Number of the Beast the Beast rejects gematria, envisioning the number not as a code to be broken, but a symbol to be understood. Idealists would contend that because there are so many names that can come to 666 and that most systems require converting names to other languages or adding titles when convenient, it has been impossible to come to a consensus. Given that numbers are used figuratively throughout the book of Revelation, idealists interpret this number figuratively as well. The common suggestion is that because seven is a number of completeness and is associated with the divine, that six is incomplete and
The Beast (Revelation) that interprets prophecies of the Bible, especially the Books of Daniel and Revelation, as events which have already happened in the first century AD. Preterist academic scholars generally identify the first beast from the sea with the Roman Empire, particularly with Emperor Nero. The beast from the earth is generally identified with the Roman imperial cult or the Jewish religious system of the first century that conspired with the Roman state to suppress and persecute the early church. Sometimes there is a particular identification with a personage such as a chief administrator of Roman rule in Ephesus and Asia Minor.