Template:Number144000
The Number
Is their a significance to the number 144,000 found in both Revelation 7 and Revelation 14?
Certainly, everything in the Bible has significance and often on multiple levels. This is because inspired writings are meant to inspire. They are not meant to encourage an appetite for the tree of knowledge and all those things that come when we move from the tree of life to the tree of knowledge.
Inspiration by the Holy Spirit brings with it peace which comes from waiting upon the LORD and His inspiration to write His laws upon your heart and mind. This is done in patience and humility desiring His understanding and not our own or the understanding of others.
Symbolic vs Literal
The number may be both literal and symbolic at the same time but a desire for the foreknowledge of its meaning will have little or no value literally nor if we understand what that symbol may represent. The desire to know may distract from the true meaning of the text if we focus on the number.
The truth is numbers are symbols by their nature but so are words. In Hebrew letters are symbols of meanings as well as symbols for numbers, therefore Hebrew letters and numbers can symbolize more than one thing at the same time and the nuance of what is written in Hebrew may not translate to other languages. For us to grasp one of the things symbolized by a Hebrew character or number may distract us from the other deeper more spiritual meaning.
God is Spirit and His Holy Spirit preexisted everything we can feel and see in the physical universe. The Spirit of God may be seen in the patterns of creation but to know that Spirit we will not find it in our knowledge of nature. That spirit can only be accessed through spirit and not through knowledge of the symbols or observations. This takes us back to personal revelation or inspiration.
The number in text
In Revelation 7:4[1] and 14:3[2] the text translated into the number representing the "144,000" (ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσσαρες χιλιάδες) is almost identical in every source copy of the verses.
In verse Revelation 7:3 they are counting those who are sealed in their foreheads as the servants of God. In this book of Revelation there is also reference to the Mark of the Beast in the forehead of those who receive that mark.
Many struggle to understand the number 666 which we see as is both the number of the beast and the number of a man.[3] Is that mark literal or spiritual or can it be both?
If it is both we may ask, is that change physically because of a chip or a change in their DNA[4] or some other change wrought in them by the Holy Spirit?
The 70 who were the Sanhedrin of Christ were sent out by Jesus were given power, the Apostles were given power, the 120 were given power. This was all done by the Holy Spirit of God.
It appears that the 144,000 were also given power when something was changed in their mind, sealed in their forehead.
In chapter 7 the author goes on to suggest that the 144,000 is composed of the twelve tribes but we also know that there were twelve disciples and Apostles who were appointed the kingdom of God[5] by Jesus who was the Christ and laterally Priest and King.[6]
So, if the number twelve which represents perfection about the 12 tribes (who the kingdom was taken from)[7], the twelve apostles (who the kingdom was appointed to)[5], and the people gathered in the 10's, 100's, and 1000's (practicing Pure Religion by the way of the Corban of Christ) simply representing all the people seeking, following, and persevering The Way of Christ then you can represent that wider church, the whole body of Christ, with the number 144,000 = (12x12)(10x10x10).
Is there a change in the spiritual mind, the thinking, of those who receive the Mark of the Beast?
If there is a change then we may ponder how do they differ?
These verses and those verses surrounding them.[8] are giving us insight into the nature of who is represented by this number of 144,000 or is identified as as redeemed[9]
Those who were redeemed were virtually bought by the blood of Christ from the world. Because many people had become merchandise of the world through the covetous practices of the method and means they employed in the support of the free bread and social welfare of Imperial Roman Cult
The sacrifices required to support the Roman Welfare State had moved from the precept of charity and volunteerism to that of Force, Fear, and Fealty. This was the way of the Corban of the Pharisees in Judea. But more than a century before their were men like Polybius warning what would happen if the people became accustomed to obtaining benefits at the expense of their neighbor.
Those warnings were inclusive throughout the prophets of the Bible warned us of an appetite for the dainties of rulers and how it would return the masses to the Bondage of Egypt and weaken the poor like it did in Sodom.
Bu Jesus getting His followers put out of that system of Corban simply by getting his baptism when he was crucified against the desire and hope of Pontius Pilate he was able to take[7] the kingdom from those who sat in the seat of Moses by their own words and appoint it to His Church[5], which became a viable republic in the heart of the Roman empire.
