Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Religion News
What Your Pet’s Microchip Has to Do with the Mark of the Beast

What Your Pet’s Microchip Has to Do with the Mark of the Beast

Last updated on: April 5, 2019 at 3:01 pm by The Conversation

What Your Pet’s Microchip Has to Do with the Mark of the Beast 2019-04-05T15:01:03-04:00 The Conversation

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

By Jordan Frith, University of North Texas

An almost invisible electronic device used all over the world – best known to much of the public for helping reunite lost pets and their owners, but also found in subway cards, electronic tolling, luggage tags, passports and warehouse inventory systems – has alarmed some evangelical Christian communities, who see in this technology the work of the Antichrist.

In a section of “A Billion Little Pieces,” my recent book about Radio Frequency Identification chips, also known as RFID chips, I investigate why these tiny items have, in some religious circles, become closely linked with the apocalypse depicted in the biblical Book of Revelation. The reasons are more connected with modern concerns than you might expect.

What is RFID?

RFID chips can be small and flexible.
Maschinenjunge/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

For starters, RFID technology is a method of wirelessly, digitally identifying objects – like luggage, cars or subway passes – that often does not require any internal power source. A small chip is inserted into or attached to an item to be identified – like a duffel bag or a toll pass transponder. It does nothing until it passes near an RFID reader, which can be a few inches away for passports, or several feet away as in highway toll barriers. The reader emits a specific radio frequency that activates the chip, which then transmits its digital identification code.

The chips, also called tags, are just about everywhere. About 10 billion tags were used around the world in 2018 alone. Retailers – especially clothing stores – are a potentially huge market that has begun to adopt RFID systems to monitor inventory and to prevent theft.

Many domestic pets are microchipped with RFID, encoding information that helps them reunite with their owners if they get lost. Some humans have also chosen to microchip themselves so their bodies can wirelessly communicate with identification systems – and that’s where the evangelicals get upset.

The people at the right of the illumination are receiving the Mark of the Beast. Getty Center/Google Cultural Institute/Wikimedia Commons

The Mark of the Beast

What does a chip implant have to do with the Bible? Believers see echoes of RFID chips in a short passage in the Book of Revelation:

“[The beast] causes all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on their right hand or on 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.”

This passage is the origin of beliefs around what would eventually become known as the “Mark of the Beast,” a way to identify those who worship the Antichrist. More than 15 years ago, some evangelicals began linking RFID to the mark.

A doctor implants an RFID chip in a patient’s hand.
Paul Hughes/Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA

My research has found that they made the connection for two main reasons. First, when biohackers chip themselves, they typically put the RFID chip into the palm of one hand because it’s easy to wave that at sensors to open doors or process payments, and the scripture specifically mentions the mark on a person’s hand. In addition, some people have injected RFID chips containing credit card payment information, which calls to mind to the payment methods mentioned in the Bible.

These links spread in some evangelical communities throughout the 2000s, with many articles published on religious sites about RFID. The authors of a best-selling book about RFID and surveillance – “Spychips” – published an alternative version targeted at evangelical Christians that included added passages about the Book of Revelation. The main RFID industry publication even published a refutation of those claims.

In the years since, the connection between RFID and the mark has remained prominent. In 2017, a Wisconsin company offered to pay for its employees to get RFID implants – if they voluntarily chose to. The company’s Google business listing was flooded with more than 100 one-star reviews, many of which said it was a sin to use RFID as a form of identification or payment. Some of them were specific about what was wrong, saying the company was “doing the dirty work for Satan himself” and urging employees to “read your Bible. This is the first sign of the mark of the beast.”

Does it really matter?

It’s more than just a curiosity that evangelical Christians have linked RFID to the apocalypse. Evangelicals are a major force in American culture and politics, and their views on technology are often underreported.

Readers mounted above the highway track RFID chips in cars passing beneath them, charging drivers for tolls.
BrandonKleinVideo/Shutterstock.com

In addition, they’re expressing concern about an increasingly ubiquitous technology, similar to objections raised by privacy advocates that have actually changed corporate policies in the past.

Most people probably don’t agree that RFID represents the Mark of the Beast. But the roots of that concern do raise interesting questions about the merging of human bodies and computing. The religious fear that every person might need to be physically tagged to pay for things and move freely shares a lot with the concerns expressed by more mainstream privacy advocates.

Finally, there’s something poetic about linking a tiny technology used to identify rescue dogs in a shelter to the Mark of the Beast. After all, there’s likely no more consequential type of identification than the differentiation of the damned from the redeemed.

Jordan Frith is the author of: A Billion Little Pieces: RFID and Infrastructures of Identification.MIT Press provides funding as a member of The Conversation US.

Jordan Frith, Associate Professor of Technical Communication, University of North Texas

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Previous Post

April 1, 2019

Why Rich Parents Are More Likely to Be Unethical

Next Post

April 15, 2019 Do You Have a Moral Duty to Pay Taxes?

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Story of God Uncategorized

Select a Month September 2022 August 2022 January 2022 December 2021 August 2021 July 2021 February 2021 January 2021 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 November 2017 October 2017 August 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 December 2014 October 2014 September 2014 July 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

What did Jesus turn over in the temple?

Select your answer to see how you score.

Statues Scrolls Tables Lamps