So I knew someone who likes The Bible Code

[WadeParticipant]

IF you haven’t heard of it, The Bible Code is the result of a journalist and a mathematician applying extreme pattern analysis to the Jewish text, specifically the Torah. This oddly, works because Ancient Hebrew is exclusively consonants and tends to be written in a standard grid with little or no punctuation.

Or it does for the purposes of this book. The authors claim to have unearthed oodles of prophecies fulfilled and more than a few with more questionable interpretation. They are also fairly upfront about the fact they cite this as evidence of a divine hand in the writings!

I have two problems with this. Firstly, the human mind likes finding patterns. This is fundamental to how our brains work because that is the key mechanism we reduce the immense amount of data our senses see into something manageable. Basic physiology. So finding these patterns in the Torah could be a kind of wish-fulfillment.

My other problem is that current scholarly thinking is that the Hebrew text we have is the product of a lot of editing. And it was probably written no earlier than about 700 BC. Most unlike the tradition that Moses wrote them!

My fellow attendees (it was a mens’ breakfast at my prior church) not surprisingly tended to take the view of “why would God put such messages in there?” We didn’t take much time to discuss it afterwards. I think a lot of them thought it was a bit rubbish, though I can see it could be useful to know about its existence.

I don’t really know much more about The Bible Code. I’ve seen the books, of course, and the Wikipedia page is useful. But I haven’t read them. It seems to be a fascinating story that probably ends in self-delusion but I’m unsure where the line is crossed.

[AndreasParticipant]

I remember reading something about this a few years ago. The thing is you can do this with any book with sufficient length – “The Moby Dick Code” or “The Brothers Karamazov Code” are two I’m looking forward to

• This reply was modified 4 months, 3 weeks ago by  Andreas.

[David HaywardKeymaster]

I know a pastor who is totally into the code stuff. He’s very intelligent. It’s very fascinating. I remember my father making me read “Chariots of the Gods” when I was a kid. My dad was into the conspiracy, secrecy, code, gnostic stuff. Weird, now that I think of it.

[Author]

Posts