Behold the Hand, Behold the Nail

This note is interpretation, not translation. It follows one idea of Jon’s: that the Hebrew name of God, YHWH, read letter by letter in the oldest alphabet, says “behold the hand, behold the nail,” and that this is a witness to the cross. It then does what the site does everywhere: it separates what the text states from what is read into it, it counts, and it puts a red flag on every step that is not found in scripture. Alongside it, because Jon asked, it gathers every place in the New Testament where people behold Jesus, and it sets out what the Bible’s numbers do and do not say, including how the number of the animal is calculated. Counts are by word in the Leningrad Codex (Hebrew) and Nestle 1904 (Greek). The renderings from Hebrew and Greek are the note’s own, and the word “behold” stands for the Hebrew hinneh and the Greek idou and ide, which the translation of the book renders “Look.”

The Name. God’s own name in the Hebrew Bible is four letters, יהוה, yod, he, vav, he: YHWH. It stands 6,521 times in 5,522 verses of the Leningrad Codex (5,698 of them bare, the rest with a one-letter prefix: to, in, and, from, like), and another 306 times in the phrase “Lord YHWH.” A short form, Yah (יה), stands 50 times in 46 verses. Hallelu, “praise,” stands 34 times, and 30 of them are Hallelu-Yah. The first three letters of the Name stand at the end of 845 proper names, 77 different names, among them Jeremiah (129 times), Hezekiah (114), Elijah (63), Zedekiah (56), Josiah (51) and Isaiah (35). Psalm 118 has the Name 22 times and Yah 6 in its 29 verses. God gives it at the burning bush: ehyeh asher ehyeh, “I will be what I will be,” and then this is my name forever, and this is how I am remembered from generation to generation (Exodus 3:14–15). The name is built on the verb hayah, “to be,” which is why Revelation says it in three tenses: the One Who Is and Who Was and Who Is Coming (1:4, 1:8; the grey note at 1:4 covers the Greek). The book puts that sentence in a particular place. Verse 5 calls Jesus Christ the faithful witness (ho martys ho pistos), who freed us from our wrongs in his blood. Verse 7 says Look — he is coming … and every eye will see him, including the ones who stabbed him. And the next verse is the Name, with the same verb, erchetai in 1:7 and ho erchomenos in 1:8, “coming.” “Witness,” “look,” “coming” and “stabbed” sit within four verses of the Name.

The Name and the cross in the New Testament’s own words. Paul puts the two in one passage. Christ Jesus became obedient to death, even death on a cross; therefore God raised him high and gave him the name above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow … and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord (Philippians 2:8–11). Kyrios, Lord, is the word the Greek Old Testament uses where the Hebrew has the Name, and Paul’s sentence follows Isaiah 45:22–23, turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth … to me every knee will bow, every tongue will swear. In John, Jesus says of the Father’s name, keep them in your name, which you have given me (17:11; and 17:6, 17:12). Romans 10:9 says confess Jesus as Lord and 10:13 gives the reason from Joel 3:5, everyone who calls on the name of the LORD will be saved, so a verse about the Name is applied to calling on Jesus. Jesus gives the baptism into the name, singular, of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Matthew 28:19). And the Name is written on people: his name and his Father’s name written on their foreheads (Revelation 14:1), his name on their foreheads (22:4), I will write on him the name of my God (3:12). That is where the Name was first written on a forehead, the gold plate on the high priest: holy to the LORD … it will be on his forehead always, for favor for them before the LORD (Exodus 28:36–38; the last word is ratson, favor).

Behold the hand, behold the nail — Jon’s reading. In the oldest Hebrew alphabet the letters were pictures. Yod was a hand, he a man with raised arms (“look!”), vav a peg or nail. The Name is yod, he, vav, he, and Jon reads it as behold the hand, behold the nail: a witness to the cross written into God’s own name. He also reads the he as 5, the number of grace, so that the Name carries the hand nailed in grace. The reading is widely repeated in Christian teaching. The Ancient Hebrew Research Center (Jeff Benner) is where the pictures are laid out, and no earlier source for the cross reading turned up in the searches made for this note.

What the letters are. Yod (י) is from the Semitic word for hand, yad (יד), which is the letter’s own name. Vav (ו) is a Hebrew word in the text, “hook” (וו, plural vavei), in 13 verses, all of them hooks of the tabernacle pillars (Exodus 26:32, 26:37, 27:10–17, 36:36, 36:38, 38:10–28); “peg” or “nail” is the picture’s sense, and Hebrew has its own words for a nail (masmer, מסמר) and a peg (yated, יתד), set out below. The hooks are what hang the veil, four pillars of acacia overlaid with gold, their hooks of gold (26:32), and the veil of the temple was torn at the cross (Matthew 27:51; Mark 15:38; Luke 23:45) and is called Jesus’ flesh (Hebrews 10:20). No verse joins the hooks to the nail. He is the weakest of the three. He (ה). There is a Hebrew word he, “here, behold” (הא; Genesis 47:23; Ezekiel 16:43; Aramaic ha at Daniel 2:43 and 3:25), but the ordinary Hebrew word for behold is hinneh (הנה), which is in 799 verses, and nobody knows what the letter was called or pictured in the earliest alphabet: a man with raised arms is one proposal and a window another.

