Re: Gematria, history of gematria, mathematical coincidences, Vernon's hypothesis

----- Original Message -----
From: "ed babinski" <ed.babinski@furman.edu>
To: "Vernon Jenkins" <vernon.jenkins@virgin.net>
Cc: <asa@calvin.edu>
Sent: Tuesday, October 05, 2004 10:22 PM
Subject: Gematria, history of gematria, mathematical coincidences, Vernon's hypothesis

> VERNON:
> >I'm wondering if you'd
>
> >care to comment on something I've been taxing the list with over the past
>
> >months, viz my contention that the Bible's first verse, in the original
>
> >Hebrew, is the most remarkable combination of words ever written, and a
>
> >tanding miracle. To support this claim I have prepared a brief summary of
>
> >my writings which you may find at
>
> >http://homepage.virgin.net/tgvernon.jenkins/Wonders.htm
> >Sincerely,
>
> >Vernon (Jenkins)
>
> >www.otherbiblecode.com
>
>
> ED: Vernon! Hi buddy! I read your article concerning the coincidences that
> you have found between the gematric values (of the first seven words in
> Genesis), and various numbers of significance to modern mathematicians.
> The first and most obvious point I would make is that discovering "Pi,"
> for instance, in the Bible does not prove that every story and teaching in
> the Bible is true, nor does it make it any easier to distinguish between
> opposing or tricky interpretations of verses and teachings in the Bible,
> nor clear up questions of ancient Biblical history, science, psychology,
> sociology, spirituality, and ethics.

Ed, you claim to have read my summary. Why then do you focus particularly on item #14 and ignore the rest? I should have thought that a balanced view of my work would make some reference to the coordinated numerical geometries which are an imposing feature of Genesis 1:1. And, by the way, the only claim I am pressing at this point is that, because of these features, this first verse of the Judeo-Christian Scriptures must be rated the most remarkable combination of words ever written. Wouldn't you agree?

> I am sure you could find various numbers of significance to modern
> mathematicians all over the place, from nature to your cereal box, if you
> looked for them with enough enthusiasm and with a wide enough knowledge of
> the entire realm of mathematics.
>
> Be that as it may, here's some questions or points to ponder concerning
> gematria, the history of gematria, and mathematical coincidences:

Ed, I have to say that, in the main, these questions are completely off-beam. As far as I am aware there are no variants in respect of the Hebrew of Genesis 1:1. The various translations are of secondary interest only - as is the history of the development of the Hebrew alphabet. Regarding an analysis of all 7-word verses in Torah: there is nothing which matches or surpasses the first verse - although, interestingly, Genesis 9:9 (" And I, behold, I establish my covenant with you [Noah], and with your seed after you;") is worthy of mention.

