Amazon has
announced its latest wonder-tech gizmo to make shopping easier and more
convenient – a hand scanner that unites your body and your bank account:
https://www.geekwire.com/2020/first-hand-experience-amazons-new-palm-reader-says-future-retail/
Fr
Athanasios, several years ago, expressed alarm in one of his sermons on St
John’s Revelation after he heard a report of a bank proposing to make use of
this kind of technology; he begins a discussion of this at about the 8:50 mark
of Sermon 36, Part 1:
http://www.saintnicodemos.com/content/apocalypse_audio.php
The Holy
Fathers have much to say about the mark of Antichrist, buying and selling,
etc.:
The
False Prophet and the Mark of the Beast (666)
In
seeking all of humanity to worship him, the Antichrist will have the aid of an assistant
—the False Prophet, a second beast, a sort of global religious leader (Rev.
13:11-18 and Rev. 19:19-20). Just as the Forerunner (St. John the Baptist)
gathered followers for the true Christ (Jesus), this False Prophet in the time
of the Apocalypse will gather followers for the Antichrist. And just as the
Apostles sealed the new Christians with the seal of the Gift of the Holy Spirit
(1 John 2:27), marking them for God, so too the False Prophet will seek to
formally mark all of humanity with the Antichrist’s name or number—the
mysterious “666”—either on the hand or on the forehead (Rev. 13:16-18). This mark—whatever it proves to be—we
Orthodox Christians view as a serious denial of Christ. We must not accept it.
Accepting it will be a
rejection
of one’s Holy Chrismation and a
rejection of God.
Modern-day
saint and wonder-worker Paisios of Mt. Athos, in speaking of the coming “666”
mark, said that if a Christian accepts the Mark of the Beast, he or she will
have denied Christ. He believed it to be some form of computerized personal ID
number.29
He noted that in the Old Testament the Jews required a yearly tax of 666 gold
talents from conquered nations. Thus, St. Paisios said that “today, in order to
subjugate the whole world, they’ll once again introduce the old tax number
linked to their glorious past. That is, ‘666’ is the number of mammon.
Everything is going as planned. They put the number a long time ago on credit
cards. As a result, he who is not marked with the number ‘666’ will be unable
to buy, sell, get a loan, or find work.”30
Accepting
the devil’s ID mark (“666”) on hand or forehead will be a rejection of the Gift
of the Holy Spirit, which was received at Holy Baptism in the Anointing of Holy
Chrism (the sealing of one’s hands and forehead by the priest)—the true mark of
the true Christ. St. Paul wrote: “When you believed, you were marked in Him
with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit” (Ephesians 1:13). This holy seal of God
is mentioned again in Rev. 7:3 as the “seal on the foreheads of the servants of
our God.” It is literally placed on the hands and forehead of each newly
Baptized Orthodox Christian to give to them the Holy Spirit through the Holy
Chrism (the sacred anointing oil) following their Holy Baptism. With that holy
Baptismal seal we “denied the devil and sided with Christ,” as St. Paisios
stated it.31
The
Baptismal Seal of the Holy Spirit is the opposite of the Devil’s seal (the
“666”), which also will be marked on right-hands and foreheads (Rev. 13:16).
This fake “chrismation” of the devil removes the Holy Spirit and brings a
person into the devil’s kingdom of darkness. It will be used to control them
through fear, because without it they cannot
buy any food.
And
he [the False Prophet]
causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a
mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads, and that no one may buy or
sell except one who has the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of
his name…and his number is 666. (Revelation 13:16-18)
Warning
from Holy Scripture: Do not take the 666 Mark—the Devil’s “chrismation”
Receiving
this “666” mark of the Antichrist will send
a person to eternal hellfire.
For any Christian who accepts it, it is a denial of Christ—a betrayal—which
cancels out their previous holy Chrismation seal/mark of the Holy Spirit and
sends them to hellfire, since they put their trust in the Antichrist (and his
system) instead of keeping their trust in the true Christ Jesus.
If
any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand, the
same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God…and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the
presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: and the smoke of
their torment ascends up forever and ever; and they have no rest day nor
night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receives the mark of
his name. (Rev.14:9-11)
The
False Prophet will try to coerce all humanity to accept the Antichrist’s
“chrismation”—the mark of the Beast—by arranging life so that in the new global
government’s one-world economy, no one will be able to buy or sell without that
mark. Those who do not take the mark face economic disaster, famine and
starvation.
Saint
Andrew of Caesarea on the Mark of the Beast
Saint
Andrew of Caesarea (d. 637AD), who for centuries has been an Orthodox authority
on the interpretation of the Book of Revelation, spoke of this in his famous Commentary on the Apocalypse.
