Before Jerusalem Fell

The Role of Nero Caesar 199
666. An ancient Hebrew or Aramaic spelling of “Nero Caesar”
(although not the most common one), was “Nnurz Qsr,” which can
be enumerated as follows:
2=50 7=200 1 = 6 2=50 ~=100 D=60 h=200
thus:
l~p 317;=666
According to Stuart, Professor Benary of Berlin noted long ago
that in the Talmud and other Rabbinical writings Nero was spelled
thus. 22
In fact, “the secret [i.e., the Neronic identity of the referent of
666] has been almost simultaneously rediscovered of late years by
Fritzsche in Halle, by Benary in Berlin, by Reuss in Strasbourg, and
by Hitzig in Heidelberg.”2 3
Although it is true that “Caesar” was
often spelled in the Rabbinic literature with an additional letter ,
Hort notes that there is “excellent authority” for the precise spelling
required .24 The same observation was made by Jastrow 25
and Ewald.26
Indeed, even were there no such evidence, Swete observes that
Revelation’s spelling would be quite acceptable as a cipher. 27
But
today hard archaeological documentary evidence for just such a
spelling of Nero’s name has been found in a Murabba’at document
of the Qumran community.
It may now be pointed out that in an Aramaic document from
Murabba’at . . . , dated to the “second year of the emperor Nero,”
the name is spelled ~~~ l’lq~ as required by the theory [i.e., that 666
signifies Nero]. The last two consonants of 7D~ are damaged, but
enough is preserved to show that no vowel-letter was written between
the ~ and CI.Z8
22. Moses Stuart, CommentaU on the Apoca@e, 2 VOIS. (Andover Allen, Merrill, and
Wardwell, 1845) 2:457.
23. Farrar, Ear~ Ilay$, p.471 n. 4.
24. F. J. A. Hort, Thz Apoca@se ofSt. John: Z-IZI (1.ondon: Macmillan, 1908), p. xxxi.
25. Mareus Jastrow, A Dichanmy of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yeru.rhalmt, and
the Mzdrashic Literature (New York: Paroles, 1950).
26. H. A. Ewald, Die Johunn. Schnjkm, 2:203 (cited in Farrar, Ear~ Days, p. 471 n. 4).
27. Swete, Revelation, p. 176.
28, D. R. Hillers, “Revelation 13:18 and A Scroll from Murabba’at,” Bzdkfin of the
American Schools of Oriental Research 170 (Apr. 1963):65. The evidence can be seen by
consulting the French work edited by P, Benoit, J. T. Milik, and R. DeVaux, Dticoveties
in the Judean Desert ofJordan II (Oxford, 1961), p. 18, plate 29.