Written by Philip Jones

What is the Bible Code?

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A Brief Bible Code History

• The idea that there is hidden knowledge in the Torah dates back to at least the Middle Ages to Jewish kabbalists. About sixty years ago, Rabbi Weissmandl investigated equi-distant letter sequences by writing the whole Torah with the letters in rectangular grids. One discovery was the name of Abraham at intervals of 50 letters in Genesis 1, and that between each letter was Elohim, the name of God. Some of his findings are collected in the book Torat Chemed.
• In 1988, Professor Eliyahu Rips published an example of clustered equi-distant letter sequences in the Journal of the Royal Statistical Society (Series A, 151(I):165).
• In 1994, the paper Equi-distant letter sequences in the book of Genesis by Witzum, Rips and Rosenberg was published in Statistical Science. Before publication there was an extensive review process, which involves examination of the validity of the work by two or three independent scientists. This is standard procedure for most scientific publications. WRR investigated the names, dates of birth and dates of death of several rabbis listed in the Encyclopedia of Great Men in Israel. Dates and names which matched particular rabbis tended to occur in closer proximities than dates and names which did not match.
• During the review process, Prof. Daconis proposed that a new list of rabbis with corresponding dates be tested. This second list also showed matching names and dates in closer proximities than mismatched ones.
• In 1997, The Bible Code by Michael Drosin was pulished, and sparked a flurry of publicity and interest in the Bible code.

The Bible Code Controversy

Here is a summary of the main arguments with brief comments.

• FOR
  • Publication in the scientific journal Statistical Science passed the rigorous peer review process, and in five years nobody has rebutted this paper.
  • The probability values that have been quoted for several Bible codes are impressively small, and difficult to simply explain away as coincidence. (The probability value indicates how unlikely or likely it is for something to occur at random.)
  • Many of the arrays look extremely compact.
• AGAINST
  • The choice of search words or the region of text being searched is often arbitrary leading to accusations of data fudging.
  • The lack of vowels in the Hebrew text.
  • Only one Bible code, namely the prominent rabbis in Genesis has passed the peer review process.
  • Some say that the Bible code lacks purpose.
• COMMENTS
  • The Statistical Science paper itself is extremely complex, and incomprehensible to non-mathematicians. However, it is clear that each code must be examined individually to decide on its own merits whether or not it is valid.
  • The lack of Hebrew vowels has been a common criticism of the Bible code, but the original Hebrew did in fact lack vowels. The fact that the Bible code works without the vowels is evidence that it is real rather than evidence against it. Vowel markings were added around the 4th century AD to make the bible easier to read.
  • The purpose of the Bible code is not necessarily to teach us new doctrine, show us a new revelation or warn us of the future. It could simply be a watermark or stamp of authorship from God.
    

The Bible code is a mathematical phenomenon, formed by taking sequences of letters at equal intervals. As such, it can be analysed using the most precise of the sciences, namely mathematics. Why then, is the code's existence so controversial, and how can the issue be resolved? Unlike paranormal phenomenon and religious experiences, the Bible code can be analysed using mathematics. The well known paper in Statistical Science did just that, but the books published for the general public contain little or no calculations, even in the appendices." Similarly, those opposed to the code have argued against the ommision of vowels in the Hebrew language, the integrity of the people behind the work or choose to mock the bible code as for example the Bill Gates 'codes' in Revelation found on the McKay web site. The result is that the general public is ill-informed and belief in the code has become largely a matter of faith rather than fact. Anyone wanting to study the Bible code for themselves is hampered by the complex mathematical arguments, and the problem of reading Hebrew texts.

KodeWize Bible Code Program is designed for the non-specialist to use, so that anyone can use statistical and scientific methods to investigate the Bible code on their own computer. Some of the special feactures of this Bible code program are the following:

Automatical statistical analysis The output of all searches the computer is asked to do includes statistical calculations. The program uses well known methods, which the general public can understand ratehr than the complex equations of the Statistical Science paper. “The program is designed for anyone to use. There’s no need to understand math, Hebrew, or to be a computer nerd, and the only software you need is Microsoft Windows itself.

Scientific control tests If the bible is scrambled so that the letters are the same but the order is random, the bible code should disappear. We can also scramble the words we search for, and see if we can find the scrambled words. Both of these controls and others are easily performed with Kodewize.

Tutorials show the user how to expose fake codes, such as the Rabin code, and correctly interpret the probability values given by Kodewize.

An online guide explains the key concepts behind the bible code, such as the use of minimal intervals between letters, clustering, quirks of the Hebrew language and two-dimensional arrays. You can read this guide on this web site by following the arrows. The Bible code program also includes worked exmaples that are available with the free download.

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