by Al Sutton
Some Thoughts on Bible Codes and Prophecy
When do you have a Bible Code that is sufficiently believable on some level as to constitute a legitimate prophecy that requires action? To put it another way, how hard does G-d have to yell in your ear before, like Lot, you grab your coat and run for the hills just before your city is destroyed forever? How hard does G-d have to yell before you race off the beach and into the hills just before the tsunami levels everything for miles inland? How many times are you prepared to run for it, only to have nothing happen for days or weeks or even years after the warning? These are the kinds of questions anyone reading Bible Codes or researching Bible Codes must be thinking about.
Here are my thoughts on the subject. I’ll give credit where I can remember the source of my inspiration whether they claim it or not. If I’ve inadvertently used someone else’s idea without crediting it, please forgive me. Let me know, and I’ll add the footnote where appropriate. My thoughts on this subject are drawn at least in part from knowledge of and research in military sensor systems and developmental software.
Unfortunately, real radars, sonars, and other military sensors aren’t as inherently reliable as they appear in novels and in movies. Signals from the source are often much smaller than desired and can be easily confused with noise in the electronics or natural phenomena with similar characteristics. Software can either enhance the chance of finding the target in space and time, or it can inhibit the detection, and the same can be said for deciding where and how to search for a target. I will attempt, by analogy to come up with a series of rules to help establish when it is time to run for the hills, and when you might as well leave your chair on the beach and enjoy the surf.
1. Do you believe that the Bible Codes are intended to transmit valid information? If the answer to that question is “no” then read no further. If you believe that the Bible Codes were given as warnings from a reasonably omniscient source, then read on. This is similar to the rule that you need to understand and believe in the basic physics and engineering of the radar before you believe that the target “blip” that appears on your screen requires your attention. Many operators have been known to turn off their sensor systems because they didn’t believe them.
2. Beating down the false alarm rate is the first order of business after you have a system that should be able to detect targets. Early radars could detect targets, but the false alarm rate (false targets per hour) was high. No operator could declare a target based on a single event. Here in priority order, are some suggestions for beating down the false alarm rate while keeping the detection rate high.
a. Don’t make too many assumptions about the nature of the target or the operation of the sensor system under any given set of conditions. Should we look for “USA”, “America”, or “United States of America” to identify the USA in a code? If we demand United States of America, we’ll certainly reduce the false alarm rate, because my software says that there are no instances of that term in the Tanach. America is much less likely than USA, and therefore should lower the false alarm rate. Restricting the search to America may also be filtering out valuable information where the code author chose to use USA instead of America because it fit better.
b. Take advantage of independent valuable sources of information as primary or secondary search terms. New Testament and Old Testament terms and phrases make good search terms as frequently demonstrated by Drosnin in his first and second books on the subject and have been used by most investigators since, e.g. “end of time.”
c. Some verse through or near the primary term of the search should be mirrored by the surface text in some important way, i.e., the “reality” should correspond to the “signal.” Drosnin mentions this correspondence in both of his books, and I have seen the technique applied most effectively by Fabrice Bect (Fab) in his excellent codes.
d. Look for several frames with the same message. Fabrice Bect is the first researcher I noticed to have mentioned this almost casually with comments like “isn’t that interesting?” In communications theory, really important messages are sent multiple times if the medium is less than dependable and in radar signal processing multiple frames are averaged over time to effectively increase the signal strength. The statistics of adding frames goes as the square root of the number of frames, so a small number of frames may be almost as good numerically as a very large number of frames. A few frames should be better than one.
e. Use only terms that are statistically significant themselves. This criterion is sometimes ignored, but its importance in generating a valid prediction was ably demonstrated by Moshe Arhon Shak in his prediction of the outcome of the last Israeli elections. The problem most of us have with this argument is that the software doesn’t always generate an understandable (or correct?) probability for terms under all conditions, although the later versions of the software are vastly better than earlier versions. Those of us using the Code Finder R-Factor as the inverse of the logarithm of the probability should consider that it can’t be that, strictly speaking, because probabilities are always between zero and one. Therefore R-Factor should always be positive if it represents the inverse of the logarithm of the probability. R-Factors are often negative, both as a raw number and as a normalized “in matrix” number.
f. And one I haven’t seen mentioned explicitly, although I think that most everyone is using it implicitly, is the confluence of similar terms in a single matrix. That’s equivalent of saying that I’m trying to find a jet fighter based on all of its potential signals including it’s visual outline, the heat it’s engines generate, the output of its radar, and the “ping” I get back from my own radar. One signal will be enough if strong enough, and the probability goes up as the number of correlated signals goes up.
g. Where there are competing theories, statistical weighting of the probabilities may help separate them?
h. Finally, we can weigh the amount of money we’re willing to spend, or the amount of time we’re willing to invest in leaving the beach for the hills based on the probability of the event in the Bible Codes much the same way that insurance companies set the insurance premium on our house.
