Bible numerics

Your faith is worth more than gold
~ 1 Peter 1:7

By numerics we do not mean numerology. Numerology is from the occult. It attempts to divine the future by drawing significance from numbers. God tells us not to do that [Leviticus 19:26; Deuteronomy 18:10-12]

By numerics we mean the observation that God has planted an order in the world and in His Word. The number seven, for example, recurs throughout the Bible – as in the number of days of creation, the days of a week, the number of biblical feasts, and others.

Both the Old and the New Testaments teem with numeric patterns of seven, as we shall see. No writings of other religions display the phenomenon. We draw the conclusion that only God could have created such a pattern. It could not have occurred by chance. It is further evidence of the seal, or signature, of God. It is proof of divine authorship.

Numerics in the Hebrew Bible

Genesis 1:1 will serve as an example:

In the original Hebrew, it would look like this – read from right to left:

1. There are seven words in the verse.
2. There are 28 letters – divisible by seven.
3. The first three words have 14 letters – divisible by seven.
4. The last four words have 14 letters – divisible by seven.
5. The fourth and fifth words have seven letters.
6. The sixth and seventh words have seven letters.
7. The key words: God, heaven, and earth, have 14 letters – divisible by seven.
8. The remaining words have 14 letters – divisible by seven.
9. The middle word is the shortest, with two letters. However, the words to the right and left of it have 5 letters each – combining with either would give seven.

Sceptics have said that the pattern is not significant. However, they are unable to find the phenomenon in writings other than the Bible, and they are unable to create the full effect, even with computers and a contrived language. Scripture abounds with mathematical features of seven which are too numerous for us to do more than touch upon, by way of illustration.

Here is another example.

Our numerals come to us from India. In Bible times, Hebrew and Greek had no such characters. To convey numbers, a numeric value was assigned to each letter of the alphabet.

This is a table of the numeric values for each character in biblical Hebrew:

Numeric value	Hebrew letter	Final form	Phonetic spelling in English
1			ALEPH
2			BET
3			GIMEL
4			DALET
5			HEH
6			VAV
7			ZAYIN
8			CHET
9			TET
10			YUD
20			KAPH
30			LAMED
40			MEM
50			NUN
60			SAMEKH
70			AYIN
80			PEH
90			TZADHE
100			KUF
200			RESH
300			SHIN
400			TAV

Now, let us re-examine our example of Genesis 1:1 and establish the numeric value for each Hebrew character:

Word	Hebrew characters	Numeric value
(BERESHEET) “In the beginning ...	BET RESH ALEPH SHIN YUD TAV	2 200 1 300 10 400
(BARA) ... created ...	BET RESH ALEPH	2 200 1
(ELOHIM) ... God ...	ALEPH LAMED HEH YUD MEM (final form)	1 30 5 10 40
(ET) (untranslatable)	ALEPH TAV	1 400
(HA’SHAMAYIM) ... the heavens ...	HEH SHIN MEM YUD MEM (final form)	5 300 40 10 40
(VE’ET) ... and ...	VAV ALEPH TAV	6 1 400
(HA’ARETZ) ... the earth ...	HEH ALEPH RESH TZADHE (final form)	5 1 200 90

There are many patterns of seven here, but the following examples will suffice:

1. The numeric value of the three important nouns – God, heavens and earth – is 777.
2. The numeric value of the one verb ‘created’ is 203, which is divisible by seven.
3. The numeric value of the first and last letters of all seven words is 1393, which is divisible by seven.
4. The numeric value of the first and last letters of the first and last words is 497, which is divisible by seven.

Numerics in the New Testament

Every passage in every book in the New Testament, examined in the original language of Greek, has multiple constructs of seven.

For example, the first eleven verses of Matthew, the first book, gives the genealogy of Jesus from Abraham to the captivity in Babylon. It has a vocabulary of 49 words (7 x 7). Also:

1. 28 words begin with a vowel – divisible by seven.
2. 21 words begin with a consonant – divisible by seven.
3. 42 words end with a consonant – divisible by seven.
4. Seven words end with a vowel.
5. There are 266 letters – divisible by seven.
6. 140 letters are vowels – divisible by seven.
7. 126 letters are consonants – divisible by seven.
8. 35 words occur more than once in the passage – divisible by seven.
9. 14 words occur once only – divisible by seven.
10. 42 words are nouns – divisible by seven.
11. 35 words are proper names – divisible by seven.
12. 28 are male ancestors – divisible by seven.

We could go on and on and on, but you surely get the message.

One followed by six noughts is a million. One followed by nine noughts is a billion. One followed by one hundred noughts is a googol. A googol can be referenced by the thought that if a bird was to take a peck once a day against a solid diamond the size of Mount Everest, it would take a googol of years to erode the diamond to sea level. The mathematical chance that all the numeric patterns in the Bible occurred randomly and by accident are one in a googol.

Evidence that the Bible is the Word of God – Related messages:

• Is the Bible true and accurate?

  The Bible is accurate history, with one purpose, one moral standard, one plan of salvation and one explanation for everything.

• Prophecies about Jesus fulfilled

  The Torah contains many prophecies of the coming Messiah which were fulfilled in Jesus of Nazareth.

• Israel regathered

  God warned Israel that He would scatter them if they disobeyed Him. He also promised that He would regather them in the last days. Those prophecies, given thousands of years ago, are being fulfilled now. Only God could have known.

• The Dead Sea Scrolls

  The discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls proved the accuracy of the Hebrew Scriptures.

• The Torah Code

  An underlying pattern of words can be found at equidistant letter skip sequences throughout the original text of the Hebrew Bible.