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Identifying the name with Nero mistakenly assumes a knowledge of Hebrew and of the Hebrew system of gematria among native Greek readers. Furthermore, to choose the name "Caesar Nero" is too convenient for the Neronic dating, since there were many possible titles and names for Nero. Also in transliteration of foreign names into Hebrew there was considerable latitude in treatment of vowels and three possible equivalents for s [ס, שׂ, שׁ]. And why would the author not use a Greek form instead of a Hebrew form?3
Mounce pithily observes, "What is not generally stressed is that this solution asks us to calculate a Hebrew transliteration of the Greek form of a Latin name, and that with a defective spelling."4Notes
1 Andy Woods, "Revelation 13 and the First Beast," in Tim LaHaye, and Thomas Ice, eds., The End Times Controversy (Eugene, OR: Harvest House Publishers, 2003), 246.
2 Woods, "Revelation 13 and the First Beast," 246.
3 Gregory K. Beale, The Book of Revelation: A Commentary on the Greek Text (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1999), s.v. "Nero not Number of Beast."
4 Robert H. Mounce, The Book of Revelation (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1977), 264.
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