We are seeing the “mark of the beast” play out in real time before our eyes.

Let me explain.

Revelation 13 talks about two beasts, not just one. This is really important.

Probably one of the best ways I have learned to think about this passage is through word pictures. The author is inviting us into grand imagery to make a point. He is asking us to engage our imaginations fully. The “beasts” aren’t the point in and of themselves. What the beasts represent is the point.

So, in Revelation 13, it is best to compare them to the word pictures used in political cartoons. In American news media we find an elephant and donkey representing political parties. We even see a bull and a bear representing the stock market's trends.

In Revelation 13, the two beasts represent political authority (first beast) and political propaganda (second beast) that have become as destructive as “beasts” within the world. There is so much animal imagery in this chapter for the purposes of having the reader think of the character of those animals. All used to describe how these two “beasts” function.

For a small example, the second beast (political propaganda) has horns like a lamb, but speaks as a dragon (Rev 13:11). That is a very provocative way of presenting the silver tongues many publicans and dictators use to present their destructive messages as sly and “innocent.” They look like a lamb, but speak as a dragon. The lamb is also used to represent Jesus and the dragon is used to represent Satan. So this is essentially describing a "dragon dressed in sheep's clothing."

This is exactly what the author is wanting his readers to understand. John of Patmos is talking about Rome and its ruler(s), both of which had—and continued to—cruelly oppressed Christians and the world through its beast like use of political power and political propaganda. Its entire existence was owed to a predatory economy and violent force.

When we understand this, the imagery here in Revelation 13 begins to speak for itself.

There were pervasive rumors during that time that the most oppressive ruler against Christians in Roman history was going to come back from the dead: Nero Caesar. This is why in Revelation 13, you’ll see the beast from the sea described has having seven heads, representing the seven prominent mountains of Rome, and one of the heads looked to have a fatal wound (Rev 13:3). On June 9, A.D. 68, to avoid being executed after the Senate declared Nero a public enemy, he forced his secretary, Epaphroditus, to help him plunge a dagger into his throat, hence the “fatal wound.”

This beast represents the entirety of the Roman empire, which had continued to embody the beast like ways of Nero, even without him ruling. He might as well have “risen from the dead.”

This context helps us to better understand why we started this whole conversation. “The mark of the beast” which is 666.

As we notice in Revelation 13:12, the second beast "exercised all the authority of the first beast on its behalf, and made the earth and its inhabitants worship the first beast, whose fatal wound had been healed." Notice John of Patmos makes special mention of the head wound again.

This second beast is the one who orders all the inhabitants of the earth to receive the mark of the (first) beast, which John of Patmos clearly tells us what it means in Revelation 13:17: the mark "is the name of the beast or the number of its name."

Then verse 18: "This calls for wisdom. Let the person who has insight calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man. That number is 666."

So, when we apply the ancient practice of gematria, which was the practice of that time of assigning significance to the mathematical sum of the letters in a word, we understand even more of what the author is trying to convey.

When you take the Greek for Nero Caesar, “Neron Kaisar” and transliterate it into Hebrew, it becomes NRWN QSR (reading right to left of course). Then when you add numerical value to each letter using gematria, you get the total of 666.

Some Greek manuscripts of the Book of Revelation also have 616, which is the same exact process, just without the final “n” in “neron,” which is Nero. This has convinced many Biblical scholars that 666 (and 616) is most likely referring to Emperor Nero.

There is another layer to this number as well. We all know the number of God from the Bible is “7.” Especially from Genesis. The number 7 represents the number of completion or perfection. Hence God resting on the 7th day. So, 666 is a massive parody of the number of perfection. It is not just 6, but 666 repeating itself on into infinity. Where 7 represents completion, 666 represents utter imperfection.

It harkens back to the 6th day of creation in the Genesis account when humanity was created (Gen 1:24-26). Without that 7th day, the day of God’s rest, humanity is utterly incomplete. We need rest. We need our purpose to be defined outside of what we do. We need to know who we are. We need to know that life is bigger than we can comprehend. We need to find that completion that only rest can bring.

Thus, the one who bears this mark of the beast is the one who pretends in vain to be divine, but instead embodies utter imperfection. Causing us to remember the common phrase in Rome at the time, "there is no Lord but Caesar." The god-king.

I was really thankful for this interpretation because it helped me understand the Bible as a whole better. Biblical interpretation isn’t about taking the words at face value and applying them to our own time. Biblical interpretation is about understanding what the authors of scripture meant in their own time, seeing what lessons they were learning and trying to convey for themselves, then seeing how those lessons might teach us about how to be wiser and more faithful in our own, very different, time.

The essential message John of Patmos is conveying here in Revelation 13 is that Rome and its rulers are “the beast.” Rome had set up an empire that was exploiting the poor and the most vulnerable through a predatory economy and violent force. This is why Rome is compared to “Babylon” all throughout the book, which was Israel's greatest enemy. Rome and its rulers were acting just like a bloodthirsty beast. Babylon reborn. It was not just imperfect, but utterly imperfect.

The placement of this “mark” is also very symbolic in this interpretation. Revelation 13:16 tells us that it would be forced on people’s wrists and foreheads.

