Satanic Posts, The Number of the Beast, and Superstitious Blogging

This calls for wisdom: let anyone with understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a person. Its number is six hundred sixty-six.
- Rev 13:18 (NRSV)

What's in a number? Tracy was so worried about her post number 666 that she got Bee to write it instead. Other people avoid 13 (especially in the US, it seems). The Chinese are famous for their belief that numbers can be lucky or unlucky.

Over the years, people have been very interested in turning names into numbers, and this is one possible interpretation of the Biblical 666.

In addition, numbers were written using letters in Latin and Ancient Greek. So 666 in Latin could be DCLXVI. The New Testament was written in Greek, and 666 could be written χξς´ , and is in some ancient Biblical manuscripts.

I once read a book on numerology. It said that you were supposed to write A=1, B=2, and so on, and then you could calculate the values of people's names. For example, "Polka" gives 55, "Dan, The People's Blogger" 206, and "Rambling thoughts of the Neverending Mind" 405.

Looking at the title of Tracy's post, and converting the numbers and symbols into what Bee actually typed you get: "TRACY HAS ASKED ME TO DO POST [POUND SIGN] SIX SIX SIX [THREE DOTS]", which adds up to, erm, 666. Coincidence? Or are there dark forces at work?


Actually, I have to confess that I tried a large number of variations (for example "Six hundred and sixty six dot dot dot", etc) until I hit on one that made the magic total. Incidentally, the title of my post also adds up to 666.

In any case, 666 might not be the Number of the Beast. According to Biblical scholars, various manuscripts of Revelations, including one dating back to the 5th Century, actually give the number as 616. And Tracy's 616th post certainly contains a number of beasts...