(Dr. Peter S. Ruckman) Bible Numerics
(Dr. Peter S. Ruckman) Bible Numerics
(Dr. Peter S. Ruckman) Bible Numerics
BB BOOKSTORE
P.O. Box 7135 Pensacola, FL 32534
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
The Scripture quotations found herein are from the text of the
Authorized King James Version of the Bible. Any deviations
therefrom are not intentional.
Preface
The number One. The number One means unity. That is, one.
Our words unum, united, unitas, unity (uno in the Spanish),
and so forth and so on, show there's truth to the evidence.
One is stability; it's fixed; it's absolute. The number One,
everywhere it's found in scripture or outside of scripture, is
connected with something that has unity to it, and stability
to it, and strength to it. It's the great word used by the
communists. Hence United Drive, United Fund, United Peace
Corps from unitas, unum, unos, one. One nation, indivisible,
"under God"; scratch out "God" and you've gotten rid of the
first commandment, and you only have the second
commandment--"one nation"--one people.
The word One occurs for the first time in the word of God in
Genesis 1:9 where we read, "let the waters under the heaven
be gathered together unto one place." Thereafter it occurs
so many times that it would hardly do to list them--literally
hundreds of times.
The great statement to Israel is, "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our
God is one Lord" (Deut. 6:4). "The Lord our God is ONE
Lord." The word one here, as its fixed meaning, means a
"plurality united," not a single unit alone, but a "unity." "The
Lord our God is one Lord." The word there, in the Hebrew, is
that word that refers to a oneness of a multiplicity rather
than a oneness all by itself with nothing connected with it.
One, therefore, plainly stands for unity. That's what the
world is working toward; unity without the Bible, or unity
with the Unitarian's Bible, or unity with the United Nation's
Bible, or a United Church's Bible. What they want is oneness,
and nothing brings this out any clearer than the first great
case of "one" in the Bible found again in the book of Genesis.
Although the first time the word One occurs is in Genesis 1:9,
the first time where we really see the word expounded on, in
all the glory of its meaning, is in Genesis 11 where it says that
the earth was of one language and of one speech and God
said in Genesis 11:6, "the people is one," and they all have
one mind to do this, and he said, "I'm gonna go down and
break `em up." He scattered them abroad upon the face of
the earth. The word one, the number One, as it stands, refers
then to a strength of unity, and when Paul says he wants to
have the believers to be of one mind, and the same mind,
he's speaking of this. Where he says, "one body," "one
Lord," "one faith," "one Spirit," "one baptism," he is
referring to the same thing--a s ole thing that is correct and
absolute into which everything is united in accord, One.
There is no problem with the word One.
The Bible says a man "shall leave father and mother and
cleave to his wife, and they shall be one flesh." One,
therefore, forever, stands for unity. The unity may be a unity
of two, or of three, or of five, of of ten, or a hundred; but
one is a single unit as it stands, and so it stands anywhere in
the word of God. There's no trouble with One.
The Number TWO
Now we get to Two. The number Two in the Bible is used like
it is used anywhere, and of course the number Two
immediately implies division. Amos chapter 3, verse 3, "Can
two walk together, except they be agreed?" Why, in Genesis
2 Adam has his side divided; he's cut open. The unity is
marred of his body and out comes a woman, Two. The Bible
says in Genesis 2 that no help meet was found for Adam, so
Adam became two in Genesis 2. You say, "Well, that's kind of
stretching it." Yes, it is. Isn't it strange, though. You don't
suppose the King James translators knew that when they
put the chapter and verse markings in, do you? No, of course
they didn't. We find the same phenomenon in other places in
two's in the Bible. But two doesn't need a great deal of
expounding on. Two plainly gives division. Now, the wise
man says in the book of Ecclesiastes that "two is better than
one," referring of course to a man and woman; but even
though those are two they're said to be one, and there
should be no division between them. If there is, that isn't an
ideal situation, and it's not a scriptural situation. Two, as it
stands, implies division.
