There are reasons to believe that the thing with using 616 instead of 666 in early Bibles is based on a miscalculation together with gnostic dogma.
The gnostics found the golden incission or the golden figure (sorry, I don't know the exact word for it in English) in everything they concidered
evil. The five edged polygon or the pentagon presents a perfect fi or golden incission within it's geometry. If you draw a line from any of the five
corners to another you divide the shape in two with the proportion 61.8% to 38.2%. This may indicate that the reason for the 616 may be a
miscalculation of 1+[root of]5, divided by 2, minus 1. Probably due to the fact that they didn't have a very good numerical system for calculating
relatively advanced math like this.
For instance if you measure your body from head to toe in the ratio mentioned and put your finger there, you'll see that you're holding your finger
in the navel. The opposite way around you'll be holding your finger at, well, good Christians wouldn't say it straight out

, but I'll say it
anyway: your genitals. You also find this ratio/proportion in the way fractals "move", we all know the Fibbonacci numbers I guess:
1,2,3,5,8,13,21..... and in the way spiral galaxies are shaped, how our genome twirls, well you'll find it anywhere, even in the Great Pyramid. But
to say it's evil would be to stretch the rubberband a little far I think, for it would be like saying everything created is evil. But we all know
Paul's speeches about how all flesh is evil, so perhaps we are at the core here. Perhaps this is what he was getting at in the first place. I don't
know, but it's a facinating subject no matter how you put it.
Blessings,
Mikromarius