What the method is. It reads a word by the pictures of its letters. Its critics (David Wilber; Petrovich in Bible and Interpretation) say that by the time an alphabet spells words its letters stand for sounds, that no lexicon works this way, and that no ancient Jewish writing reads words by the pictures of their letters. The rabbis did read the letters of the Name, in a different way: this world was made with the he and the world to come with the yod, from be-Yah YHWH tsur olamim, “in Yah, the LORD, is an everlasting rock” (Isaiah 26:4; Menachot 29b; Genesis Rabbah 12:10), and God gave Abram and Sarai a he from his own name (Genesis 17:5, 17:15). The Name’s own explanation in the text is Exodus 3:14–15, from hayah, “to be.”

Red flag That the letters of the Name, read as pictures, say “behold the hand, behold the nail,” and that this is a witness to the cross. No verse and no ancient source reads the Name this way, the picture of the letter he is uncertain, and the method is one its critics say is not how Hebrew words work. Ian Paul’s tests for a hidden or numerical meaning, set out near the end of this note, ask that it be a possible meaning for the author and first readers, and this one has not been shown to be. The nearest texts are the ones below, which say the same four things in plain words. That the Name carries the cross in its letters is Jon’s reading.

In the Hebrew: look, the hand, lifted up. The Hebrew has the words together in one verse. Thus says the Lord YHWH: Look, I will lift up my hand to the nations, and to the peoples I will raise my banner (Isaiah 49:22). The Hebrew words are hinneh (הנה), essa, yadi (ידי), arim and nissi (נסי). Nes is the pole on which Moses set the bronze snake (Numbers 21:8–9), and it is found in 20 verses; Isaiah says of the root of Jesse that he stands as a banner for the peoples, that the nations seek him, and that his resting place is glory (11:10). Isaiah 49:22 is in the chapter that has look (hen), on the palms I have engraved you (49:16; chaqah, to engrave, is in 19 verses and this is the only one that says palms). And Isaiah 52:13: Look, my servant will act wisely; he will be raised (yarum) and lifted up (nissa) and be very high, three verbs of lifting from three roots, rum, nasa and gavah. John uses one Greek verb of the Son of Man, hypsoō: so the Son of Man must be lifted up (3:14), when you have lifted up the Son of Man (8:28), if I am lifted up from the earth, I will draw everyone to myself (12:32). The Hebrew gives the look, the hand, the lifting and the pole in one verse of Isaiah and in the verse of the snake. No verse says Isaiah 49:22 is about the cross.

Psalm 118, the psalm with the Name 22 times, has the hand and the lifting too: the right hand of the LORD is lifted up (romemah), the right hand of the LORD does valiantly (118:15–16); the stone the builders rejected has become the head of the corner (118:22); blessed is the one who comes in the name of the LORD (118:26); and bind the festival offering with cords to the horns of the altar (118:27). The crowd uses 118:26 for Jesus (Matthew 21:9), he quotes the stone of 118:22 (21:42), and he says you will not see me until you say, Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord (23:39).

In the Hebrew: the tree, the peg and the nail. The tree. If a man has committed a sin worthy of death and is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body must not stay all night on the tree … for a hanged one is the curse of God (Deuteronomy 21:22–23; talah, to hang, qilelat Elohim talui). Paul quotes it of Christ: Christ freed us from the curse of the law, becoming a curse for us, for it is written, Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree (Galatians 3:13), and Acts says of him that they killed him hanging him on a tree (5:30; 10:39). Talah is in 27 verses of the Hebrew Bible. The five kings of Joshua 10 are put to death and hung on five trees, and taken down at sunset, as Deuteronomy 21:23 requires (10:26–27). The peg. Yated, a peg, is in 19 verses: the pegs of the tabernacle (Exodus 27:19; 35:18; 38:20, 38:31; 39:40; Numbers 3:37; 4:32), Jael’s tent peg driven through Sisera’s head (Judges 4:21–22; 5:26, her hand she put to the peg), a peg to hang things on (Ezekiel 15:3), the pegs of Zion’s tent that will never be pulled up (Isaiah 33:20) and a peg in his holy place (Ezra 9:8). Two verses use it of a person. I will drive him in as a peg in a sure place, and he will be a throne of glory to his father’s house. And they will hang on him all the glory of his father’s house (Isaiah 22:23–24), next to the key of David at 22:22 that Revelation 3:7 draws on; and then on that day the peg fastened in a sure place will give way and be cut off, and the load on it will fall (22:25). And from him the corner, from him the peg, from him the battle bow (Zechariah 10:4). The nail. Masmer is in four verses (1 Chronicles 22:3; 2 Chronicles 3:9; Isaiah 41:7; Jeremiah 10:4), and its plural once more: the words of the wise are like goads, and like nails driven in, given by one shepherd (Ecclesiastes 12:11). The Hebrew has the hanging, the peg and the nail, and the peg that holds the weight of a house and then gives way. No verse of it says that the peg or the nail is the cross.

