666 v. 616

The Claim: A new translation of the bible is saying the number of the beast is supposed to be 616 not 666. When asked if they would be changing their beliefs accordingly, a member of a New York satanic church said something along the lines of "we will if the Christian Church does."

The Facts:

A newly discovered scrap of the oldest surviving copy of the New Testament seemed to suggest that when it came to the mark of the beast, they had the wrong number. In fact it was the rather less ominous 616.

Magus Peter H Gilmore, High Priest of the Church of Satan, New York, responded, saying Satanists were happy to start using 616 as the number of the beast if that scared Christians more.

"By using 666 we're using something that the Christians fear. Mind you, if they do switch to 616 being the number of the beast then we'll start using that."

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