He wrote of this mark of the Beast/Antichrist:
He…will
strive to place upon all the outline of the ruinous name of the apostate and
deceiver, “in their right hands,” in order to cut off the doing of right and
good deeds, and likewise “in their foreheads,” in order to instruct the
deceived to be bold in deception and darkness. But it will not be received by
those sealed in their faces with the Divine Light (cf. Rev 7:3,4). And the seal
of the beast will be spread everywhere, in buying and selling, so that those
who do not receive it will suffer a violent death from want of necessities.32
St.
Ephraim the Syrian on the Mark of the Beast
St.
Ephraim the Syrian (fourth century) in his sermon, “On the coming of the Lord,
the end of the world, and the coming of the Antichrist”, wrote this about the
mark of the beast:
Beloved,
we need a lot of prayer and tears in order that some of us prove strong through
the trials; because the beast will work many illusions. He himself is an enemy
of God and wants to destroy everyone. The torturer will use such means so that all will have to have the mark of the beast on themselves, in due time,
that is at the fulfillment of time, when the Antichrist comes and deceives all
with signs. And only in the case [that they have the mark] will they be able to
purchase food and other necessities; and he will set up supervisors to enforce
his orders. My brethren, notice the wiliness of the beast which is above all
measure, and the contriving of his wickedness—how he will start with the
stomach, so that man, when brought to an extreme of food deprivation, will be
compelled to accept the mark, or rather the wickedly profane symbol, not just
on any part of the body but on the right hand and also on the forehead, so that
he will be unable afterwards to make the sign of the cross with the right hand
or to sign the holy name of the Lord or the glorious and honorable cross of
Christ our Savior on the forehead… Therefore my brethren, a terrible trial is
ahead for all the Christ-loving people—that they not fear or fall into
negligence until the hour of death during the time when the serpent will be marking
[people] with his sign instead of the sign of the cross of the Savior… And if
someone will not be marked with the mark of the beast, that person will not be
taken captive with his fantastic signs. And likewise the Lord will not abandon
such, but will enlighten them…
St.
Paisios of Mt. Athos warns Orthodox not to take the 666 Mark
The
Christians who reject the “666” mark and refuse to worship the image of the
Antichrist will be seen as religious rebels and extremists—unfortunately—and
will be persecuted by the authorities, becoming martyrs for Christ as in the
days of the Roman Empire. However, St. Paisios the Athonite warned that not all
Christians will see any danger in taking the devil’s mark. He believed that
even some Orthodox Christian priests will be fooled and will not warn their
flocks. Instead they will “diaper” their spiritual children with comforting
lies, telling them to take the “666” mark and not to worry, saying: “it does
not matter, it is nothing.”33
How sad! These clergy will not
be able to discern the “signs of the times,” and will earn for themselves the
same rebuke that the Lord Jesus gave to the Pharisees in His day: “You know how
to interpret the appearance of the sky, but you cannot interpret the signs of
the times” (Matt. 16:3). Yet those Christian non-conformists who do actually
refuse the “666” mark will be “hated by all nations” for Christ’s sake, as the
Lord Jesus prophesied in Matthew 24:9. Because of the Christian rebellion
against the Antichrist’s claims, the Antichrist will launch the fiercest
persecution of Christians ever seen in history, as the Lord predicted in
Matthew 24:21—“Then shall be great
tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world
to this time.” But out of His mercy, for the sake of those faithful followers
who are going to be saved, the Lord Jesus promised that “those days will be
shortened” (Matthew 24:22).
--Quoted from Fr Andrew Anderson, https://orthochristian.com/106805.html
But let us
also take note of one other occult aspect of this hand-scanning technology that
links back to a practice that is very old indeed, to palm reading. The practice of chirognomy seeks to divine
knowledge of one’s ‘personality and physical health’ by examining the size,
shape, color, etc., of the fingers and hands:
https://www.occultopedia.com/c/chirognomy.htm
In the age
when ‘data is the new oil’ (https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2020/11/01/operation-warp-speed.aspx), this massive upload of
data related to precise hand dimensions will no doubt be used to pry into and
manipulate, via demonic methods, the minds of everyone who signs up to use this
technology – from simple things like knowing how to persuade certain people to
buy or not buy certain things to more complex decisions (voting, for instance).
But because
the typical Yankeefied American exults in his cleverness and worldly-wiseness,
in efficiency and ever-greater profits, he will probably be one of the first to
sign up for the privilege of using this soul-destroying device.
***
A related
development:
--
Holy Ælfred
the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!
Anathema to
the Union!
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