Abjad is a traditional alphanumeric system used in Arabic and related Semitic languages in which each letter is assigned a numerical value. The origin of the mathematical logic underlying these values is unknown, much like the deeper origin of the Arabic language’s own structure, which is built on a triliteral root system still in use today. The Abjad system can be traced back at least 4,000 years. Long before the adoption of modern numerals, letters themselves functioned as numbers, allowing words, names, and phrases to be represented quantitatively. This system was widely used for chronology, poetic structure, cataloguing, and symbolic analysis across the Islamic world.

Rather than treating language as purely phonetic, Abjad reflects an older way of understanding letters as structured units of meaning. Certain ancient languages (e.g. Sanskrit and Nahuatl), though developing independently, exhibit remarkably ordered and often mathematical internal architectures. Modern linguistics tends to focus on language change and deterioration, yet rarely asks how such highly structured systems emerged in what are often described as “primitive” societies. Just as the universe today is understood through numbers (where meaning is inferred from equations) earlier cultures also approached meaning through language. The design of ancient languages made it possible to derive layered meanings from words, suggesting that language itself operates according to underlying mathematical principles. In this sense, the universe communicates through signs that human beings formalize as equations, while human speech (our primary mode of communication) may once have been more mathematically precise and meaning-dense than it is today, functioning as a linguistic aid through which humans sought to understand divine signs, not as a mediator of the Divine itself.

Arabic is unique among ancient languages in that it has been spoken continuously as a living language without interruption from antiquity to the present. Unlike languages such as Sanskrit or Latin, which were abandoned as vernaculars and preserved only in liturgical or scholarly contexts, Arabic never ceased to function as a spoken language, even among non-Arab communities living in Arabia and the wider Islamic world. The Qur’an did not revive a dormant language, but rather preserved a classical form of an already living one, creating an unbroken continuity between spoken usage and a fixed textual standard that has no close parallel elsewhere.

This positions Arabic as perhaps the most suitable language for a system like Abjad. Its uninterrupted continuity and relative preservation of structural integrity have maintained not only its letters, but also its phonetic precision and semantic depth. For these reasons, Arabic remains uniquely well-suited to numerical analysis through its letters.

Click Here for an Abjad Calculator that can be used to calculate the numerical value of Arabic words by summing the classical Abjad values assigned to each letter.

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The Mark of The Beast

In recent years, growing interest in eschatology has led many people to re-examine symbolic systems that were historically used to encode meaning beyond the surface level of texts. One well-known example is the “mark of the beast” a concept from the Book of Revelation (specifically Revelation 13:16–18) in the Christian New Testament. It is described symbolically, not as a straightforward object or technology.

In the text, the “beast” causes people to receive a mark on their right hand or forehead, without which they cannot buy or sell. The passage then says: “This calls for wisdom: let the one who has understanding calculate the number of the beast, for it is the number of a man, and his number is 666.” Some manuscripts give 616 instead.

But what is the biblical definition of a beast?

In biblical literature, the term “beast” functions as a symbolic category rather than a biological one, and its meaning is established most clearly in the Book of Daniel, where successive “beasts” are explicitly interpreted as empires or ruling powers that govern through force rather than moral restraint (e.g. “these great beasts… are kings which shall arise”).

These beasts are contrasted with the “Son of Man,” a figure representing truly human rule grounded in moral responsibility, making the distinction ethical rather than zoological. Revelation deliberately adopts this established symbolism: the beast speaks, strategizes, enforces economic control, demands allegiance, and regulates participation in society. These are traits of coordinated systems, not animals or isolated individuals. Its emergence from the “sea,” a common biblical symbol for chaotic masses or unformed power, further signals collective structures rather than singular creatures. The defining feature of the beast is therefore not intelligence or organization, but power exercised without accountability to divine or moral law. In this sense, a “beast” represents a dominant political, economic, or ideological system that mimics human authority while operating in a fundamentally dehumanizing way, reducing persons to instruments rather than recognizing them as morally accountable agents.

As for the “mark of the beast”, a few key points matter for understanding it correctly:

First, the mark is explicitly tied to a number and a name, not merely a physical sign. The text invites the reader to calculate the number, which strongly suggests an alphanumeric system where letters correspond to numbers. In the Greco-Roman world this was done through isopsephy (Greek letter–numbers), and in Semitic cultures through systems like Abjad or gematria. Early readers would have naturally understood this as a numerical encoding of a name or identity (not a barcode, chip, or medical procedure).

Second, the forehead and hand are symbolic locations. In biblical language, the forehead represents belief, allegiance, or worldview, while the hand represents action and behavior. In other words, the “mark” signifies who one aligns with in thought and deed, not necessarily a visible stamp.

Third, historically, many scholars interpret the number as a coded reference to a contemporary figure (often Nero Caesar), whose name can be numerically calculated to equal 666 using Hebrew letter values. This reading fits the historical context of Roman persecution and explains why the text emphasizes calculation and wisdom rather than recognition.

Today in Christian theology and popular culture, the mark became detached from its symbolic and linguistic roots and was reimagined as a literal future device tied to end-times speculation. This shift often ignores how ancient audiences actually read texts, through symbolic language, numerical encoding, and layered meaning.

However, in the symbolic language of Revelation, if the “beast” were present today it would not be a single person or object, but a system of power that governs human life through efficiency, control, and compliance while operating without moral accountability. It would shape belief (what is considered true or acceptable) and action (who may participate economically or socially), rewarding alignment and marginalizing dissent, not through overt cruelty alone but through normalization and necessity. In that sense, the beast would be recognizable less by spectacle than by its ability to reduce human beings to functions within a system, while presenting itself as inevitable, rational, and indispensable.