In the Hebrew: the Name, and being seen. The Name has a name with “see” in it. After the ram, Abraham called the name of that place YHWH-yireh, “the LORD sees” or “the LORD will see to it,” as it is said to this day, On the mountain of the LORD it will be seen (Genesis 22:14, be-har YHWH yera’eh), and the verse before is God will see to the lamb for himself, my son (22:8, Elohim yireh lo ha-seh). “See” and “lamb” are the two words of John 1:29, Look, the Lamb of God. The verb of 22:14, in its form that means “appeared” or “was seen,” is in 93 verses of the Hebrew Bible, 48 of them with the Name in the verse: the LORD appeared to Abram (12:7), 17:1, 18:1, 26:2, 26:24, and the LORD appeared again at Shiloh (1 Samuel 3:21), 1 Kings 3:5, 9:2. Swete’s Greek translates it ōphthē: kai ōphthē Kyrios tō Abram (Genesis 12:7), and at 17:1, 18:1, 26:2, 35:9 and 48:3, and at 22:14, on the mountain the LORD was seen. Ōphthē is the verb the New Testament uses of Jesus risen: he was seen by Simon (Luke 24:34), he was seen by Cephas, then the twelve (1 Corinthians 15:5–8, four times), he was seen over many days (Acts 13:31), seen by angels (1 Timothy 3:16), and he will be seen a second time (Hebrews 9:28, ophthēsetai). That is a link of vocabulary between the LORD appearing and the risen Jesus appearing. It is not the same as saying that Jesus is the one named in YHWH-yireh.

Beholding him: what the New Testament says. A sweep of the Greek New Testament for the verbs of seeing (horaō, theaomai, theōreō, blepō, atenizō, aphoraō, emblepō, optanomai, katoptrizomai, epoptēs) and for the words ide and idou gave 834 verses. What follows are the ones where the one seen is Jesus, or where he is the one people are told to look at, grouped by what is being seen. The list is as complete as that sweep, and a verse missing from it is a miss to be added, not a verse left out. The words idou and ide occur 234 times in these writings, 23 in John and 26 in Revelation. John 19 has five of John’s 23, in a chapter that is 42 of the Gospel’s 879 verses; by chance about one would be expected, and five or more would happen about once in two hundred, before allowing for how many chapters could have been looked at. Three of the five present Jesus to the crowd, Pilate’s Look, I am bringing him out (19:4), Look, the man (19:5) and Look, your king (19:14), and two are Jesus’ own at the cross, Look, your son and Look, your mother (19:26–27).

Told to look at him. Look, the Lamb of God (John 1:29, 1:36); Pilate’s three at 19:4, 19:5, 19:14. The prophets’ “look” is quoted of him: Look, my servant (Matthew 12:18, from Isaiah 42:1, hen avdi); Look, your king comes to you (Matthew 21:5 and John 12:15, from Zechariah 9:9, hinneh malkekh yavo lakh); Look, I lay in Zion a stone (Romans 9:33 and 1 Peter 2:6, from Isaiah 28:16). Jesus says it of himself: look, something greater than Solomon is here (Matthew 12:42; Luke 11:31). In Revelation: Look, the Lion … has conquered (5:5), Look, the Lamb standing on Mount Zion (14:1), Look, he is coming (1:7). Zechariah 6:12 has Look, a man whose name is the Branch (hinneh ish tsemach shemo); John 19:5 does not quote it, and the Greek differs (anthrōpos for anēr).

Beholding his glory. We beheld his glory (etheasametha tēn doxan autou), glory as of an only son from a father, full of grace and truth (John 1:14): the beholding and grace are in one verse. John the Baptist: I have watched the Spirit coming down … and I have seen and testified that this is the Son of God (1:32–34). You will see heaven opened and the angels of God going up and down on the Son of Man (1:51). If you trust, you will see the glory of God (11:40). Isaiah saw his glory and spoke about him (12:41). We want to see Jesus (12:21). Whoever has seen me has seen the Father (14:9; and 14:7, 12:45). You behold me, because I live (14:19). Everyone who beholds the Son and trusts in him has eternal life (6:40). That they may behold my glory (17:24). They saw his glory at the mountain (Luke 9:32), and when they raised their eyes they saw no one but Jesus alone (Matthew 17:8; Mark 9:8). Peter calls himself and the others eyewitnesses (epoptai) of his majesty (2 Peter 1:16–18). John: what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and our hands touched, about the Word of life (1 John 1:1–3); we have beheld and we testify that the Father has sent the Son as Savior of the world (4:14). Paul: with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, we are changed into the same image (2 Corinthians 3:18, katoptrizomenoi); the light of the good news of the glory of Christ (4:4); the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ (4:6). Hebrews: we see Jesus … crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death (2:9). Stephen: Look, I see the heavens opened and the Son of Man standing at the right hand of God (Acts 7:55–56). John in Revelation: the one like a son of man among the lampstands (1:12–18), the Lamb standing as slain (5:6), the rider called Faithful and True (19:11–16).

Beholding him crucified. The centurion, seeing that he breathed his last, said, Truly this man was the Son of God (Mark 15:39; Matthew 27:54, where the soldiers with him had seen the earthquake and what happened); in Luke he said Truly this man was righteous (23:47). Many women were there, watching from a distance (Matthew 27:55). The people stood watching (Luke 23:35), and all the crowds who had come together for this sight, when they saw what happened, went home beating their chests (23:48). They saw he was already dead (John 19:33), and the one who has seen has testified (19:35). They will look at the one they pierced (19:37). Paul to the Galatians: before whose eyes Jesus Christ was portrayed as crucified (3:1). Jesus himself: as Moses lifted up the snake in the desert, so the Son of Man must be lifted up (John 3:14); when you have lifted up the Son of Man, then you will know that I am he (8:28); and I, if I am lifted up from the earth, will draw everyone to myself (12:32). Hebrews: looking to Jesus … who endured a cross (12:2, aphorōntes).

