And what might that mystery be? While there is an infinite series of integers that satisfy the second-order equation a2 + b2 = c2, there is only one unique sequence of integers that solve the third-order expression a3 + b3 + c3 = d3. Those numbers are 3, 4, 5 and 6 ― with 63 being equal to 216. If the second-order Pythagorean Theorem defines the geometry of a right triangle, the more esoteric third-order equation refers to the geometry of a figure that extends beyond three-dimensional Space! Add to this the fact that six cubed may be expressed as 6@6@6, and one would have to agree that the number 216 has a strong whiff of sulfur about it! Getting back to Mani’s “fourth time”, his chronology appears to dovetail with that of Midrashic sources, which speak of eight “Great Months” extending from Adam’s Fall to the era of the Messiah. Under this reckoning, each “Great Month” consists of 490 years ― a duration derived from the Great Conjunctions of the planets Jupiter and Saturn. Since these were the two outermost planets known to the ancients, the 20-year intervals between their conjunctions constituted the longest astronomical cycles observable within our solar system. Even longer cosmic cycles were based on the position of the great conjunctions in relation to the Zodiac’s four elements or “triplicities” ― Fire, Earth, Air and Water. Astrologers of old observed that the Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions make the transition from one triplicity to the next ― an event they called a “mutation” ― in periods of approximately 240 years. The Great Conjunctions complete a full circuit of the Zodiac in four mutations, a period known as a “great mutation”. Since the Hebrews’ prophetic “Great Month”, to which Mani was referring, closely corresponds to two mutations, it may be inferred that these “months” begin and end with Great Conjunctions. Furthermore, if the “Great Month” changes at every other mutation, then the great conjunction at the inception of each successive “month” must invariably alternate along the same axis of opposing triplicities ― i.e. either Fire-Air or Water-Earth. According to the Midrashic “Prophecy of Enoch”, the birth of the Messiah was to mark beginning of the eighth “Great Month”. As we have mentioned earlier, Jesus’ actual nativity coincided with the Jupiter-Saturn conjunctions of 7 BC, when the superimposed planets Jupiter and Saturn appeared as the “Star of Bethlehem” in the Water sign Pisces. The great conjunction of the Christ’s nativity was the last of its series in the Water signs, with the next such conjunction (14 AD) located in Sagittarius, a Fire sign. Thus, the Nativity coincided with the Water‑to‑Fire mutation which launched the eighth “Great Month”. Consequently, we deduce that the Great Conjunctions initiating the “Great Months” must alternate between Fire and Air signs. Mani’s chronology picks up where the Midrash leaves off, then Mani’s “fourth time” must relate to the four “Great Months” following the eighth “month”, which marked the beginning of the Messianic era. Hence the “fourth time” is equivalent to the Midrashic twelfth “Great Month”. The twelfth “month” extends from 1603 AD to 2020 AD. This “month” opened with a remarkable cosmic prodigy ― the appearance of a bright-red Supernova in the constellation Ophiuchus, very close to the conjunction of Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. My reader may recall our earlier discussion of Milton’s vision in Paradise Lost of Satan ascending to his “zenith” in the constellation Ophiuchus. The Supernova appeared on October 9, 1604, the first day of the Jewish festival of Succoth, which is mystically linked to the coming of the Messiah. Within a few days, Supernova 1604 ― or “Kepler’s Star”, as it was also known ― outshone the three planets and every other star in the sky. It would continue to dominate the night sky for 17 months, after which it faded away. The number 17 has apocalyptic connotations, especially with respect to the looming crisis of the Roman Papacy. The spectacular appearance of Kepler’s Star in 1604 was a veritable signal for the emergence ― or, perhaps better said, re-emergence ― of a number of occult “secret societies” which traced their origins to the medieval Knights Templar. The most prominent of these at the time was the Order of the Rosy Cross, or Rosicrucians. Anonymous Rosicrucian manifestoes spoke of the discovery in 1604 of the tomb of Christian Rosenkreutz ― literally “Christ of the Rosy Cross”. This pseudo-Christ was of the type of the vegetative “Green Man”, who undergoes endless cycles of death and rebirth. The rose is an esoteric symbol for perpetual regeneration, because rose petals distribute themselves around the stem in accordance with the mathematical proportion of the Golden Mean phi, which exhibits the property of self-replication. The transitional period, during which the twelfth “Great Month” will overlap the thirteenth, began on May 28, 2000, with the great conjunction in Taurus, and will end on December 21, 2020, with the great conjunction in Aquarius. Within this transitional timeframe will fall the end of Mani’s “fourth time”, when we can expect the “Statue”/Beast to be revived. One intriguing post-script to this little digression of ours will bring us back to our main theme. In the Jewish calendar system, there was a “leap month”, periodically intercalated to reconcile lunar and solar time, which resulted in every nineteenth year containing not twelve but thirteen months. In the context of the prophetic chronology we have been discussing, this thirteenth month, coming as it does after the “end of Time”, fits squarely into the scenario of Christ’s Millennial reign in the New Jerusalem. But we must not overlook the fact that it jives just as solidly with the Manichaean-Arian conception of a purely temporal “Messianic” kingdom based on a regenerated “Adam”. “Adam” represents the Male principle which generates all of our experience of the manifest Universe. Due to the breakdown of this principle, the Eternal image or archetype of Man residing in the feminine Unconscious becomes static and “frozen”, for lack of renewal by creative Consciousness. Perhaps this is why the Kabbalah teaches that the “son of David” shall not come until all souls that are in the body of Adam “have come out”. In other words, since the Male principle “Adam” is dead, the Female principle can do nothing but replicate his form until it is utterly exhausted of content. At that juncture will appear the “son of David” who, we have thus far concluded, is the false Messiah ― described by Irenaeus as the “recapitulation” of all that has separated humanity from God throughout history. As the recapitulation of all of the apostasy latent in Adam, the Man of Sin completely empties the moribund form of the collective Male and leaves its place in the Unconscious temporarily vacant. Into that void steps the Son of Man as the archetype of the New Man. The counterpart of the New Man is a renewed Bride, who now reflects His image forth in the fullness of Her Glory. Given that the Bride is traditionally represented by the nuptial Cup, the Parousia is, in a manner of speaking, “rehearsed” in the Eucharistic feast: The Paraclete descends upon the Ciborium, whose transformed Interior brings forth the Body of Christ. And if the Bride is also the Church ― which is to say, the people of God ― then it becomes inevitable that the final act in the salvation of Man is an act of Man himself. It must be so, because evil can only be negated at its source, which is within us ― “Omne malum ab homine”. Collective humanity must give birth to the Son of Man, just as the Blessed Virgin ― the divine image of God’s people ― delivered Christ out of her own womb. To fathom the meaning implicit in the Pentecost, we need look no further than the presence of Our Lady with the Apostles in the upper room. Her pregnancy came to term in the ninth month, and in the beginning of the ninth “Great Month” our collective pregnancy began, as Jesus himself announced only days before his execution: And woe unto them that are with child, and to them that give suck in those days! To the popular mind, the Second Coming is the apparition of Jesus, Deus ex machina, from outside of Time to end Time. But we must remember that Jesus is the Octave: He is eighth in the line of the Hebrew prophets; his incarnation, as prophesied, occurs in the eighth “Great Month”; the gematria of his name is 888. The eighth simultaneously completes the lower Octave and inaugurates the next higher ― exactly as the Messiah is both the final event of Time and the first event of the new Aeon. Q.e.d., He will not come from outside of Space/Time, but He will come from the Microcosm, which is the Infinite human Interior ― the great Chalice of the ultimate transubstantiation. Here we begin to limn the outlines of the great Mystery of the Grail, because the instrument of this transubstantiation is itself a thing transformed ― in the twinkling of an eye ― from what it had been. In other words, the Grail of human Redemption is ― up to the last conceivable moment of Time ― the Cup raised to the mouth of the Harlot drunken with the blood of the Saints. Hers is not the blessed Womb, but rather the Cauldron in which the corpse of the old Man may be continually regenerated. It is a purely vegetative generation that follows the mathematical principles known to the antediluvians. As we have seen, the Cainites encoded these secrets on the dual pillars, the prototypes of those that stood outside the Sanctuary of Solomon’s Temple ... as if waiting for the opportunity to enter. According to the prophecies of Daniel and St. Paul, that opportunity has presented itself, and the day is now upon us when the Abomination generated out of the numerology of those two pillars will boldly stride into the Holy Place. Of this numerology ― a veritable obsession of the those who follow the contra-Apostolic succession ― we have already stumbled upon several principles. For example, we have observed that the Son of Man is incarnated in the eighth “Great Month” and that He returns to reign in the thirteenth. We have also talked about the Golden Mean, the mathematical proportion of the biological growth spiral, which may be approximated by the ratio eight-thirteenths, or about .616. Quite notably, 616 is the “number of the Beast” in the Greek versions of St. John’s Revelation, because the sum of the numerical equivalents of the Greek letters in “Caesar-god” yields 616. The Golden Mean, phi φ , is one of those “transcendental” numbers, like pi π, that can never be expressed with complete exactness, but rather must be represented by a sequence of ratios that “converge” upon its value. In the case of the Golden Mean, the sequence of ratios that converges on its value is determined by what mathematicians call the “Fibonacci Series”, which looks like this: 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, 21, 34, 55, 89, 144, 233, 377, 610 ... Tellingly, we find that the Fibonacci Series “generates itself”, insofar as each successive integer is the sum of the two that precede it. This explains why it is the mathematical model of self-replicating growth. No factor external to the succession itself is required for its indefinite extension. Totally lacking, therefore, is the “inspiration” which characterizes Creation. What remains is unexalted, unrelenting growth, of which a cancer cell is perhaps the epitome. If we take the ratio of each successive integer in the Fibonacci series to that which follows it, we get a series of decimals that asymptotically approach the value of φ. Let’s glance at the first few entries in this series: ; 2:3 = .666 3:5 = .600 5:8 = .625 8:13 = .615 ... We observe that this series of ratios converges