The Bible Code - Fact or Fiction?

The Bible Code is a method for finding various expressions in the Torah by reading them with equidistant letter skips. This way, you can read a specific expression—say, find the words 'Oslo Accords' by skipping a fixed number of letters. For example, in a particular verse, the letter 'O' might appear, then five letters later 'S', another five 'L', and so on.

The Bible Code was discovered only in the last few decades but has since sparked significant controversy. Some view the hidden codes in the Torah (Rabin's assassination, the Twin Towers collapse, Versailles Hall, and nearly every significant public event) as probabilistic possibilities that can also be found in Harry Potter. Where is the difference? That's where we begin our investigation.

"To be clear, we can find various expressions in almost any book," clarifies Prof. Eliyahu Rips, an Israeli mathematician and one of the leading researchers in Israel on the Bible Code. "In research, we typically look for the smallest skips—every two letters, every five, and so on. When viewed in this way, the picture changes, and the statistical options are significantly reduced. In addition, we discover a phenomenon in the Torah not seen in other books: taking a group of words referring to a specific topic, you suddenly find they concentrate in a particular chapter or a few select verses instead of scattering randomly across the Bible. For example, with the Twin Towers, a series of keywords—'Twin Towers,' 'Plane,' 'Attack,' 'Victims,' 'Ruins,' and more—turned out to all appear together in a short passage in the Book of Numbers using this minimal skip criterion. Such a phenomenon, at this level, simply does not occur in other books".

How exactly do you decide which words to take? After all, isn't it possible to manipulate the results here too?
"In the specific case of the Twin Towers, we did something simple: we took a segment from Israeli newspapers dated 12.9.2001, the day after the disaster, and extracted the keywords in exactly the same form and spelling, to nullify the argument that we used words convenient for us and omitted those that weren't".

One of the prominent rabbis promoting the Bible Code is Rabbi Zamir Cohen, head of the Hidabroot organization. Although the topic as a whole emerged only in the past few decades, as noted, the rabbi mentions an earlier testimony to the code from the RAMAC (Rabbi Moshe Cordovero)—a 16th-century Kabbalist from Safed who wrote even then that the Torah contains letter skips, letter combinations, acronyms, and other elements hinting at future events. "Scientists have formulated various criteria, but for me, the truth in this matter is found in the words of the RAMAC, who was among the greatest Kabbalists and said that the Torah is written in layers upon layers," says Rabbi Cohen. "After all, the Torah contains PaRDeS—an acronym for P'shat (simple), Remez (hint), Drash (interpretation), and Sod (secret). One of the layers of Remez is, indeed, the letter skips".

"When searching for the words 'Minister Ze'evi' in the Bible, for example, they appear at a skip of 704 letters adjacent to the verse 'And it came to pass on the way at the lodging-place, that Hashem met him and sought to kill him'—a verse spoken about Moses. What percentage of chances could there be for something like this to occur by chance? The word 'murder' also appears nearby, and the word 'PLO' appears in the same Table at a skip of 704 letters as well. The word 'in the morning' appears in the same Table at a skip of 704 letters, along with the words 'two people' also appearing in the Table. Such a convergence of details leads to the conclusion that there is no chance this happened by coincidence".

To the eternal claim: Why is it always discovered after the events have occurred? Why not before?

"The famous finding of Yitzhak Rabin actually surfaced beforehand. About two years prior to the assassination, his name was found overlapping with a verse speaking of murder, and according to American journalist Michael Drosnin, the finding was even brought to Rabin's attention. However, this is rare, as Yitzhak Rabin was specifically searched for in the Bible due to his status. Versailles Hall—who would have thought to look for it in the Torah before the collapse? Only after the hall collapsed did they check and found that the words appear precisely in the Table stating 'for we will destroy this place,' and the names of the groom and bride appeared in equal skips at that exact spot. No one can claim that only after the Versailles Hall collapsed—someone amended the Torah—it's written thousands of years beforehand. It simply required looking.

Why does most of the scientific community in the country not accept the validity of the Bible Code?"There has been a long-standing debate for 10-15 years," says Professor Rips. "Doron Witztum and I conducted an experiment on a series of rabbis with their dates of death and tried to find them in the Torah. We published the research in '94 in a scientific journal, and a group of scientists examined it from all statistical angles and found no flaws, thus claimed 'You falsified the data, conspired with the assistant chair of the Library Department at Bar Ilan to give you the names.' The scientific community, seeing the controversy, tended to agree with their claim, and since then, they have ceased to regard the Bible Code seriously. They simply don't engage with it, and thus aren't discovering what they could easily with scientific tools, if only they showed a little more interest".

Rabbi Cohen has a slightly different explanation: "They deny the Bible Code for the same reason Muslims claim there wasn’t a Temple, even as they themselves destroy artifacts on the Temple Mount to support their claim. That is, as soon as a serious issue threatens the existential basis of their claim to the Temple Mount—they're ready to fight it in any way. In a similar vein, the Bible Code can cause an earthquake because if there truly is a Bible Code, it means all of humanity must change course and apply everything written in the Torah. Such a shake-up is probably too strong for them—not every person can live with such awareness, so surely anyone who can find an escape route in denial will take it".

Professor Rips—when you, immersed in this subject and certain of its truth, see people who witness all this and still remain unconvinced—how does that make you feel?
"I explain the principles, counter their arguments, and demonstrate why they are incorrect, unreasonable, and unscientific, but a person who closes their eyes and doesn’t want to know—I have no solution for that. If someone is genuinely willing to listen—I’m willing for you to publish my phone number, 02-5865542. We'll sit together, they can present all the arguments in the world, I'll answer, and they will understand everything only through the scientific angle. I've never seen someone not convinced in such manner, face to face, when all the evidence is laid out before them".

To purchase the "Bible Code" software on Hidabroot Shops, click here.