The look-and-live of the snake has its own Hebrew. Everyone who is bitten, when he sees it, will live (Numbers 21:8), and he looked at the bronze snake and lived (21:9, vehibbit). That is the verb of Zechariah 12:10: I will pour out on the house of David … a spirit of grace (ruach chen) and of supplications, and they will look to me whom they pierced (vehibbitu elai et asher daqaru), the verse John 19:37 quotes and Revelation 1:7 echoes. Grace and the pierced one are in a single verse, and the look is the same verb that saved the people in the desert. Isaiah has the same call in the Name’s own voice: turn to me and be saved, all the ends of the earth, for I am God, and there is no other (45:22).

The hands and the nails. Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I (Luke 24:39; verse 40, which says he showed them, is in double brackets in Nestle 1904 because some manuscripts lack it). He showed them his hands and his side. So the disciples rejoiced, seeing the Lord (John 20:20). Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails (20:25; hēlos, nail, is two words in the New Testament, both in that verse), and put your finger here and look at my hands (20:27). Having wiped out the handwritten record against us … he took it out of the way, nailing it to the cross (Colossians 2:14; prosēloō, to nail to, is found only there). And the Hebrew scriptures: look (hen), on the palms I have engraved you (Isaiah 49:16), in the chapter that has in a time of favor I answered you (49:8, et ratson, which Paul quotes at 2 Corinthians 6:2 with two idou) and the God who does not forget (49:15); they dug my hands and feet (Psalm 22:17; the Hebrew word is disputed and Swete’s Greek has ōryxan, “dug”); what are these wounds between your hands? (Zechariah 13:6).

Beholding him risen. There you will see him (Matthew 28:7; Mark 16:7); there they will see me (Matthew 28:10); when they saw him they bowed down, but some doubted (28:17). Mark 16:14 has those who had seen him risen. The two on the road: their eyes were held (Luke 24:16), then their eyes were opened and they knew him (24:31); he was seen by Simon (24:34). Mary Magdalene sees Jesus standing (John 20:14) and says I have seen the Lord (20:18); the disciples saw the Lord (20:20, 20:25); to Thomas, because you have seen me, you have trusted; blessed are those who have not seen and have trusted (20:29). Appearing to them over forty days (Acts 1:3, optanomenos). God gave him to become visible, not to all the people but to witnesses chosen beforehand (10:40–41). He was seen over many days by those who went up with him from Galilee (13:31). Paul: Have I not seen Jesus our Lord? (1 Corinthians 9:1) and he was seen by Cephas, then the twelve; then by more than five hundred brothers at once; then by James, then by all the apostles; and last of all, as to one born out of time, he was seen by me (15:5–8, ōphthē four times). Seen by angels (1 Timothy 3:16). Paul’s own: Jesus, who appeared to you on the road (Acts 9:17); he saw the Lord on the road (9:27); to see the Righteous One and hear a voice from his mouth (22:14); I appeared to you for this, to appoint you a servant and a witness of what you have seen of me and of what I will appear to you in (26:16).

What seeing him does. In the Gospels and in Revelation the first thing people do when they see him is fall down. The unclean spirits, whenever they saw him, fell before him (Mark 3:11); the man from the tombs saw Jesus from far off, ran and bowed to him (5:6; Luke 8:28); Jairus saw him and falls at his feet (Mark 5:22); Peter saw and fell at Jesus’ knees: go away from me, for I am a sinful man (Luke 5:8); Mary saw him and fell at his feet (John 11:32); the disciples saw him and bowed (Matthew 28:17); and John: when I saw him, I fell at his feet like a dead man. And he put his right hand on me, saying, Do not be afraid (Revelation 1:17). Some who saw him did not trust: you have seen me and you do not trust (John 6:36); now they have seen and hated both me and my Father (15:24); the city saw him and begged him to leave (Matthew 8:34). And the disciples saw him walking on the sea and took him for a ghost (Matthew 14:26; Mark 6:49–50; John 6:19).

Beholding him go, and come. As they were looking, he was lifted up (Acts 1:9), and this Jesus … will come in the same way as you saw him go (1:11). You will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of the Power and coming on the clouds of heaven (Matthew 26:64; Mark 14:62; and Matthew 24:30, Mark 13:26, Luke 21:27). Look, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him (Revelation 1:7). He will be seen a second time, apart from sin, by those who are waiting for him (Hebrews 9:28). Without holiness no one will see the Lord (12:14). We will see him as he is (1 John 3:2). They will see his face, and his name will be on their foreheads (Revelation 22:4). And, on the other side of the cross: a little while and you no longer see me, and again a little while and you will see me (John 16:16–19; 14:19; 16:10).

