When do signifcant numbers cross the line to numerology?

When a number is made to represent anything more than a number.

 

What about it? He is speaking of the identification of antichrist, a person.

 

I was the poster who called the other post "mumbo jumbo".

In my opinion, if the Bible itself applies meaning to a number, fine. As well, I don't really see a big problem with finding general application (7 being "complete", etc.).

But once you start to determine hidden meaning and significance, you have definitely crossed the line. Especially once you start counting words and letters in English or other languages that didn't exist at the time scripture was written. It's all arbitrary and guesswork, no rules, no verifications. You can find any meaning you want to find. Mumbo jumbo. And even if there was real meaning in such cases, it is technically occultic (the real meaning of "occult" is "hidden") to try and "divine" those meanings.

 

I used to do some numerology before I was a Christian, and I think the bottom line is that we don't know why Moses was on the mountain for 40 days, or what 666 means. As a new believer, I used to hear people say that 40 meant something, 3 meant something else, and 7 was completion, etc., and I accepted it until I found out the Bible does not tell us what these numbers mean. I think unless God makes it clear in his word what a number means, we should not go too far afield trying to figure it out.

Numerology, as Natters said, is seeking a hidden meaning that is not apparent. The Kabbalah uses numerology with the Old Testament, by giving a number equivalent to each letter of the Hebrew alphabet and then working out numbers for names of biblical characters, etc. (I think this is called gematria). This is how numerology is done today -- each letter has a number equivalent and meaning is read into the numbers. Dates are also reduced to numbers.

It's fine to observe how often 40, 7, and 12 are repeated in the Bible, but I don't think there is hidden meaning that we are supposed to uncover. Some correlations seem obvious - like 12 tribes and 12 disciples. But that is not a hidden meaning. Observing these correlations is one thing, but trying to read a meaning into them is another.

 

Keith
"Is there a tie-in to the number of the beast (three sixes)? Does this also imply the beast (a man - 6 - is trying to be a god - 3 - by faulty means - 666)? Or is all of this an invention of early "Christian" mystics that has been carried over to the present day by well meaning teachers?"
"
Call me oldfashioned, but I think those early "Christian" mystics where right when they came up with the notion that 666 referred to Nero Caesar.

 

How did they come up with Nero being 666?

 

This sounds like NUMEROLOGY. I really don't think God gives us answers through numerology. Hebrew doesn't have vowels, so that messes this up anyway. It seems one can manipulate the name several ways to get the 666. And why convert Nero's name to Hebrew in the first place?

I don't think we have a clue as to what the 666 means and we may not even know when it's in front of us (this is for those who think it's in the future) since we don't know what God means by this.

 

ARITHMETIC - the science or art of computing
byh positive, real numbers, specif, by adding,
subtracting, muyltiplying, and dividing.

Mathematics such as the Calculus, probiblaity,
and set theory go beyond arithmetic.
Most people who barely passed 8th grade "math"
didn't understand when (if?) the teacher
explained the difference between arithmetic
and mathematics. Arithmetic is a subset of
mathematics.

IMHO the most evil of the current misuses of
arithemetic and the Bible is the gematria
(devination by Bible letter order) AKA:
Bible code.

 

Marcia
"This sounds like NUMEROLOGY."
"
Ofcourse it does, it is.

" I really don't think God gives us answers through numerology."
"
In this particular case it is spelled out in the text itself that there is a hidden meaning that can deciphered by those who have discernment. The problem with numerology is that random hidden meanings get read into texts where there is no hidden meaning. In this case there certainly is a hidden meaning

"Hebrew doesn't have vowels, so that messes this up anyway."
"
Revelations is however in Greek.

 

Well, numerology is divination.

I think God saying the number is 666 and you need wisdom to understand this does not in any way mean it is connected to numerology. I've heard that the 666 might be the opposite of the Trinity, and that's why it's the number of man, or humanity. I'm not necessarily agreeing with that. But that is not numerology.

Yes, I know that , but look at the post where I asked how they came up with Nero being 666. KeithS said:

Since he specifically said Hebrew letters, I responded with the answer above about the Hebrew alphabet.

 

Well...I'm gonna apply a little "logic" to this whole subject without getting too technical(since 10th grade math was MY limit).
Mathematics is a pretty "exacting" science and God is an "orderly"God so if He choses to do things in a mathematically "orderly" way it should come as no surprize since like everything else,He invented MATH TOO!I think that there may well be some significance to the recurring appearance of certain numbers like 3,6,7,40,etc,and lessons to be learned from each.BUT,the very miracles we see in the Bible such as the parting of the Red Sea,the sun standing still for a day,wine out of water.Jesus walking ON water...and many others PROVES that our Creator CAN and often DOES change the rules we understand that govern our existence.Why...He even violated the law of GRAVITY by bodily ascending into Heaven!
Numbers in the Bible may have some hidden significance...but God is not bound to mathematical exactness so the study of this kind of stuff should not be made into a law of some sort or carried too far.JMO

Greg Sr.

 

I guess I said all that to say this...God IS in CONTROL...so it is NOT POSSIBLE to bind Him by any set of rules or mathematical "formula" that the mind of man can invent or deduce.Just about the time man thinks he has it all figured out...God can and will do something to show him how dumb he really is...lol....JMO

Greg Sr.

 

KeithS
That last link of yours, didn't link 666 to the pope but to that notorious threat to early Christianity Gnosticism. I think that the explanation in the article is a bit to complex, but it's certainly a viable alternative.

To a significant number of American baptists on this board.
Many of you have no problem whatsoever believing the most convoluted constructions featuring multiple Biblebooks written centuries apart. It's amazing that folks who believe in things like the pre-trib rapture, or that the feet of a statue described by the prophet Daniël refer to the EU have difficulty believing something as simple as the notion that some numbers (like 3, 7 and 40) have a certain special significance, despite the fact that the same numbers show up again and again and again.