Sorry if I somehow have missed this, however, still.. this is NOT how God wanted us to count the number this way. God warned that his call for
wisdom is to
evaluate His Word in comparison to itself to find God's own interpretation! It means, we need to read His Word, in the light of His Word. The Bible then becomes its own interpreter and even dictionary. Not our private interpretation of a historic coin with some famous name so we can add numbers to it. Absurd! It is IMPORTANT that we allow the book of Revelation to interpret its own symbols through repetition and shed light itself through parallel usage.
When we study Scripture nobly, contrite of spirit, and with an honest view of ourselves (
as the Bereans Acts 11:17), we will begin to surrender to the authority of the Word itself, rejecting wild personal opinions. When we consider how the author (
God Himself) used the Words elsewhere in Scripture, we can begin to discern that it can only be God who defines His own terms. The Scriptures are not subject to our private interpretations or personal calculations. It is only at the point of realizing this that we will begin to understand that this beast and his number
cannot be understood by human formulas, numeric equivalents, or by overactive imaginations foreseeing a coming super devil-man. Wisdom and understanding will come
by the Spirit of Christ through a sound and ordered exegesis of God's Word itself. The answers are not found in intricately woven tales of a Satanic seed, world politics, national geography, world economics, mathematical guesswork, or unbiblical Bible codes. Selah!
The "
six hundred and sixty-six" question can only be answered from
within the pages of the Scripture
itself. The only place we can find it, not in your imagination with Titus! If we are going to be faithful to God wherein we do not lean towards our own personal understanding of the matter, then we will have to get an understanding of the imagery of Revelation from the Word of His prophecy. When we trust in the written Word, comparing Scripture with Scripture, then we are on the only path that will bring us to God's truth, rather than our own supposition of it.
Selah!