toward the Golden Mean as we move from the left, but that it equally diverges toward the Beast’s .666 as we move from the right. Hence, it at once describes the left-handed involution of the Female principle toward φ and the complementary right-handed evolution which projects Antichrist upon the plane of manifestation. As we have already recognized, the ratio 8:13 incorporates a diabolical parallel to the two Advents of the Son of Man in the eighth and thirteenth “Great Months”. It relates to the parousia of the Man of Sin on another level ― a cosmic one ― as well. Considering the planetary orbits of the Earth and Venus, we discover the amazing coincidence that they exactly synchronize with each other in the φ proportion 8:13. Every eight terrestrial years, Venus completes exactly thirteen orbits around the Sun. Furthermore, as we move “outward” from 8:13 in our series of φ-ratios, we next encounter 5:8, which happens to be the ratio of the Earth’s orbital period to the interval of its inferior conjunctions with Venus. Finally, the locations of these conjunctions trace a pentagram on the ecliptic plane every eight years. In the symbolism of the Tarot and the Grail, which evolved together as systems of Cathar hieroglyphs, the pentacle is associated with the Paschal dish of the Last Supper, or alternately with the platter on which the Baptist’s head was placed. Significantly, the Arian heresy of the medieval Knights Templar also involved the idolatrous adoration of a bearded human head known as Baphomet, which appears to be an amalgam of Baptist and Mahomet. All of these heretical icons derive from the skull of Adam, the ultimate symbol of the continual reincarnation of the dead Male principle out of the Cauldron of the goddess of Eros and Death. Mythology abounds with examples of this regeneration motif. The Celtic bards or Arthurian times, for example, sang of the ogre Bran, father of Guinevere, who owned the Cauldron of Cerridwen, out of which heroes were reanimated. Bran’s severed head was also consulted for divinatory purposes and was said to ensure the fertility of the land and to protect London from invaders. Many interpreters of the Grail Legend have connected the Celtic ogre Bran with the similarly-named Fisher King Brons and have viewed the Grail Cup itself as a derivative of Bran’s Cauldron. Bran was a vegetative god in the genre of the “Green Man”. His worship involved the now-familiar pattern of periodic fratricide involving his brother Beli ― who, as the name implies, was an offshoot of the Babylonian-Philistine abomination Bel or Baal. The dead god would be ritually interred in an oracular cave constructed to resemble an underground beehive, from which the Queen Bee goddess would attend to his rebirth. As we have learned, the recapitulation of the sacred king invokes the “outward moving” direction of the Fibonacci φ-ratio sequence, which diverges toward .666. Hence we have the hexagonal geometry of the Bran’s beehive tomb, as well as the six-sided format of his brother Beli’s temple at Stonehenge. Although the archaic rituals of royal reincarnation may strike us as mere primitive superstition, the underlying faith in the Roi perdu ― familiar to us as Tennyson’s “Once and Future King” ― is every bit as pervasive in “modern” cultures. The most obvious example is the unwavering romantic attachment to the figure of King Arthur. Arthur’s name derives from the Welsh for “bear” ― signifying both his extended “hibernation” and his fealty to the ursine lunar goddess, with her monthly cycles of death and rebirth. Among the Germans, there is a strangely similar legend concerning the 12th Century Holy Roman Emperor Frederick Barbarossa. It is written that he never actually died, but fell asleep in a mountain grotto in Thuringia, from whence he will one day return to rule the World for a thousand years. In no small measure, the nightmare of Nazism drew upon the Barbarossa myth to implant its own version of the Thousand Year Reich in the mass psyche. The detail of Frederick Barbarossa’s somnolence in a Thuringian grotto positively links his legend to that of the heroic knight Tannhäuser, which is celebrated in the Wagnerian opera of the same name. A minnesinger ― the German equivalent of a troubadour ― Tannhäuser was seduced by the goddess Venus and spent seven years indulging his carnal appetites at her court in the Horselloch Cavern of Thuringia. Returning at last to the World, he vainly sought absolution for his sins from one priest after another, appealing finally to the Pope, who dismissed him with the words: “You have as much chance of receiving absolution as this dry wooden staff in my hand has of sprouting green leaves!” Miraculously, the Pontiff’s staff did sprout fresh shoots three days later, but a despairing Tannhäuser had already returned to the pleasures of Venus’ court, where folklore has him remaining “until the end of Time”. We already know that the sprouting branch is an emblem of a Messianic legacy which is to be falsely claimed by pretenders. But the Tannhäuser-Barbarossa story takes us one step further into the perversion of this scriptural image by introducing the heretical theme of Life from Death. While the Old Testament prophets spoke of a King to come out of the living root of Jesse, the German legends allude to a Great Emperor literally revived from the dead, like Nero redivivus. Interestingly, Nostradamus offers us a variant of this same mythic motif in the following Quatrains: The
tree that had long been dead and withered, In
one night will come to turn green again: Cronus
sick King, stump-footed Prince, ... The
world on the verge of the end-Time, FROM: http://apokalypso.com/Ch7_Quest-of-Grail.htm
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MATHEMATICS OF THE GREEKS AND THE HEBREWS
DREAMS OF THE GREAT EARTHCHANGES - MAIN INDEX
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