Dear Tim, John and Doves:
Thanks to all for reading my post on Feb 21st concerning the image of the beast. And in case I don’t say it enough, thanks again John Tng for providing this marvelous 5-Doves web-site for your Brothers and Sisters in Christ. Surely your rewards will be great someday.
Tim, as far as the numbers 616 or 666, I don’t find either one in my King James Bible. The text reads…Six hundred three score and six, not 666 or 616. John admonishes us to …count the number of the beast if we are to have wisdom and understanding about this.
600 = Six hundred
60 = sixty
6 = six
is entirely different than 666!
We will be wise if we compare Scripture with Scripture (1Cor 2:13), rather than making the word of God of none effect by believing man’s traditions (Mk 7:13). Solomon was referred to as the wisest man that ever lived. 1 Kings 10:14 says Now the weight of gold that came to Solomon in one year six hundred threescore and six talents of gold. Best I can tell, that 4 ½ tons of gold paid to Solomon on the temple mount was like a “tax” from his surrounding Arab neighbors. Therefore to be wise, we should look back to this same mention of “six hundred threescore and six” to help us solve the riddle in Rev. 13:18.
We read in Daniel 1:1-2, 2 Kings 24:13, and 2 Chronicles 36:10, that Nebuchadnezzar carried all this gold Solomon had stored in the temple treasury to Babylon which commenced the times of the gentiles in 606 B.C.
Now as far as counting those individual numbers go, we read in 1 Chronicles 21:25 that Solomon’s Father King David bought the threshing floor (Temple Mount/Mt. Moriah) from Ornan a Jebusite Prince who owned the land for six hundred Shekels of gold by weight.
Then in Daniel 3:1, referring to the temple mount gold Nebuchadnezzar stole from the temple mount treasury, we read: Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, whose height was threescore cubits, and the breadth thereof six cubits: he set it up in the plain of Dura, in the province of Babylon.
Since the beast map you were referring to http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/feb2006/davidb222.htm has Iraq/Babylon as it’s heart, where the temple gold was taken to by Nebuchadnezzar and later converted into the image set up in Babylon, I believe there is a definite connection to today. That Islamic beast is getting ready to pounce on Israel with everything it’s got! I believe the Arab leader (11th horn/Mahdi) of this beast hidden in the map, will probably come out of Iraq and be and may be a Shiite.
To sum it up Tim, I had rather go with this scriptural explaination of the “Six hundred threescore and six” number rather than the 666 traditional rendering. I admit I don’t have it all worked out yet, but I believe the number of the beast has something to do with a tax imposed on the residents of Jerusalem, Judaea and the surrounding region, specifically a Moslem pole tax called the “jizya”. When the Islamofachist beast antichrist king invades Israel in the near future, none will be able to afford to pay this “jizya” tax due to the lack of money caused by the famine associated with the riding of the black horse of Revelation 6:5. Therefore, he causeth all to receive this mark and submit to Allah, or die!
In the early years of Islam, an Islamic conquer named Suleiman (715-717), had a tax collector named Usamah that would brand a symbol on the bodies of the tax payers. If they refused the symbol or mark, then they were beheaded. I believe this future jizya tax mark will have something to do with Allah. I do not believe it will be worldwide, but confined to the prophetic earth around Israel.
As far as the pope being the beast or false prophet, there again I’m going to side with the Bible rather than tradition. Without getting into a long drawn out explanation on this, I’m going to refer you back to a post I did on December 16, 2004 entitled: “Here is Biblical proof: Daniel’s 4th kingdom is ISLAM and not Rome!” http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/dec2004/davidb1216.htm
Thanks again for reading my stuff, and I hope you will be a Berian and study this out to see if it could be so.
In His Service,
David Burnette@valink.com