Revelation 7:4

After a pause, in which the sealing is supposed to have taken place, the writer hears that the number of the sealed is the stereotyped 144,000, twelve thousand from each of the twelve tribes of Israel (a “thousand” being the primitive subdivision of a clan or tribe, like the English shire into “hundreds”). The enumeration of these tribes (Revelation 7:5-8) contains two peculiarities, (a) the substitution of Joseph for Ephraim, a variation to which we have no clue, and (b) the omission of Dan. The latter reflects the growing disrepute into which Dan fell; it either stands last (e.g. in [912].; Joshua 19:40 f.; Judges 1:34) or drops out entirely, while it is curiously connected in the Talmud as already in Test. XII. Patr. (Daniel 5)' with Beliar, and in Irenæus (5:30, 32) as in Hippolytus (de Antichr. 5, 6) with the origin of Antichrist. This sinister reputation (cf. A.C. 171 174, Selwyn 200 204, Erbes 77 f.), current long before Irenæus' day, rested on the haggadic interpretation of passages like Genesis 49:17; Deuteronomy 33:22; and Jeremiah 8:16. Andreas, commenting on Revelation 16:12, thinks that Antichrist will probably come from Persia, ἔνθα ἡ φυλὴ τοῦ Δάν.

[912] Codex Porphyrianus (sæc. ix.), at St. Petersburg, collated by Tischendorf. Its text is deficient for chap. Revelation 2:13-16.