Isn't it strange that the division of the tribes of Israel began
way back there in the book of Numbers and continues right
slap on through, clean up to the time of Christ? Do you
realize that there are two spies that came back in the book
of Numbers, and ten of them were not faithful and two of
them were and that divided the camp right down the
middle? It was divided again under Rehoboam after
Solomon; into two southern tribes and ten northern tribes,
and so help me if James and John (two brothers!) didn't
come to Jesus and say, "Grant us that we may sit at your
right hand and your left hand in the kingdom."
Do you realize the Old Testament is divided, and the main
division is between the law and the prophets? Jesus speaks
about the law and the prophets and the Psalms in His exact
division, but where Paul is speaking before his witnesses and
gives the divisions he simply says, "the law and the
prophets." That is the usual division. I realize that technically
there are three divisions: the writings, and the law, and the
prophets; but we find very often the expression "the law
and prophets," just the two given as the main divisions. The
main representatives of the law and the prophets, of course,
are Elijah and Moses. That's division. Elijah divides off the
prophets; Moses divides off the law. As a matter of fact, with
three sections in the Old Testament, there are two dividing
marks in them. One demarcation is between the law and the
prophets; the other demarcation is between the prophets
and the writings. The two men who stand in these two
divisions are Moses and Elijah. Isn't that a strange thing? I
guess you realize when Moses and Elijah come back before
the Second Coming of Christ, they'll herald the Second
Coming of Christ, and when Christ returns (Zech. 14), the
Mount of Olives shall cleave in Two. The word Two clearly
implies division. As a matter of fact, a schizophrenic is a split
personality, implying two people in one person or two
personalities in one person.
It was two angels who came to Sodom and got Lot out of
town. That split his family up pretty good, too, if you'll
remember. He had two daughters. We find two daughters a
lot; Laban had two daughters.
There is a superstition, of course, among natives that twins
are no good, and they are to be buried or killed. In many
African tribes twins are still killed, and so is the mother killed.
Why? Two is division. Two is division. And this is clear. You
don't find many good meanings on the word Two.
The first time the word Two occurs in your Bible is Genesis
1:16. God made two lights, a reference to the sun and the
moon. You know what the Lord said they were for? They
were to divide, brother, to divide the day from the night, the
light from the darkness. One was Lord of the daytime, the
sun; one was Lord of the night, the moon. Two then clearly
stands for division, and most any place you find it, that will
be the basic idea behind it. One is unity, Two is division.
The Number THREE
Now Noah was 500 years old when the Lord began to deal
with him about making the ark; he begat Shem, Ham, and
Japheth. He was 600 when he went into the ark, which
brings us up to the number Six. Now Noah of course had
found grace in the eyes of the Lord, and so somebody could
grab that 500 and say, "Well, that shows grace." But let's just
face it, Noah may have had some grace shown on him, but
the Bible says he condemned the world over in II Peter 2 and
Hebrews 11. He is death to them. The number that is
connected with going into the ark and the flood coming was
600; which brings us to Six.
Now six has some problems connected with it. Normally, it is
said to be "the number of man," and I'm not going to argue
with this. I'm sure it has something to do with man; but as to
whether it is limited to man, I don't know. Also, as to
whether or not it is man in this age, I don't know. I don't
know how much you can connect it with man alone, or the
Antichrist alone, or demons or the Devil in relation to man,
but the facts are these: The number, as it stands by itself
(six), occurs for the first time in Genesis 7:6 where Noah is
600 years old when the flood comes.
"Sixth," which is kin to it, is of course connected with
Genesis 1 "on the sixth day," and the sixth day is the day that
Adam is made, and this of course gives tremendous weight
to the theory that six is connected with man. It's on the sixth
day that Adam is made. (It certainly has something to do
with man.) The number "six" occurs several times in the
book of Genesis, and the most notable place was the 600th
year of Noah's life.
Later in the Bible we find 600 men a very common
expression for some reason. The scholarly approach to this
business is "These are just round numbers"--that is, they
don't mean anything. Of course we reject that nonsense.