Beholding him by trust, not by sight. Whom you love though you have not seen him, in whom, not seeing him now but trusting, you rejoice (1 Peter 1:8). No one has ever seen God; the only God, who is in the Father’s arms, has made him known (John 1:18; 1 John 4:12); whom no one has seen or can see (1 Timothy 6:16); he is the image of the invisible God (Colossians 1:15). Consider Jesus (Hebrews 3:1, katanoēsate), looking away to Jesus (12:2). And those who longed to see him and did: the magi, they saw the child … and bowed (Matthew 2:11); Simeon, my eyes have seen your salvation (Luke 2:30; and 2:26); Zacchaeus, who was trying to see Jesus, who he was (19:3–4); Herod, who had long wanted to see him (23:8).

What this list shows, and does not. Beholding Jesus is everywhere in John, in Paul, in Hebrews and in Revelation, and the places gather at four spots: the glory, the cross, the empty tomb and the coming. It is not one phrase. The verbs differ, and no verse says his Name says it. What it does show is that the Bible says in plain words the four things Jon reads in the letters: a look (behold), the hand, the nailing, and grace. John 1:14 and Zechariah 12:10 put grace in the same verse as the seeing. If the Name does carry the cross in its letters, scripture says the cross in plain words in every place above; and if it does not, scripture still says it.

Grace and the letter he: Genesis 17. In Genesis 17 God changes Abram to Abraham by adding a he (17:5), and Sarai to Sarah by putting a he in place of the yod (17:15). That is the letter that stands twice in the Name, given to two people in the chapter of the covenant of promise. Paul says of that promise that it is by grace: for this reason it is from trust, so that it is by grace (Romans 4:16), and to Abraham God has given it by promise (Galatians 3:18, kecharistai, from charis, grace). That is the nearest scripture comes to joining the letter he to grace, and it joins them through Abraham, not through the number five.

Numbers: what the text counts. To test a claim that a number means something, count. For each number the share of its verses that have a grace or favor word (chen, chanan, ratson; charis), a mercy word (chesed, racham; eleos), a rest or sabbath word, or a forgiveness or atonement word within three verses is set against the share of all verses, and against control numbers (three, four, six, seven, ten). In the Hebrew Bible, grace and mercy words are scarcer near every one of these numbers than near an average verse (7.6% and 7.5% of all verses have one within three verses), because the verses that carry numbers are mostly lists, measurements and genealogies. One number stands out against that background, and it is not five.

Five. There are 316 verses in the Hebrew Bible with a “five” word, and 38 in the Greek New Testament. In the Hebrew, 11.1% have a grace, mercy, rest or forgiveness word within three verses, against 21.2% of all verses; grace words alone, 1.6% against 7.6%. Five is at or below every control. Mostly it counts quantity: cubits, widths and lengths, offerings, years, thousands and hundreds. The claim that five is the number of grace is E. W. Bullinger’s, in Number in Scripture (1894): five is four plus one, four being creation and one God’s addition, and grace is favour shown to the unworthy. His verses are real. There are five animals in Abram’s covenant (Genesis 15:9), a he added to Abram’s name (17:5), five smooth stones (1 Samuel 17:40), five of you chasing a hundred (Leviticus 26:8) and five ingredients in the anointing oil (Exodus 30:23–25). None of them says five means grace. Leviticus 26:8 sits in a blessing for those who walk in the statutes (26:3), which is the opposite of favor to the unworthy, and his “five in a rank” at Exodus 13:18 rests on a disputed word, where Swete’s Greek has pemptē genea, “in the fifth generation.”

Read in context, the fives that go with a penalty or a judgment sort three ways. Some are judgment on those who refused: Isaiah 30:15–17 (velo avitem, “you were not willing”; at the rebuke of five you flee; and then the LORD waits to be gracious, 30:18), Revelation 16:10–11 (the fifth bowl, and they did not repent of their works), Luke 16:27–31 (five brothers, if they do not hear Moses and the prophets). Some are penalty rules that are not about refusing grace: five oxen for an ox stolen (Exodus 21:37, Hebrew numbering), and add a fifth in restitution (Leviticus 5:16; 5:24 in the Hebrew; Numbers 5:7), each followed by atonement and forgiveness. And some are neither: five Amorite kings (Joshua 10:5), who are put to death and hung on five trees (10:26), five golden tumors and mice (1 Samuel 6:4), Paul’s five beatings (2 Corinthians 11:24). On words of refusal the count says the same as on words of grace: within three verses, 3.8% of five-verses against 12.4% of all verses. Where five does go with favor, it is real and it is not common: Joseph’s five portions and five changes of clothes for Benjamin (Genesis 43:34; 45:22), five cities of Egypt turning (Isaiah 19:18), and the fifth seal, where the souls are told to rest a little (Revelation 6:9–11). Revelation’s five words are 6:9 (fifth seal), 9:1 (fifth trumpet), 9:5 and 9:10 (five months), 16:10 (fifth bowl), 17:10 (five fallen) and 21:20 (fifth foundation).

Red flag That five is the number of grace, and that the he of the Name, as 5, carries it. No verse says it. Hebrew letters were first used as numerals on Hasmonean coins in 78 BCE, long after the Hebrew Bible, which writes number words. The counts above do not show five going with grace, and the he is the third most common letter in the Hebrew Bible (102,335 of 1,202,938 consonants, 8.5%), so it is in most words. The nearest texts are Isaiah 30 and the Joseph passages on one side, Genesis 17:5 with Romans 4:16 and Galatians 3:18 on the other, and Bullinger’s arithmetic is a doctrine of 1894. That five and the he mean grace is Jon’s reading.

