Bible Code, Truth or fiction? (Vanity)

3-4-03 | Wingy

[Remedy]

Consider the following proofs of this statement: 1. I Samuel 10:2-6 give a series of prophetic statements to Elijah of events that were to shortly happen in sequence which were perfectly fulfilled. The probabilty that this prophecy was not from an omniscient Creator is less than one in 21 factoral. This number as most know is 21 x 20 x 19 x 18 etc. on down to 1, which is a number that exceeds the number of stars estimated in the cosmos or even the late Carl Sagans statement of "billions of billions". 2. The prophecy of Zechariah which foretold of Jesus that he would be sold for thirty pieces of silver [ Zech: 11:12 ], and would enter into Jerusalem of an unridden foal of an ass [ Zech. 9:9 ], can there be any doubt about the few yet to be fullfilled . . . [Zech. 12:10; 14:4]. 3.Or for that matter those yet to be fulfilled in Matt 24 & 25, after Matt. reviews some 23 specific Old Testament prophicies fullfilled at Jesus's coming 2000 years ago.

[Belial]

Lots of things will happen as world history unfolds. It is not difficult to conform them to some ancient text or another.

But if it provides you with a sense of structure and stability to believe they were foretold, hey...enjoy!

[lafroste]

I am unfamiliar with the code you reference, and judging from the responses so far, I'd say I'm not missing much. That said, my sister made a fascinating discovery (?) regarding a Biblical "code" that I will admit has me very intrigued. The entire theory is somewhat longwinded and is composed primarily of noticing a pattern of symetries in Man's history.

In short, her theory is that modern history is ancient history running backwards along a defined timeline. Some of these features include:
Creation: ~4004 - 4006 BC (I know, I know, but lets not get sidetracked just yet - and I think there is a simple explanation anyway)
History's inflection point (ie. where it begins running oppositely in a mirror of what has come before): ~500 BC

Then one can pair events on either side of the inflection point, thusly:
Birth of Isiah: ~ 1000 BC ----- Birth of Christ ~ 0 AD
Great Flood (Noah): ~1800 BC ----- Black Plague ~1350 AD
She had dozens (maybe hundreds) of other examples. She also hypothesized that human history also mirrored the personal history of Abraham wherein 1 year of Abraham's life equaled 40 years of human history (Abraham lived to be 175, and had his son Isaac via a miracle at age 100; mankind had Christ via a miracle at age 100 x 40 = 4,000 years). Wheels within wheels indeed.

As an interesting sidelight, if you render the Holy words in the Bible (in Hebrew) and assign them a simple numeric value (A=1, B=2, etc.) and add them up, then take the result and render it in binary code, they are all palindromes (identical forward and backwards). If you take the number of the beast, 666 and render it into binary, you get an anti-palindrome (exactly opposite forwards and backwards). She finally dismissed this curiosity as evidence of a divine sense of humor.

Anyway, I found it intriguing.

[Thinkin' Gal]

Well, you could start by analyzing the Alef-Beit significances in NT passages, say Mark 10:17-27.

The rich man chasing after the poor man to give him charity is the gimel (rich man, camel) following the dalet (poor man, door). The eye of the needle is the letter kuf, which the gimel is never proceeded by, whereas the gimel often follows the dalet, both in language structure and alefbeitical order. The tav is the cross, which is also the kingdom of God.

http://www.inner.org/hebleter/HEBLETRS.HTM

The race of the gimel (rich man) to get to the dalet (door, poor man) in order to reach the tav (cross) is right there in the text.


Mark 10:21 Then Jesus beholding him loved him, and said unto him, One thing thou lackest: go thy way, sell whatsoever thou hast, and give to the poor, and thou shalt have treasure in heaven: and come, take up the cross, and follow me.

And...


Mark 10:25 It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God.

So you see, the goal here is to finish the race:


Hebrews 12:1 Wherefore seeing we also are compassed about with so great a cloud of witnesses, let us lay aside every weight, and the sin which doth so easily beset us, and let us run with patience the race that is set before us,

Hebrews 12:2 Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Alef to Tav, or in the Greek, Alpha and Omega:

Revelation 1:8 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty.

Revelation 1:11 Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.

Revelation 21:6 And he said unto me, It is done. I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end. I will give unto him that is athirst of the fountain of the water of life freely.

Revelation 22:13 I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the end, the first and the last.

Beginning = Gen 1
End = Rev 22

Hebrew letter order

1 = alef
22 = tav

Etc.

[templar]

Don't think of it as anything but fiction. I have one of those bible code programs on my computer. I can get anything I want out of it. Bet I could do the same with War and Peace if I wanted to.

[Lurking Libertarian]

Absolute total hokum. Less scientific than astrology.

Nice when you and I agree. :-)

[ItisaReligionofPeace]

Wasn't there some Arab calendar that showed planes heading towards the trade center towers? Of course, they weren't psychic, only psycho.

[timestax]

I predict that the temperatures will really heat up this summer in Arizona!

[Redcloak]

I wonder what the guy's "algorithm" would turn up if it were applied to a few FreeRepublic pages.

(It's a hoax.)

[Sci Fi Guy]

Try this from the Christian Research Institute

Their website is www.equip.org

[BibChr]

Woo!

Talk about your "going out on a limb"!

Dan

[Quix]

I haven't gotten around to porting the latest MARCH Bible Code Digest to FR.