Everything in that Book has some meaning to it. They're not
just round numbers; they have meaning to them. We find
600 men used frequently, and we find that in Genesis 46:26
the number of souls that go down into Egypt with Jacob
have the number six in them, "all the souls were threescore
and six." It is used in reference to people in that case and
most of the time it is. When Pharaoh chases the children of
Israel he takes 600 chosen chariots, and as I said before, this
600 men keeps popping up. Notice it in I Samuel 30:9; notice
it in II Samuel 15:18, and there are several other places where
this business shows up. Notice in the book of Judges, three
times in Chapter 18, the six hundred men. Notice it in Judges
20:47. Now, I don't know why that is, but there is something
very significant about that. Notice again in I Samuel 23:13;
27:2; and 30:9. I never have worked out that six hundred, but
there is bound to be something to it. The Bible doesn't
throw numbers around for no reason, and this idea of
"round numbers" of course is nonsense.
The Lord is very careful to tell you the number of fishes that
come into the net in John 21 and the number of people that
got saved on the boat wreck that Paul was on. Any book this
specific is not going to waste time talking about generalities
and "round numbers." When it gives a number, Brother,
there is a reason and purpose behind it, and our ignorance is
no reason to reject it.
I've never professed to know all that Book; I don't profess to
know it now. There is something about the tone of my voice
that irritates people, and I've heard people complain and
say, "You know, Bob thinks he's right and everybody else is
wrong." You have to consider the source. Those who say
that usually are either too lazy or too proud to investigate
anything but their own conceit. Anybody who takes the
trouble to do a great deal of studying quickly finds out that
many of the things he's been taught (the sacred cows) are
wrong. There is plenty about the Bible I don't know. I know
where the verses are, but God forbid that I should profess to
be able to interpret them. I can't interpret them--the Holy
Spirit interprets them, and where He doesn't show me the
answer, I don't have the answer. But I know when another
man doesn't have it too! That's one of the blessings about
being critical. If you are hard on yourself, the other fellow
won't get by you too close. Now I don't know why these six
hundred men keep popping up, but I'm absolutely certain
there is a purpose behind it.
The six days of creation are found repeated throughout the
Bible in connection with the Sabbath rest and the warning to
the Jew to be careful about the seventh day. He keeps
mentioning the six days, the six days, the six days, in Exodus
16:26; 20:11; 21:2; 23:12; 23:10. The cloud covers the tabernacle
six days in Exodus 24:16. The golden candlestick in the
tabernacle has seven lights on it, but it is so made that it has
only six branches, the seventh branch being the candlestick
itself, the center piece. We read about six names of the Jews
on one stone and six on the another in Exodus 28:10. When
the Jews get in the promised land, they're told to have six
tribes on one mountain and six tribes on another reading the
curses of the law. Yet when the division of the tribes comes,
it never comes on a six and six proposition. Where the tribes
are divided, they're always divided off into ten and two as
we'll see later when we get into a study of the number ten.
They're always divided off into ten and two, for some
reason, with Joshua and Caleb leading the way back there in
the book of Numbers.
Jericho is compassed six days before it fell on the seventh
day. The giants evidently have six fingers and six toes in II
Samuel 21:20, showing that they are supermen. Solomon, as
a type of the Antichrist, has his throne with six steps and six
lions on one side and six lions on the other side making 666.
Now this lends great weight to the theory that six is
connected with man, as the Antichrist will be the Super-man,
the God-man, the Trinity--666. Of course, the only problem is
that he is the wrong god. If you're looking for a God-man
you'd have to look for 777. And of course this is all outside of
the realm of physics and mathematics, and not even the
extra sensory perception, LSD, hippie, gurus, and Berkeley
crowd can get on the boat here because they don't have the
brains or the fortitude! What you're looking for is 777; it is
three times completion. That's the Trinity times perfection,
and that's the One you're looking for.
Obviously, 666 is incomplete, and 666 is obviously a trinity of
sixes. If six is man, then it is man at his best, fallen man at his
best. This is the number you're told to look out for in
Revelation 13:18. Somehow or other the verse marking
escaped the notice of the new conservatives in that verse 18
itself has three sixes in it.