First let me say that we should all have minimum disaster plans in place for the kinds of events that are probable or even certain within our lifetimes. There will certainly be earthquakes, storms, fires and other events for which camping supplies, food, water, and first aid supplies should always be on hand. Start there if you haven’t already. There are excellent resources on the net by government and non-profit organizations. Personally, I keep a fully packed lightweight backpack good for 2-weeks on the trail ready, plus the incidentals needed to expand that to a family of 4. Anne Miller published an excellent list of the contents of her survival pack in a 16 August 2005 post to the Exodus 2006 Yahoo Group.
An Example
Predict a Starting Date for World War III
(Andy McCracken published a possible date of 9 Av 2006 years ago)
My Primary Software is Code Finder With Bibles Codes 2001 as Secondary
I started with a central search term of world war (mem lamed chet mem tav ayin lamed mem) and searched over skips between –171,000 and +171,000. Both software products predict approximately 29 “finds” based on random probability. Code Finder finds 29 and Bible Codes 2001 only finds 27. That means that the central search term isn’t statistically significant in itself, and my Code Finder software agrees by assigning it a raw R Factor of –1.50 while Bible Codes assigned it a probability of only 1 out of 2 of being significant, i.e., flip a coin.
There’s more than a difference in the number of “finds” however. The finds between the two software packages don’t agree either in skip-space or location in the Tanach except for the locations noted in Table 1. There were only 3 matches between the two software searches. If we’re going to reduce the false alarm rate, the first filter we might apply is to reject the matrices that don’t match between software unless we’re sure we understand why. I rather arbitrarily decided to analyze the three that match plus the three lowest skip finds for Code Finder. I have no idea why I got 3 matches in the order I did, or why I didn’t get all matching or all failing to match once outside the Torah.
The first possibility is finding coding extensions to “world war” that would make the central term statistically significant, and that’s the process recommended by Shak. An ability to read Hebrew facilitates this step, but a good Hebrew/English dictionary makes an acceptable substitute. This is effectively enhancing the target in skip space. The most obvious possibilities here are a leading or trailing gimmel for “third”, or perhaps a leading heh for “the” world war following Einstein’s dictum that a nuclear third world war would lead to a fourth world war fought with sticks and rocks. Based on the R Factor, none of the extentions reaches significance (R Factor >1.3?). Based on Code Finder statistics, all of the extensions fail to reach a statistical significance >2s.
The second possibility is selecting a key word that is so strong that its geometric correlation with the central search term is predictive. In these cases I used the Drosnin suggestions of “third” and “universal” along with a date of HC 5766 which starts on 4 October 2006 Gregorian. Any critical keyword adds about 2.5 +/-0.5 to the R Factor of the central terms and all other terms believed correlated.
The results of the experiment tend to support a date for the start of World War 3 during Hebrew Calendar Year 5766, although an alternative date of HC Year 5770 is viable. See Table 2 for the Code Finder summary. See Figures 1-6 for the matrices and reports.
Given that there is accumulating evidence from the Bible Codes, geology, and geopolitics that we are about to enter the tribulation as defined by St. John in Revelation, previously prophesied by Ezekiel, Daniel, and other Old Testament prophets, how much can you afford to spend to protect yourself and your family? In engineering management we would multiply the probability of the negative event occurring times the cost for the organization to estimate the probable cost of the event to the organization or algebraically:
Probable Cost = P(event) x Cost(event)
Once you you’ve determined your probable cost, you can then make an educated investment decision to prevent or mitigate the loss.
If I own a home and it will become a total loss because of the event, the cost to me is the retail cost of the house. The same is true for personal property like automobiles, clothing, electronics etc. For an easy guess, check the value of your insurance policies if you’re insured. If you escape with your life, will you be able to find work somewhere else after the event? Even with great damage to their economies during and after World War 2, many people in Russia, Japan and Germany continued to work and earn a paycheck, so don’t think of this as an all-or-nothing situation. How much is the life of a family member worth? Don’t say either “priceless” or “worthless”, please. As a technical manager, I’m used to the rule that a $1,000,000 property loss and the loss of a human life is equal severity. In the United States it costs several hundred thousand dollars to rear a child from infancy through college. Maybe a number like that makes sense to you, and maybe a larger number or a small number does.
What’s the probability of a major negative event affecting you? Nobody can tell you, but it’s worth thinking about. We will soon have some good evidence on how the probability of a Bible Code being “accidental” maps to the probability of the Bible Code matrix being prophetic. Geologists talk about events with low probabilities with uncertainties in the hundreds of thousands of years. War is always a probability, but nobody can predict from history or military plans which cities will be targeted for nuclear annihilation in the next war. You have to pick a number based on your own prejudices.
