Are there codes in the bible? I say not true?

Question

Last night they had a show on the history channel about Bible codes. But really I feel that if you think rationally about it the bible a book so edited and messed with from the beginning would have been corrupted too much to have any valid codes in it today.

Another thing they only used the old testement or Torrah. part of the bible. This truly disproves it!

Answer 1

Actually, Nightshade, codes were very important in the Bible -the OT, anyway- and the methodology devised by the scribes of that day is one you are using right this very minute!

I'm referring to checksums. Checksums are a number derived from applying a common mathematical formula across a span of data. The "sender" applies it to a given data stream, then sends the data AND the checksum to the "receiver." The receiver -because it is just a hunk of electronic parts- doesn't know if the info it received is, in fact, what was actually sent; that is, it has no way of detecting if there is an error in the data itself. It can, however, run the little math routine on the data to derive a checksum on its own. If it matches the checksum that was sent -BINGO! All the data is assumed to be OK.

And THAT'S what the scribes were doing as they copied page after page of scripture. Believe it or not, most of these guys didn't know how to READ. They truly were human "copy machines." The way they checked for accuracy was to count up the values of letters across a line of text, and make a note of what the final calculated value was. If the value on a copy matched that of the original, the copy was deemed accurate. If it didn't -they threw the page away! And we're not talking cheap notebook paper here, either. We're talking animal skins -and baby needs a new pair of shoes!

Did it work? You betcha it worked! While many assume that bible text has become hopelessly scrambled because of centuries of manual copying (and even some cheating, maybe) the truth is just the opposite. The most recent "ancient" manuscripts are a close match to the oldest. And so, when you thumb through the worn pages of your OT, you may realize that even in a technological sense, the Scripture is a very contemporary document!

All that said, 'shade, there WERE occasions when the text was corrupted. Sometimes, one of the daddy-o's who COULD read might scrawl an entry in the margin -perhaps something noteworthy to argue about with the other rabbi's, perhaps just a flash on insight -or maybe the "honey bring home some milk and bread" reminder. Whatever the cause or reason, these scribal "glosses" as they are called, would occasionally be included as actual text when the next copy was made. And thus, you would get such incomprehensible lines as, "...and he went unto the mountain and therein found a cave from whence uttered a vast wind of milk and bread tonight." I made that up -but you get the idea.

How do we know this happened? Because over-all, the copying was SO accurate -and enough "clean" copies have been found- that you can pick out the marginal notes when you compare one set of scrolls to another.

Are there "mystery codes," meaning "hidden messages?" No. The very same algorithms that found the codes in the Bible also find them everywhere else the technique is applied. Apply it to THIS post and I shuuder to think what terrible predictions might lie herein.

But were codes deliberately applied to the text. Yup. Same as your modem or router is doing as you read this.

Good question.

Answer 2

so edited and messed up / corrupted .... (non encoded text) like "Moby Dick"... or "War and Peace"?

Drosnin found - Princess Diana, the World Trade Center, the Hale-Bopp Comet

quote from Bible-code Digest:
"The code examples presented by skeptics in no way compare to the clusters and matrices discovered by some code researchers. There is a tremendous gap between the two."

"Most if not all technically strong code researchers would attest to the validity of the link between the subject matter of the literal text and the content of codes found there. Their convictions are based on a long series of observations of unique situations, or what scientists call "anecdotal evidence." These researchers have observed this pervasive phenomenon, and are convinced of it. The problem with anecdotal evidence is that there is rarely enough of it of the exact same kind that it would add up to statistically conclusive proof.

Simply presenting yet another collection of new and intriguing pieces of anecdotal evidence is no way to convince skeptical scientists of the potential validity of any Bible code phenomenon. What is needed is some way to focus on the location phenomenon in a way that involves enough objective observations that a highly improbable result could possibly occur. What is needed are 25, or 50, or 100, or more, observations of the same kind where a comparison can be made between actual and expected results. Just such a situation is described in this article, and the odds against chance occurrence are less than one in 27 million. Before we cover it, however, we will first look at a simple example that resembles the more complex one we are really interested in.

What sort of experiment would one conduct to test the general observation that there is a strong correlation between the subject matter of Bible codes and the literal content of the text where such codes appear? To be compelling, it would be most useful if the topic in the literal text were one that appeared a large number of times and if the subject matter of the ELSs were terms that were undisputable in their linkage to the original topic and in their spelling. If there were several terms, then selection of some obvious grouping of terms would also strengthen the credibility of the experiment."

-

"There are some code phenomena that are so extensive and complex that no code skeptic could possibly find comparable examples from any non-encoded text. They are not to be found, because they don't exist. Prominent code skeptics are more than intelligent enough to know that they don't exist, so they wisely will not expend the effort to look for them."

†

Answer 3

I have no trouble believing that there were codes used in the writing of several of the books--mostly acrostics, though, nothing as elaborate or mystical as is alleged. Many were lost when the Torah was translated into other languages. The Christian book of Revelation was almost certainly written in a sort of code, though that was to protect the writer, not because of any cosmic design.

Answer 4

I'd be inclined to agree with you. You could use the same process advocated by the Bible Code fanatics on Dickens' "Bleak House" or Vonnegut's "God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater" and find the same sort of mystic hoo ha.

Answer 5

Bible codes are a modern day myth propagated by people who sell the software to a gullible market.

Answer 6

No, there are no codes in the Bible or in paintings by Leonardo da Vinci and Nicholas Poussin. That is sheer nonsense. It is amazing what nonsense some men waste their time in concocting or in believing.

Answer 7

I think that the Bible is God's word and should not be treated like a Ouji Board.

Answer 8

There are codes in the phone book. So what?

Answer 9

I heard that if you read the bible backwards your head explodes!

Answer 10

codes? like you mean how christians say there are "codes" in heavy metal albums?