Seven, and the others. The one real enrichment in the counts is seven. In the Hebrew Bible 13.1% of seven-verses have a rest or sabbath word within three verses, against 6.6% of all verses, and 9.0% have a forgiveness or atonement word, against 3.0%. That is in the text: the seventh day on which God rested (Genesis 2:2–3), the seven sabbaths of weeks and of years (Leviticus 23:15–16; 25:8), the blood sprinkled seven times for atonement (Leviticus 16:14, 16:19). Seven is not enriched for grace or mercy words (3.8% and 2.1%, against 7.6% and 7.5%). Where the text itself gives a number its meaning, it says so. The book explains its own sevens: the seven lampstands are seven assemblies (Revelation 1:20), the seven heads are seven mountains … and they are seven kings (17:9–10), the ten horns are ten kings (17:12), and the wall’s measure is a human’s measure, that is, an angel’s (21:17), the same word “human” beside a number as at 13:18. Ten is the number of the covenant words, said three times: the ten words (Exodus 34:28; Deuteronomy 4:13, 10:4). Forty is explained at Numbers 14:33–34, a day for a year, forty years, and as a test at Deuteronomy 8:2 and 8:16 (to test you), and Jesus is tempted over forty days (Matthew 4:1–2). The count agrees in the Greek New Testament, where 19.0% of the 21 forty-verses have a testing word within three verses against 6.5% of all verses, and does not in the Hebrew Bible (4.1% against 4.3%). Twelve counts the tribes (Genesis 49:28) and the apostles (Matthew 10:2), and the apostles judging the twelve tribes on twelve thrones (19:28) is where it goes with rule. Three has on the third day (Hosea 6:2; 1 Corinthians 15:4, according to the scriptures), and the one name of the three (Matthew 28:19). Six has the day on which the human was made (Genesis 1:26–31) and the number of a human (Revelation 13:18). Daniel 3:1 gives the image sixty cubits high and six wide, and 3:5 names six instruments; nothing in the text adds them up. Eight has the eighth-day circumcision (Genesis 17:12) and eight souls saved through water (1 Peter 3:20); that eight means a new beginning is not said. Fifty is built from seven: seven complete sabbaths and then fifty days (Leviticus 23:15–16), seven sabbaths of years, forty-nine, and then the fiftieth, the jubilee (25:8–10).

Sevens through scripture — at Jon’s pointer. Jon asked for the sevens to be set out. In the Hebrew: Noah takes the clean animals “seven seven, a male and its mate” (Genesis 7:2), which can be read as seven pairs or as seven of each. At Jericho seven priests carry seven ram’s-horn trumpets, and on the seventh day the city is circled seven times (Joshua 6:4, 6:15). Naaman is told, “go and wash seven times in the Jordan, and your flesh will come back to you and you will be clean” (2 Kings 5:10). The jubilee comes after “seven sabbaths of years, seven times seven years … forty-nine years” (Leviticus 25:8), in the fiftieth (25:10). The lampstand has seven lamps (Exodus 25:37). Leviticus 23 sets out the sabbath and the yearly feasts; counted as seven, the yearly feasts are Passover, Unleavened Bread, First Fruits, Weeks, Trumpets, Atonement and Booths, though the chapter itself does not number them. In the New Testament, Jesus tells Peter to forgive “not up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven” (Matthew 18:22). The Greek, hebdomēkontakis hepta, is the Greek translation’s wording for Lamech’s seventy-seven at Genesis 4:24, so it can also be read as seventy-seven; either way it answers Lamech’s revenge with forgiveness. Matthew 23 has seven woes on the scribes and Pharisees in Nestle’s text (23:13, 15, 16, 23, 25, 27, 29; some copies add an eighth at 23:14). Three more sevens are counts readers make, not numbers the text gives. John numbers only his first two signs (2:11, 4:54), and the seven usually counted are Cana, the official’s son, the man at the pool, the five thousand, the walking on the water, the man born blind and Lazarus. The “I am” sayings with an image are usually counted as seven: bread, light, door, shepherd, resurrection, way and vine. And Matthew 13 is usually counted as seven parables. In Revelation the word for seven is 55 words and the word for seventh 5: seven assemblies, spirits, lampstands, stars, seals, trumpets and bowls (1:4, 1:12, 1:16, 5:1, 8:2, 15:7), and the book explains some of its own sevens, as above.

Letters as numbers. Greek and Hebrew used letters as numerals. In Greek, alpha is 1 to theta 9, iota 10 to koppa 90 in tens, rho 100 to omega 800 in hundreds, with stigma for 6; the Greek name for adding up a word is isopsēphia, from psēphos, a pebble for counting, and a wall at Pompeii carries the line I love her whose number is 545 (the cultural note at 13:18 gives it). In Hebrew the same practice is gematria: alef 1 to tet 9, yod 10 to tsade 90, qof 100, resh 200, shin 300, tav 400. The Hebrew Bible and Nestle’s text write number words, not letters; Revelation 13:18 reads hexakosioi hexēkonta hex. Hebrew letters as numerals are first attested on coins of Alexander Jannaeus, year 25, 78 BCE. Standard values only are used here, with final letters counted as the plain ones.

