Its all over popular culture: movies, music, you name it. The Antichrists number is 666. Not sure what his area code is, though
For two millennia, the number 666 has been known and feared as the devils symbol: the mark of the Beast, his son, who as the Antichrist will rule the world in blood and horror before the final judgement of God. Cheerful stuff, were sure youll agree. Even if youre not a Christian (or a Satanist, maybe) and you dont believe in such delightful stories of love, harmony and turning the other cheek, youll have heard of the number ranking right up there with the number 13 as considered incredibly unlucky. The number itself is taken from the final book of the Bible, Revelation: the hallucinogenic fever dream of a man known only as John, about whom very little is known. In it there are umpteen number puzzles and ciphers and bizarre imagery, all apparently designed to keep paranoid schizophrenics and conspiracy theorists busy for a few thousand years, and the mark of the Beast is one such. 666, thats the one except its not. A recent new translation of the oldest copy of the book of Revelation in existence has proven that the number of the Beast is actually 616. They were fifty off good news if youre buying a sofa, bad news if youve spent a small fortune avoiding any mention of the number 666, as happened with US highway 666, which was renamed highway 491 a dozen years ago at significant time and expense. Worse news for Moscows highway administration departments, though back in 1999, they renamed their ill-fated bus route to Hell from Route 666 to Route 616. So now everyone has transport to the end of the world. Good to know.
Professional writer, punk werewolf and nesting place for starfish. Obsessed with squid, spirals and story. I publish short weird fiction online at desincarne.com, and tweet nonsense under the name Jack The Bodiless. You can follow me all you like, just don't touch my stuff.