This would hold a lot of mystery and speculation unless we take Deuteronomy 6:4-9 into account here. In this passage, God calls all people to bind God’s words on their wrists and their foreheads as a sign of fidelity and worship of God alone. The cultic power of Rome then subverts this fidelity by demanding total allegiance to itself and its ways alone, even above God. It wants all people to be bound by its words alone, not God's Word.

This right here is the essence of Revelation 13 and probably the whole book of Revelation. Who will Christians give their ultimate fidelity to? Who will Christians “pledge their allegiance” to? The beast or the lamb? The empire or the kingdom of God?

According to Revelation 13:17, wothout this mark or forced loyalty, one cannot engage in economic activity, such as buying or selling. In the context John was speaking into, one had to swear allegiance to Caesar and his divinity in order to do business. This meant that many Christians had to decide whether to participate in a contrary claim to Jesus as lord or become destitute or even starve. This is akin to demanding loyalty today to a particular ideology from political leaders or have extreme taxes or sanctions imposed, weaponizing the economy to demand loyalty.

To be marked by the beast is to pledge allegiance to the utterly imperfect ways of the beast in such a way that you are not only marked by its practices of exploitation and violence, but you inflict that mark onto others as well.

It is whatever leaders act like Nero and whatever empire acts like Rome.

It is pharaoh and pharaoh’s Egypt.

It is Nebuchadnezzar and Nebuchadnezzar‘s Babylon.

It is Herod and Herod’s Israel.

It is Nero and Nero‘s Rome.

It is Hitler and Hitler’s Germany.

It is our current political leaders and their America today.

Whenever Christians crawl into bed with the empire, whenever they follow leaders like Nero and carry out their ways, they are "marked by the beast." John of Patmos here is not only critiquing the imperial power of Rome, but he is also warning against the church forming an unholy relationship to civil and political power. Especially those powers that are intent on exploitation and violence as a way of maintaining ensuring its own definition of “peace” and “freedom,” like Rome was.

This is a message still deeply relevant today.

The book of Revelation has so much to say to Christians who are tempted by nationalism, imperialism, a predatory economy, and the civil religion of the empire. Yet, its powerful message has been so drowned out by fiction, folk lore, and conspiracy theories that we are often not able to hear its prophetic words for the church today.

The church has been “marked by the beast” so often in its history. Like when it crawled into bed with the Roman Empire through Emperor Constantine in 313AD. Then through the heresy of “Christian empire,” it marked the world in beast like ways through the doctrine of discovery, crusades, inquisitions, genocides, slavery, and patriarchy. This heavily influenced and gave way to the manifest destiny and triumphalism of the British Empire, the Lutheran church’s support of Naziism in Germany, the Dutch Reformed Church’s support of apartheid in South Africa, and many Christian’s support of endlaving human beings and the genocide of indigenous peoples here in the United States.

Yet, there has always been a Christian resistance, like John of Patmos, who are vocal opponents of Christians getting caught up in the beast like ways of empire. Christians who insist that they will be marked by the ways of the lamb and lift up others through the kingdom of God rather than oppress them through the ways of the empire (Rev 14:1).

When we understand the power of this message, we can hear how John of Patmos and his prophetic critique of the Roman Empire and his call for the church to maintain its fidelity to Christ alone. This compels us Christians today to call out nationalism, authoritarianism, imperialism, predatory economic practices, and religious tyranny as the ways of the beast that have “marked” us and our present context.

Ways that have caused many in the American church to try to fuse their fidelity to God with the ways of our American empire. What makes discernment difficult today is how so many have fused Christianity and America as one and the same. So we are told to not look for the ways the Neros of our time are using Christianity as a tool to coerce people to be loyal to the ways of the beast.

Our American empire is currently building concentration camps, built by private prison corporations that support both Republicans and Democrats. It is ripping families apart. Spreading propaganda and conspiracy theories to stoke hatred towards marginalized communities, mostly people of color and anyone outside the Christian religion. Ignoring the rule of law. Exercising political power and even lethal force against voices of descent. Writing enormous economic bills that strip healthcare and needed assistance from our most vulnerable populations. And so much of this is being done in the name of profit.

When we see beneath the layers of modern ambiguity and fear over things like the mark of the beast and discern what scripture is actually trying to express, we find a very clear and powerful message for us Christians today. Fidelity to Christ and his ways. Resisting the temptation to act like the beasts of this world, especially in an attempt to coerce others to follow “be Christian” too.

It is important to remember that so much of our discussions around the "End Times" focuses on destruction, rather than redemption. It focuses on escaping the planet, rather being present and working towards its renewal. It focuses on the beast, rather than the lamb. It focuses on the antichrist, rather than Christ. It focuses on all the fear and none of the hope.

The reality is, the reason why this book is called "revelation" is because of what is being "revealed." God in Christ Jesus! When we have our reading shaped by Jesus and his desire to redeem, restore, and heal, we come out the other side of our interpretation with a much healthier, and more hopeful view of his return.

Moreover, it should give us a more hopeful view of the "endings" we all will experience in our own lives. It becomes less about how things will "end" and more about how all things will be made new (Revelation 21: 1-8).

It is Jesus after all. Any kind of theology of his second coming that makes his return seem anything less than joyful and restorative is one to be wary of.

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