Calculate. Revelation 13:18 says psēphisatō, “let him calculate.” Psēphizō is two words in two verses in the New Testament: here and Luke 14:28, counts the cost. Its noun psēphos, the pebble, is three words in two verses, Acts 26:10 (a vote) and Revelation 2:17, twice, the white stone. Arithmos, number, is 18 words in 17 verses; in Revelation 5:11, 7:4, 9:16, 13:17, 13:18 three times, 15:2 and 20:8. The verse sets the task under here is wisdom and the one who has a mind, and calls the number arithmos anthrōpou, a human’s number, and it gives the sum: six hundred and sixty-six.

The names. Computed by letter, standard values. Nero Caesar, in the Hebrew letters of the Greek spelling (נרון קסר, nrwn qsr): 50+200+6+50+100+60+200 = 666. The Latin spelling, without the final nun (נרו קסר, nrw qsr): 616. Lateinos (Greek): 666. Teitan: 666. Euanthas: 666. Gaios Kaisar, Gaius Caesar, in Greek letters: 616. Nero Kaisar in Greek letters: 1,337, which is not 666, so the Nero solution needs Hebrew letters. Iēsous, Jesus: 888. To thērion, the animal: 617. The sum of the Name, YHWH, is 26 (10+5+6+5), and echad, “one,” and ahavah, “love,” are each 13. Abram is 243 and Abraham 248; Sarai is 510 and Sarah 505.

Jesus and 888. This is a popular claim, not Jon’s, set out so that it can be tested. In Greek the name Iēsous is iota 10, eta 8, sigma 200, omicron 70, upsilon 400, sigma 200, which is 888. The claim is old. The Epistle of Barnabas, an early Christian letter usually dated to about the year 100, reads Abraham’s 318 men (Genesis 14:14) as the iota and eta of Jesus’ name, 10 and 8, and the tau, 300, which is the shape of the cross (9:7–9), and it calls the eighth day the beginning of another world (15:8–9). The Christian part of the Sibylline Oracles (Book 1, lines 324–331, usually put in the second or third century) states the number outright: eight units, eight tens and eight hundreds. None of that is scripture. What scripture has with eight: circumcision on the eighth day (Genesis 17:12); when eight days were fulfilled to circumcise him, his name was called Jesus (Luke 2:21); eight souls through the flood (1 Peter 3:20); and after eight days Jesus comes to the disciples again and says to Thomas, put your finger here and look at my hands (John 20:26–27). The counts: in the Greek New Testament 888 is shared by 15 of 17,356 word forms (670 words), and Iēsous is 461 of them; the commonest other is legōn, “saying” (177), then dedōken, “he has given” (12). The values from 880 to 896 average 12.6 forms each, so 15 is ordinary. In Hebrew the name is Yeshua (ישוע), worth 386, or Yehoshua, 391, and not 888; the number belongs to the Greek spelling only. The same sort of sum gives Christos 1480, and Kyrios 800, which is also pistis, “faith,” and the ō of Alpha and Omega.

How easily they match. The Hebrew Bible has 40,088 different consonantal word forms. The sum of the Name, 26, is shared by 42 of them, in 6,567 words in all, of which 6,004 are the Name itself. Among the others are vehayah, “and it shall be” (והיה, 408 times, and the four letters of the Name in another order: vav, he, yod, he), beyadi, “in my hand” (בידי, 34 times), hibbit, “he looked” (הביט, 6 times: Numbers 23:21; Psalm 33:13, 102:20, 142:5; Lamentations 5:1; Habakkuk 2:15), heitiv, “to do good,” and vido, “and his hand.” Someone who wanted “the Name equals in my hand equals he looked” could make it, and someone who wanted something else could make that. The count is why: with 40,088 forms, and sums that mostly run into the hundreds (the middle form is 327), a small total is shared by dozens of forms. The total 13 is shared by 30 forms, among them echad, “one” (499 times), avi, “my father” (206) and ahavah, “love” (14); the total 666 by 38 forms, among them tirenah, “they will see” (10 times); the total 888 by 7. So that “one” and “love” are both 13 is true, and it is one pairing among 30 such forms; and that he looked and in my hand are both 26 is true, and it is one among 42. A match of this kind has to be expected before it can mean anything.

666 or 616. Most manuscripts and Irenaeus read 666. Papyrus 115, from the third century and published in 2011, and Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus read 616 (chis for chxs). Irenaeus (Against Heresies 5.30.1) says 616 is a copyist’s error, and lists Euanthas, Lateinos and Teitan (5.30.3), calling Lateinos “very probable.” He ends that it is safer to wait for the fulfilment than to guess the name (5.30.3), and he does not name Nero. That one name gives 666 in one spelling and 616 in the other is a reason many give for Nero, and the grey note at 13:18 records it as a proposal. The note on the Slanderer says whose number Jon reads it to be and marks that reading with its own red flag. This note does not decide who the number names.

Red flag That the numerical meanings in popular teaching are in scripture: that eight is a new beginning, that the name of Jesus adding to 888 is a sign of one, and that the Name’s 26 is “one” plus “love.” These are popular claims, not Jon’s. No verse says any of them. Where the text gives a number a meaning, it says so, and the places are listed above. The sums are true as arithmetic (the table is computed), and what they are worth is a reading.