Crucially, the symbol points to a pattern, not a prophecy checklist: wherever power becomes totalizing, demands allegiance in thought and behavior, and severs itself from transcendent moral limits, the logic of the “beast” is already at work.

This is eerily similar to the alliance of the western world today (US, Canada, Europe and Australia), where participation in ordinary life, working, traveling, accessing healthcare or buying food, all depends on full integration into a centralized system that evaluates people continuously. The system does not require people to believe anything explicitly, but it quietly enforces conformity by tying access to economic and social life, towards compliance. If you align with its standards, everything works smoothly; if you don’t, doors begin to close, not violently, but administratively.

Over time, people internalize this logic. They adjust their beliefs to avoid friction (the forehead), and they adjust their behavior to remain functional within the system (the hand). The system presents itself as neutral, efficient, and necessary, merely “how things work.” No one needs to worship it, and no single ruler needs to announce authority. Power operates impersonally, through rules, metrics, and incentives. Moral questions are reframed as technical ones, and responsibility is diffused: no one is accountable, yet everyone must comply.

In biblical terms, this is what makes the system beast-like: not cruelty or spectacle, but power without conscience, intelligence without moral orientation, and coordination without responsibility. It looks orderly, even beneficial, but it gradually reduces human beings to inputs, scores, and permissions, functioning smoothly while quietly eroding moral agency.

That is the kind of system the symbol is meant to help people recognize, not fear.

In its most overt form, a beastly system seeks to dominate. In the context of expansion, such as colonization, it can conveniently ethnically cleanses a society without repercussion. This does not begin with mass violence; it begins with reclassification. The targeted population is first redefined in language and law, not as neighbors or citizens, but as problems, risks, or obstacles to progress. Their identity is reduced to a single trait, which is then framed as incompatible with security, modernity, or stability. This linguistic shift is crucial: once a people are no longer seen as fully human moral agents, actions taken against them can be presented as administrative necessities rather than crimes.

The next phase is systematic exclusion, carried out through institutions rather than mobs. Access to land, employment, education, movement, and legal protection is gradually restricted. Economic suffocation replaces immediate expulsion. Everyday life becomes unlivable, but in ways that appear bureaucratic and impersonal, such as resources withheld, diplomatically isolated, and history distorted beyond recognition. At this stage, the system often claims moral innocence: “no one is being targeted; these are just policies.” Violence, when it occurs, is framed as enforcement rather than aggression.

Finally, overt force is used not as an outburst of hatred, but as a mechanism of completion. By the time displacement, expulsion, or extermination occurs, the moral groundwork has already been laid. The population has been portrayed as alien, dangerous, or expendable, and the broader society has been conditioned to see their removal as regrettable but necessary. This is the hallmark of a beastly system: atrocity without conscience, carried out through structures that diffuse responsibility so thoroughly that no one feels personally accountable.

In biblical terms, this is why such systems are called “beasts.” They possess intelligence, planning, and coordination, but lack moral restraint. They do not merely conquer territory; they colonize meaning, rewriting who counts as human and what counts as justice. And once a society accepts that logic, the system no longer needs to justify itself, the machinery runs on its own.

In Revelation, the beast is not identified by appearance or announcement, but by name rendered as number. The text explicitly says, “let the one with understanding calculate the number,” which assumes that the beast can be recognized through contemporary names encoded numerically, using the alphanumeric conventions of the time.

The key limitation, however, is this: the text does not authorize free speculation or name-hunting across all times. The number functions as confirmation, not discovery. It presupposes that the audience already recognizes the system, authority, or figure in question, and the numerical calculation merely reveals what is already evident about its character. This prevents the symbol from collapsing into paranoia or arbitrary accusation.

Considering in its most overt form, the beastly system is uniquely manifested itself in the apartheid state of modern day Israel.

1. It dehumanizes Palestinians through language, labelling the targeted population as a problem, threat, or obstacle rather than as fully human moral agents.
2. It systematically uses legal and bureaucratic exclusion, such as vetoes in the UN, laws, permits, classifications, and administrative rules to restrict statehood, movement, work, land access, and civil participation.
3. Palestinians are economically strangulated, where their livelihoods are systematically undermined so that survival becomes increasingly difficult without overt mass violence.
4. The apartheid state consistently uses tactics of moral inversion, where acts of oppression are framed as security, order, or necessity, while resistance is labeled extremism or disorder.
5. Palestinians are collectively punished. Individuals are treated as interchangeable members of a group, with guilt assigned by identity rather than action.
6. The system which involves the US and Europe, effectively diffuses responsibility, where no single actor appears accountable, harm is conveniently carried out through “casualties of war,” “unavoidable policies,” and “safety measures.”
7. When starvation or inhumane force is escalated and displacement through violence is rampant, it is presented as administration, enforcement or relocation for the greater good and not as moral wrongdoing.
8. Cruelty is normalized, what once seemed unthinkable (such as 20,000 children murdered live on social media, in an open air prison) becomes routine, procedural, and emotionally distant.
9. There is a claim of inevitability. The system portrays itself as unavoidable, “this is just how the world works now.”

Taken together, these traits describe power that is organized, intelligent, and effective, yet unaccountable to moral limits, which is precisely why biblical literature names such systems “beasts.”

As discussed above, because Arabic remains uniquely well-suited to numerical analysis through its letters, we can test the applicability of Israel, as the most overt form of the beast.

I invite anyone to try and calculate using abjad or by Clicking Here, the name of the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu transliterated into Arabic: بنجمن نتنيَهو

The result should shed some light on the head of the contemporary “beast” of our time, and the implications for the future of the wider world.