I suppose the King James translators rigged this up!
Certainly, they positively could not have even thought about
it. It just came out that way. Somebody says "Coincidence."
Well, I used to believe that for a long time. Then, after I
discovered about 85 percent of the "instances" in the Bible
were sheer "coincidence," I decided I'd better go with the
bookies and con men and bet safe.
Let me illustrate: It is amazing how when you produce these
things from the word of God somebody says, "You can do
that with any type of number, and there is nothing to it." Yet
no man who bet on odds or numbers, no professional man
who dealt with numbers professionally, would think of
taking such odds. The only people who take such odds are
Bible "scholars" who resent the Authorized Version. They'll
take `em; I won't!
How do you account for that 666 popping up in Chapter 13
on a verse that is divisible by three sixes? A man said,
"Coincidence." Tell me something. Why does the number
occur again in Ezra 2:13? In the thirteenth verse of Ezra 2 it
says 666. Could you tell me why the only other time that
thing occurs is in II Chronicles 9:13? 666. How come it is
always showing up with the thirteen? You say, "Well, it
shows up in Chapter 10 of I Kings." Well, that's one out of
four. Tell me something, with the odds of three to one in
31,000 verses; what are you talking about, "Coincidence,"
when the odds are three to one?! I don't know many
gamblers who would take odds of three to one, do you? I've
known some gamblers; I've known some who take what
appear to be three-to-one odds, but that isn't all. These odds
are better than three to one considering all the possibilities
of numbers that could have been used.
The 666 occurs again in I Kings 10:14, and it is still connected
with the same man, and the same thing, and the same
measurements, and the same articles mentioned in II
Chronicles 9:13. How can we separate this gold or gold image
with a head like a lion of Nebuchadnezzar, the king of
Babylon, from the beast in Revelation 13 who has a mouth
like a lion, who controls all the gold, whose number is 666,
who shows up in a verse divisible by sixes and is found in
Ezra 2:13 where the man mentioned, Adonikam, means the
"lord of rebellion." The odds are not three to one. If it were
just the number you were dealing with, the odds would be
three to one, but you were dealing with gold, lions, kings,
rebellion, and world dictatorship. Now what are the odds?
The odds are too great for a gambler to take a chance on.
The only person who would take a chance on it is a
Protestant, Catholic, or Jew who doesn't like the Authorized
Version of the Bible.
When Jesus dies on Calvary's cross it was about the sixth
hour when the darkness comes (Luke 23:44), and that of
course puts it from noon until about three o'clock in the
afternoon, clearly dividing the day itself at the sixth or
middle point. Thus six evidently has something to do with
the division of time. Six months is going to be a division of a
year; the sixth hour is going to be a division of a day. We
were amazed to find how many times this combination of
three and six is used where it refers to a division: three years
and six months, three days and a half. This thing occurs over
and over again in your Bible in connection with the
resurrection of Jesus Christ and the reign of the Antichrist.
The measurement of forty-two months itself is three years
and six months. The measurement 1260 days, given in
Revelation 11, is three years and six months. This division
occurs over and over again--three and one-half, three and
one-half, three and one-half. Daniel refers to it as "time,
times, and a half a time."
So I learn the term "six" has not only something to do with
man, but also has something to do with the division of time
in connection with man. His days are "numbered," as it were.
Exactly what all of it means, I don't know. I know the
Antichrist is the Superman, 666. I know that God
commanded His blessing on the Jew on the sixth year in
Leviticus 25:21 so they could rest on the seventh year. I know
six cubits is said to be something to do with a man in the
book of Revelation. I know from reading the Bible that six
days has to do with the period of this age. Christ doesn't
appear in glory until after six days, Matthew 17:1, Mark 9:2.
The Sabbath is plainly a type of the Millennial reign of Jesus
Christ, so this age that I live in is peculiarly marked by the
number Six. That has to be a characteristic of this age. If I
had lived before the year 1000, the thing that would have
marked my age would have been five. If I had lived the first
1000 years before Christ, my number would have been four.