Here’s my personal calculation for the rest of my life without reference to Bible Codes:
Probability of being affected by the eruption of the Yellowstone super volcano: 0.00001
Probability of being affected by a major cosmic impact: 0.0001
Probability of being affected by a great earthquake in Southern California: 0.001
Probability of being affected by WW-3: 0.01
Total estimated probability of a major disaster affecting me 0.011099
Cost of total loss of personal property in thousands of US dollars: $ 200
Cost of total loss of earned income in thousands of US dollars: $ 400
Cost of loss of life of family members (wife, 3 minor children) $ 1,300
Total estimated cost of catastrophic loss for a major event near me: $ 1,900
Estimated Probable Cost = 0.011099 X $1,800,000 = $21,000 (3 significant figures)
Given my conservative nature, I feel I would be willing to spend on the order $5,000 to $10,000 US just to insure against an otherwise unpredictable catastrophic loss (assuming I had that much to spend) since the largest share of the cost would be loss of life. I have spent on the order of $7,000 US over the last 10 years for camping supplies, a generator, a camping trailer, oil lamps, etc. I plan to spend at least another $2,000 to $3,000 over the next year, mostly for recyclable expendables like food, medicine, and fuel.
If dated Bible Codes start coming true in the next months, then I’m willing to move and change professions to keep the probability number from reaching exactly 1.0, and I’ll be spending every available dollar on expendables with long shelf lives plus survivable housing. Choose a strategy that makes sense for you.
A conclusion:
The
total R-Factor for the 6 matrices developed is approximately 113. The
root square sum of the R-Factors for the 6 matrices developed is approximately
51. Stated qualitatively, there’s almost no chance within the usual
way of thinking of things that these codes exist by chance. I think
I can say with some confidence that there is a coded message in the
Tanach that would lead me to believe that World War 3 starts sometime
next year, that Tishri will be an important month, and that 9 Av will
be an important day associated with the war. Whether this is prophetic
can’t be determined. If it’s not prophetic, somebody went to a lot
of trouble to encode a fairly specific string of messages connected
to the Third World War in the Bible. Remember that next year (HC 5766)
starts with 1 Tishri on 4 October 2005. As I write, that’s approximately
5 weeks away.
Some questions:
1. How can codes be prophetic if they’re not reproducible across different software?
2. How can we be sure we understand the probability of finding multiple terms in the same geometry where those terms are not part of the central search term?
3. Does a high probability against chance for a specific matrix suggest that a prophecy is encoded, or only that we got lucky satisfying our prejudices?
4. Does a high joint probability of a concept across several different matrices suggest that a prophecy is encoded, or only that we got lucky several times?
5. How much insurance can you afford?
Table 1 A Comparison of Possible Codes on World War 3
The Tanach Searched between Skip –171,000 and 172,000
|
Code Finder ME |
Bible Code 2001 |
||||||
|
World War |
World War |
||||||
|
Found At |
match |
matrix |
Found at |
match |
matrix |
||
|
Skip |
location |
Skip |
location |
||||
|
258112 |
Y |
Y |
2839 |
258112 |
Y |
Y |
|
|
973335 |
Y |
3662 |
939044 |
||||
|
394580 |
Y |
Y |
-4639 |
394580 |
Y |
Y |
|
|
1064601 |
Y |
-7251 |
655776 |
||||
|
782559 |
Y |
12788 |
902116 |
||||
|
-15626 |
472867 |
-18036 |
834138 |
||||
|
-21575 |
865364 |
26158 |
1009006 |
||||
|
28176 |
798327 |
27025 |
979760 |
||||
|
255629 |
Y |
Y |
28576 |
255629 |
Y |
Y |
|
|
32530 |
733026 |
-30789 |
607385 |
||||
|
32863 |
261988 |
-30853 |
999827 |
||||
|
-38665 |
916683 |
-42256 |
871844 |
||||
|
39101 |
515657 |
45283 |
847309 |
||||
|
-45984 |
774896 |
-58604 |
1185402 |
||||
|
-46826 |
972929 |
-65968 |
1158765 |
||||
|
57642 |
714102 |
70898 |
117462 |
||||
|
-66175 |
590642 |
72087 |
4192 |
||||
|
-68092 |
967519 |
-77556 |
1046104 |
||||
|
96157 |
209762 |
82739 |
603399 |
||||
|
-104841 |
819978 |
86522 |
171969 |
||||
|
123145 |
287482 |
88220 |
370946 |
||||
|
123615 |
34364 |
-89229 |
951959 |
||||
|
135876 |
136154 |
-94545 |
878110 |
||||
|
-136115 |
1141495 |
-105201 |
1095070 |
||||
|
-138430 |
1056777 |
123367 |
274101 |
||||
|
-141823 |
1026219 |
134989 |
99500 |
||||
|
149660 |
87673 |
||||||
|
152154 |
4327 |