- ↑ Καὶ ἤκουσα τὸν ἀριθμὸν τῶν ἐσφραγισμένων, ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσσαρες χιλιάδες, ἐσφραγισμένοι ἐκ πάσης φυλῆς υἱῶν Ἰσραήλ·
- ↑ καὶ ᾄδουσιν ὡς ᾠδὴν καινὴν ἐνώπιον τοῦ θρόνου καὶ ἐνώπιον τῶν τεσσάρων ζῴων καὶ τῶν πρεσβυτέρων· καὶ οὐδεὶς ἐδύνατο μαθεῖν τὴν ᾠδὴν εἰ μὴ αἱ ἑκατὸν τεσσεράκοντα τέσσαρες χιλιάδες, οἱ ἠγορασμένοι ἀπὸ τῆς γῆς.
- ↑ Revelation 13:17 And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. 18 Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number [is] Six hundred threescore [and] six.
(Greek-ἑξακόσιοι ἑξήκοντα ἕξ)
(Hebrew text Revelation 13:18 - שש מאות וששים ושש)
(modern translation of the number 666 - שש מאות שישים ושש)
(Ezra 2:13 the number 666 - שש מאות ששים וששה - ↑ DNA can be altered by frequencies on a sub atomic level. See Spiritual DNA.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 5.2 Appoint a kingdom
- Matthew 21:43 "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof."
- Luke 12:32 "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom."
- Luke 22:29 "And I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me;"
- John 19:15 But they cried out, Away with [him], away with [him], crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar.
- ↑ Priest and king
- Hebrews 5:6 As he saith also in another [place], Thou [art] a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.
- Hebrews 7:1 For this Melchisedec, king of Salem, priest of the most high God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him;... 17 For he testifieth, Thou [art] a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec.... 21 (For those priests were made without an oath; but this with an oath by him that said unto him, The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou [art] a priest for ever after the order of Melchisedec:)
- Psalms 110:4 The LORD hath sworn, and will not repent, Thou [art] a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek.
- ↑ 7.0 7.1 Kingdom Taken
- Matthew 2:6 "And thou Bethlehem, [in] the land of Juda, art not the least among the princes of Juda: for out of thee shall come a Governor(2233), that shall rule my people Israel."
- Matthew 9:16 "No man putteth a piece of new cloth unto an old garment, for that which is put in to fill it up taketh from the garment, and the rent is made worse. 17 Neither do men put new wine into old bottles: else the bottles break, and the wine runneth out, and the bottles perish: but they put new wine into new bottles, and both are preserved." Jesus did not just reform the kingdom.
- Matthew 21:43 "Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof." Jesus would take it as priest and king.
- Luke 13:9 "And if it bear fruit, [well]: and if not, [then] after that thou shalt cut it down." The Corbans of the world were covetous practices
- John 19:15...19 "But they cried out, Away with [him], away with [him], crucify him. Pilate saith unto them, Shall I crucify your King? The chief priests answered, We have no king but Caesar." The kingdom taken by the words of their own mouth.
- John 15:4 "Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me." The people must seek The Way.
- John 15:8 "Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples."
- Luke 12:32 "Fear not, little flock; for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom."
- Luke 22:29 "And I appoint unto you a kingdom, as my Father hath appointed unto me;"
- Mark 15:26 And the superscription of his accusation was written over, THE KING OF THE JEWS."
- 1 Peter 2:9 "But ye [are] a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light:"
- See Taking and Giving the Kingdom
- ↑ Revelation 7:3 Saying, Hurt not the earth, neither the sea, nor the trees, till we have sealed the servants of our God in their foreheads. 4 And I heard the number of them which were sealed: [and there were] sealed an hundred [and] forty [and] four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel.
- Revelation 14:1 And I looked, and, lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Sion, and with him an hundred forty [and] four thousand, having his Father’s name written in their foreheads. 2 And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps: 3 And they sung as it were a new song before the throne, and before the four beasts, and the elders: and no man could learn that song but the hundred [and] forty [and] four thousand, which were redeemed from the earth.
- ↑ ἠγορασμένοι ēgorasmenoi translated "having been redeemed" of the earth with ēgorasmenoi from ἀγοράζω agorazo 59 translated to buy or redeemed but defined "to be in the market place, to attend it"