It has some surprises for both proponents and skeptics.

They did a VERY, VERY, VERY, VERY EVEN-HANDED, LEVEL PLAYING FIELD EXPERIMENT BETWEEN WAR AND PEACE AND I THE BIBLE--I THINK EZEKIEL PLUS SOME TO MATCH THE LENGTH OF THE WAR AND PEACE TEXT.

Before that experiment, the Bible Codes won hands down in that nothing approaching the length of the codes found in the Bible were found in any other text. And, there were a lot of other factors unique to exceptional clusters of codes found in The Bible.

This latest experiment found a 30 letter 'code' in War and Peace. However, the Bible Codes found were still longer and perhaps more importantly, the statistics derived from the experiment were conclusive in distinguishing the Bible Codes from anything found in War and Peace.

The Codes are still cryptic. And sometimes at least as cryptic as some prophetic Scritpures--surface text.

Nevertheless, there appears to have been one clearly pointing to the Columbia disaster. I think there had been some speculation beforehand that there would be a shuttle disaster because of the code found. But, of course, it was much clearer after the fact. Most scholars decry trying to be predictive with them as beyond the science and intent--though how one can pontificate with a straight face about God's intent with them is beyond me. He tends to often keep His own counsel on such things.

I certainly believe they are authentic. I believe they are a confirmation of the Surface Text and probably what Daniel was told about some of the secrets he was given being sealed up until the end times.

I believe the science and interpretation skills related to the codes will continue to be refined as we race toward the end curtain call on history as we know it.

I believe there will be some surprises turn up via the Codes right in sequence with God's timing and moves in other spheres.

There are a number of codes regarding Iraq and Hussein.

The most impressive to me are the CLUSTERS OF SIGNIFICANT CODES which seem to be sort of like a kind of Chinese puzzle box in their intricacies. Sometimes even the geometry of the Codes in the clusters seem to be part of the message wherein key words cross in emphasizing ways.

I think they are fun and one of the examples of God having fun with us and Him having fun with His Word. I think he laughs at the folly of "the fools who have said in their heart there is no God" and their sputtering, fussing, fuming, rationalizing, ranting at and about the Codes.

None are so blind as those who WILL NOT see.

Certainly they don't substitute for the Surface text. But they are a wonderful, thought provoking, fun decoration that is part and parcel of the surface text.

Indeed, the correlations between some of the Codes and the subject of the surface text the Codes are embedded under is exceedingly interesting and impressive.

Particularly mystifying to me, are those responses of people who seem so addicted to Bibliolatry--worshipping printed ink on pages instead of The Living Word. Some seem so constipated, narrow, rigid and generally paranoidly up tight about such things that they feel compelled to rail and rant against the Codes as though they were satanic or some threat to the surface text.

I think such people are ignorant, shallow and silly to the extreme. They clearly have not thought things through rationally and/or not exammined the evidence. The Codes are affirming and confirming of the Surface Text!!! Not that The Surface Text needs it but hey--why knock confirmation??? Crazy!

Welllllllllll, off the cuff, that's my response to your post.

I think the BIBLE CODE DIGEST SITE which I see someone has linked to--is the best place to study it. They have links to other quality researchers around the world.

AT least one agnostic Rabbi scholar, researcher has been brought to faith through them.

I don't think much of Drosnin's books. I have the first one but haven't bothered to get or read the 2nd one. I think he's too sloppy with his criteria and squeezes things into his construction on reality whether they fit or not and whether the Codes he wants to use are statistically significant or not. I also suspect he's a tool of new agers or worse.

Anyway--delighted to see your post and query. If there are some questions I can respond meaningfully to, please ask away.

Blessings,

[Quix]

After reading a fair amount about McKay et al in their detractions of the Codes, I do not think they are intellectually honest. I wonder if they are honest at all.

They are at best charlatans.

The evidence of the above is quite plainly available though it requires wading through a lot of pages of rather complex material.

The refs for that are on my earlier postings on the Codes--I think in the thread about Feb's Bible Code Digest.

[Consort]

A good topic......................for the Religion Forum.

[Quix]

Except for terminal closed mindedness, I cannot imagine how you could read the research in the MARCH BIBLE CODE DIGEST and still keep such a death grip on your seemingly rather rigidly narrow and overtly ignorant view.

[Quix]

GWARSH

Color me humbled and super impressed.

Thanks.

Thanks Big.

God's best to you and yours.

[Quix]

There were predictionis of 9/11 in the Biblical prophetic world up to 3 years prior.

I have a fuzzy memory that there were some cryptic codes that were easily interpreted as fitting after the fact. I think some speculation occurred before the fact.

There's certainly a list of Codes regarding Iraq and Hussein et al which could easily turn out to be predictive.

And, I believe there was a Code--one of the less obscure in terms of wording that predicted the Columbia disaster.

I think in such a young area of investigation--especially involving The Bible, one is wise to be cautious about blanket statements.

[Quix]

You are demonstrably, documentedly wrong as of the very very very VERY level playing field experiment done between WAR AND PEACE and the Bible as reported in the MARCH BIBLE CODE DIGEST.

[Quix]

Your understanding is at best well behind the times in terms of the refinement of the research experiments ran, the statistics derived and the Codes obtained--in the March Bible Code Digest--the differences are still stark though surprising in some respects for both proponents and skeptics.

[Faith65]

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