If I had lived before the reign of Solomon, it would have
been three. You can't beat the mathematical, absolute,
infallible accuracy of numbers. The number that will
characterize this age before Christ comes will be the number
six. You say, "Are you sure?" Yes sir! "Dear right?" Absolutely!
"You think everybody else is wrong?" Absolutely, Brother!
You say, "I never heard such conceit in all my life." No, you
never heard such truth in all your life, Brother. Six is the
characteristic of this age (and you'd better look out for
words that end in X)!
All right, so there is the number Six; and it obviously has
something to do with man, although I don't understand
everything about it. It has something to do with the
Superman and something to do with the day or age of man
that you're now living in. It is wound up by the perfect
complete number, Seven. I'm looking for the return of 777,
and you can have old 666. I don't want him; I don't like him;
he's too electronic for me.
The Number SEVEN
Of all the numbers in the Bible, the next one is the least
satisfactory; and that is the number Eleven. In fact, I don't
really profess to have any solution on it at all. I've read books
about it; I've seen numerology books printed about it, but
none would give me any satisfaction, and I find no clue in
scripture to locate the thing as to exactly what it is. As a
general practice in trying to find a number, the thing you do
is find the number of that book--like if you are looking for
eleven, you take the eleventh book in the Bible. Then when
you have found the eleventh book, take the eleventh
chapter and look at the eleventh verse. This does not always
yield results but sometimes it does.
The eleventh book in your Bible, as it stands, is I Kings, and
of course I Kings 11 takes you right into the time of Solomon,
king of Israel. First Kings 11:11 is a warning by the Lord that
Solomon has not kept the covenants that He made with him.
This means nothing by itself, and it stands about by itself in
the Bible. It isn't good. The eleventh chapter in the Bible is
Genesis 11 which is not good either. In Genesis 11 we have the
Tower of Babel and the scattering of the nations abroad
across the face of the earth. The first time the word eleven
occurs in the Bible is in Genesis 32:22. The obvious indication
is in Genesis 37:9 referring to the sons of Israel exclusive of
Joseph.
Now we find this eleven popping up in the New Testament;
the eleven disciples in Matthew 28:16, the eleven in Mark
16:14, the eleven in Acts 1:26, and Acts 2:14. The eleven are
the apostles minus Judas, and yet this is an incomplete
number in that they have to choose a replacement for Judas.
Jesus promised in Matthew 19 that twelve apostles will sit
upon the twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
The number, as it stands, is one number over a Gentile and
one number short of Israel, as it stands.
"Twelve" in the Bible is very rarely divided into eleven and
one, except in the case of Judas. The division normally in
twelve is ten and two, or six and six. (I don't recall hardly any
places where it is divided any differently.) Wherever you
have twelve, it's divided into six and six, like the six tribes
and the six stones and the six more below them and the six
in one mountain cursing and the six in the other mountain
blessing and that kind of business. Then there's ten and two
which is a division of the tribes of Israel, but eleven and one
is a division that doesn't bode too much good. It is only used
in reference to Judas Iscariot; I know of hardly any other
place where the thing is used any other way than that.
The eleventh month is referred to a good bit in Numbers and
Deuteronomy but nothing special with it. We read about the
eleventh hour in Matthew 20:6 meaning the last hour and in
Matthew 20:9 the same thing. Eleven seems to indicate
something right before a catastrophe, and it is almost
impossible to locate it. I don't profess to know exactly what
it does mean.
We could work in combinations. It's made up of ten and one.
Ten is plainly a Gentile number beyond any dispute; One is
unity or singleness or unification, so I don't know where you
are there. You could work it up of nine and two. Two is
division and nine is probably fruitfulness--that doesn't yield
anything. You could work it up of seven and four--seven
being completeness or perfection and four, unknown. You
could work it up of five and six--six being man's number, and
five being death. That isn't a very good combination.
The number is a dark horse. It has not been located. It is
usually significant of the lull before the storm or the last
hour before the thing falls apart. This is of course because
there are twelve hours in a day and twelve hours in a night.
As I've said before, the findings on it are inconclusive.
The Number TWELVE