>
> --------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #1: What exactly is the translation of the first seven
> words in Genesis, is it even a complete sentence? And are there no ancient
> textual variants in words or spelling?
>
> ----------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #2: Have you studied the history of "gematria?" The
> Universal History of Numbers : From Prehistory to the Invention of the
> Computer by Georges Ifrah contains a small section on gematria that's
> worth reading.
>
> ------------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #3: The early Hebrew alphabet is not the same as the
> later Hebrew alphabet, and "gematria" came into use only after changes
> were made in the Hebrew alphabet -- in about the 3rd century B.C. I think,
> based on the following paragraph I found on the internet:
>
> According to Diringer (Story Aleph Beth, 136), one of the distinctive
> differences between Early Hebrew (which is very much like Phoenician) and
> Square Hebrew (which is influenced by and perhaps derived from Aramaic) is
> the presence of final forms in the latter, so this form of gematria cannot
> have been used before Square Hebrew. Diringer (135) says, "a distinctive
> Palestinian Jewish type of script - which we can definitely regard as the
> Square Hebrew script - can be traced from the second and the first
> centuries B.C.E. According to Prof. W. F. Albright, it became standardized
> just before the Christian era." He adds (136), "In the Square Hebrew
> style, unlike the Early Hebrew, ... there are five letters which have dual
> forms, one when initial or medial, the other when final.... The dual forms
> in great part go back to the period before the various offshoots of the
> Aramaic script assumed their distinctive features; they are found, indeed,
> in some third-century B.C.E. cursive documents in Egypt, in Nabataean
> inscriptions, and in the earliest Square Hebrew inscriptions and other
> documents. In some early documents, the letters 'aleph, he and taw also
> have dual forms." And finally (p. 137), "It was during the second century
> C.E. - according to Prof. Tur-Sinai - that our present Square Hebrew
> script, in its current form, became more or less fixed, and it was only in
> this period that the consistent Massoretic tradition regarding the use of
> the dual forms of the letters kaph, mem, nun, pe, sade was established."
> Therefore the use of the final forms in gematria is not likely to predate
> the second cent. C.E., and their use in numeration cannot have predated
> their invention in the third or second cent. B.C.E. (Further, as noted
> above, they were originally assigned the same numerical values as the
> corresponding medial forms, which would agree with their originally
> inconsistent use in medial and final position.)
>
> ----------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #4: What system of gematria are you using? Apparently
> there are different gematric values depending on which system of gemtaria
> you are using. There's the so-called "standard" value, the "sofit" value,
> the "katan" value, the "full" value, and the "ordinal" value. Which value
> are you using?
> http://www.biblewheel.com/GR/GR_intro.asp#std
> ---------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #5: Translators disagree on exactly how to translate the
> first few words of Genesis 1:1-2:
>
> A. "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. And the earth
> was unformed and void." [30]
>
> B. "When God began to create the heavens and the earth -- the earth being
> unformed and void." [31]
>
> C. "At the beginning of the creation of the heavens and the earth, the
> earth was unformed and void."
>
> D. "At the beginning of the creation of the heavens and the earth, when
> the earth was unformed and void." [32]
>
> Notice that none of these translations state, "In the beginning God
> created the heavens and the earth 'out of nothing.'" Rather, "In the
> beginning" only means "at the commencement of time, in the remotest past
> that the human mind can conceive, God created the heavens and the earth."
> How God did that is depicted in the verses that follow Genesis 1:1-2. [33]
> For instance Genesis states that heaven was formed on the second day of
> Creation "in the midst of the water." And the earth was called forth on
> the third day from the watery "deep." But what was this primordial
> "water" from which (or in which) heaven and earth were created? Nought
> but primordial Apsu and Tiamat, their waters commingling as a single body
> (Enuma Elish)! Because it was agreed among all the Hebrew's neighbors that
> vast primeval "waters" existed "in the beginning":
>
> "At the beginning the world was a waste of water called Nu, and it was the
> abode of the Great Father. He was Nu, for he was the deep...and Ra bade
> the earth and
> the heavens to rise out of the waste of water."
> -- Creation Myth of the Sun Worshippers (Egyptian) [34]
>
> "Nothing existed except the vast mass of Celestial Waters."
> -- The Book of Knowing How Ra Came Into Being (Egyptian) [35]
>
> "In the beginning there existed neither heaven nor earth, and nothing
> existed except the boundless mass, of primeval water which was shrouded in
> darkness."
> -- Another Telling of the Origin of the Gods (Egyptian) [36]
>
> "Sing the sacred race of immortals...who sprang from Earth and starry
> Heaven, and murky Night, whom the briny Deep nourished...In truth then
> foremost sprang
> Chaos."
> -- Selections from Hesiod's Theogony (Greek) [37]
>
> "The beginning of all things was a...windy air...and a chaos, turbid and
> black...destitute of form. But when this wind became enamored of its own
> first principles (the chaos), an intimate union (commingling) took
> place...(and) from its embrace with the wind was generated Ilus
> (Mud)...the putrefaction of a watery mixture, And from this sprang all the
> seed of creation and the generation of the universe."
> -- A Phoenician (Canaanite) Creation Myth [38]
>
> Eusebius of Caesarea quoted Philo Byblius on the ancient Phoenician
> cosmogony, "As the beginning of all things he assumes (i.e., Philo
> Byblius) a dark and windy air or a blowing of dark air and a marshy, dark
> chaos." [39]
>
> One cannot fail to see how much the Hebrew creation story owes to its
> neighbors' conception of "primordial waters." However, the Hebrew God,
> unlike the rest, is not portrayed as being born of those waters. Instead,
> they simply exist "in the beginning," and the Hebrew god is commanding
> them. Kind of like the Hebrews were playing "one-up-man-ship" with the
> stories of the gods and watery creation that already were common in the
> ancient world.
>
> ---------------------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #6 : Exactly how many "seven word" series in the entire
> Bible and in other books, have you examined with an eye to finding as many
> coincidences between those words' gematric values and mathematical
> figures?
>
> Suppose you discovered additional "seven word" series whose gematric
> values were filled with mathematical coincidences?
>
> Suppose you didn't, but someone with a great knowledge of mathematics (and
> more determination) did find some seven word series with an equal or
> greater number of such mathematical conicidences?
>
> Exactly how many interesting mathematical values are you aware of in both
> the realm of higher and lower mathematics (let's not limit ourselves to
> just prime numbers and pi and e). There are probably lots of intriguing
> values you can find in any seven word sequence if you know a lot about
> mathematics and the many possibly significant numbers and equations in
> higher mathematics.
>
> -----------------
>
> QUESTION OR POINT #7: Isaac Newton was fooled by Pyramidology. "Pi" was
> found, along with numerous "amazing numberical coincidences," connected
> with the external and internal measurements of the Great Pyramid. The
> earliest Pyramidologists found a few simple mathematical coincidences, and
> later pyramidologists kept building on the basic ones, finding more
> "fine-tuned" and more "amazing" mathematical coincidences. The seeker's
> mind acting like a sieve, ignores all negatively significant, or
> contradictory coincidences in favor of coincidences that she or he can
> creatively interpret as "significant," until they have a bookful of
> coincidences, while the REST of the story remains untold, the countless
> numbers of mathematical significance that were not found, or were found in
> odd out of the way verses when the entire Bible is analyzed gematrically.
>
> The articles at the websites below explain why such numerical coincidences
> are not as "amazing" as one might think at first glance. Even Christians
> eventually debunked Pyramidology claims (though it was Christians who
> first propagated such claims) and show why the discovery of "Pi"-related
> numbers in the pyramid's measurements are not so "amazing." Even a
> mathematical genius like Isaac Newton was taken in by both Pyramidology
> and Alchemy in his day and age, so no one need kick themselves for being
> taken in by gematria.
>
> http://answers.org/CultsAndReligions/pyramid.html
>
> http://www.greatdreams.com/pyramid.htm
>
> http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/ancient/egyptians/pyramidology_01.shtml
>
> If you study pyramidology in depth you begin to understand how easy it is
> to "find" numerical coincidences when you "look" for them.
>
> I guess we all have a tendency to "see" what's most important to us,
> sometimes even in the most unlikely places. It's based on the way our mind
> filters information. Or as Francis Bacon once put it, "The general root of
> superstition is that men observe when things hit, and not when they miss,
> and commit to memory the one, and pass over the other."
>
> Cheers,
> Ed

Thank you, Ed, for your very comprehensive review of many interesting matters. However, you must appreciate that my interests and findings are far more focussed.

Sincerely,

Vernon
www.otherbiblecode.com

>
> ------------------------
>
>
>
> "Vernon Jenkins" <vernon.jenkins@virgin.net> writes:
> >Hi Ed,
> >
> >Welcome to the ASA list. You may remember writing to me way back in
> >Aug/Sept
> >2003 with a number of observations re my interest in Bible numerics. As I
> >recall, our dialogue finished rather abruptly, and I'm wondering if you'd
> >care to comment on something I've been taxing the list with over the past
> >months, viz my contention that the Bible's first verse, in the original
> >Hebrew, is the most remarkable combination of words ever written, and a
> >standing miracle. To support this claim I have prepared a brief summary of
> >my writings which you may find at
> >http://homepage.virgin.net/tgvernon.jenkins/Wonders.htm
> >
> >Sincerely,
> >
> >Vernon (Jenkins)
> >www.otherbiblecode.com
> >
> >PS I still await a reply from Brendan McKay.
> >
> >V
 
Received on Wed Oct 6 17:29:44 2004