Goodness, mercy and the ban — Jon’s reading. One of the sums above leads to a reading of Jon’s, though not the one the sum suggests. Racham, “compassion” (רחם), and cherem, “the ban,” the devotion of something to destruction (חרם), are the same three letters in a different order, and Abraham (אברהם) has the same sum, 248. Any two anagrams have the same total, so the sum proves nothing. What Jon takes from the Hebrew is two things of his own: that God’s goodness and mercy are a focus of David’s in relation to why we praise him, and that mercy for some could include the judgment on others. A third point is Charles Nieman’s teaching, as Jon reports it: that the goodness and mercy in David’s writings suggest a reason why God is God. Nieman did not say the part about judgment on others; that is Jon’s own suggestion. This note has not checked what Nieman himself said.

Why we praise: the Hebrew. The Hebrew gives goodness and mercy as the reason for giving thanks. Hodu la-YHWH ki tov ki le’olam chasdo, “Give thanks to the LORD, for he is good, for his mercy is forever.” The refrain ki le’olam chasdo, “for his mercy is forever,” stands in 42 verses: all 26 verses of Psalm 136, Psalm 100:5, 106:1, 107:1, 118:1–4 and 118:29, 1 Chronicles 16:34 and 16:41, 2 Chronicles 5:13, 7:3, 7:6 and 20:21, Ezra 3:11 and Jeremiah 33:11. David is in it. First Chronicles 16:34 is the psalm David gave Asaph to sing (16:7), 16:41 is his appointment of Heman and Jeduthun to give thanks with it, and 2 Chronicles 7:6 speaks of the instruments David made for it. In David’s own psalms: surely goodness and mercy will follow me all the days of my life (23:6, akh tov va-chesed); for you, Lord, are good and ready to forgive, and abounding in mercy (86:5); I will give thanks to your name for your mercy and your truth (138:2); the LORD is good to all, and his compassions are over all his works (145:9). Good and mercy stand in one verse 22 times in the Hebrew Bible, and five of them are in psalms with “of David” in the title (23:6; 63:4; 69:17; 86:5; 109:21). By count, chesed is in 31 of the 74 psalms titled to David (42%), against 23 of the other 76 (30%); tov, good, in 35% against 24%; and racham, compassion, is level, 11% and 12%. So David’s psalms lean toward goodness and mercy, though not by a wide margin.

Is that why he is God? Charles Nieman’s teaching, as Jon reports it, is that the goodness and mercy in David’s writings suggest a reason why God is God. The Hebrew does not say so in those words. The ki, “for,” gives the reason for giving thanks, and that is stated: Psalm 100:3 says know that the LORD, he is God, and 100:5 gives for the LORD is good, his mercy is forever as the reason to come in with thanks; Psalm 136:2 is give thanks to the God of gods, for his mercy is forever. What the Hebrew does say is that God ties his Name to them. I will make all my goodness pass before you, and I will call out the name YHWH before you; I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and have compassion on whom I will have compassion (Exodus 33:19; the first time in the Bible the verb racham, to have compassion, is used), and then YHWH, YHWH, a God compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in mercy and truth (34:6; the first rachum, compassionate).

Mercy for some, and judgment on others. Psalm 136 puts the judgment inside the thanks. To him who struck Egypt in their firstborn, for his mercy is forever (136:10); and shook off Pharaoh and his army in the Red Sea (136:15); to him who struck great kings … Sihon king of the Amorites, and Og king of Bashan, for his mercy is forever (136:17–20). In 2 Chronicles 20 Judah sends singers out in front of the army, saying give thanks to the LORD, for his mercy is forever (20:21), and when they began with song and praise, the LORD set ambushes against the sons of Ammon, Moab and Mount Seir who had come against Judah, and they were struck (20:22). David’s psalm of praise has both in one breath: the LORD is good to all, and his compassions are over all his works (145:9), and the LORD guards all who love him, and all the wicked he will destroy (145:20). And the Name’s own proclamation has both: abounding in mercy and truth … and who by no means clears the guilty (Exodus 34:6–7). Jon’s reading, which is his own suggestion and not Nieman’s, is that the judgment on some is part of the mercy to others: Israel’s rescue and Egypt’s firstborn are one sentence of thanks.

Discipline, and who receives it. The text separates the cases by who receives, and Jon reads that as strengthening his point. Hand such a one over to the accuser for the destruction of the flesh, so that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord (1 Corinthians 5:5; olethros, destruction); whom I handed over to the accuser so that they may be disciplined not to blaspheme (1 Timothy 1:20); when we are judged by the Lord we are disciplined, so that we are not condemned with the world (1 Corinthians 11:32); the Lord disciplines the one he loves (Hebrews 12:6), and if you are without discipline … then you are illegitimate children and not sons (12:7–8); Jesus, to Laodicea, those I love I rebuke and discipline; so be zealous and change your mind (Revelation 3:19). In the Hebrew, cherem is in 76 verses and racham in 95, and they meet in one verse, in the law of the city devoted to the ban: so that the LORD may turn from the fierceness of his anger and give you compassion and have compassion on you (Deuteronomy 13:18). Joshua 6:17 has the city cherem and only Rahab the prostitute shall live, because she hid the messengers and had asked for kindness (chesed, 2:12); and in 1 Samuel 15 Amalek is devoted (15:3) while Saul tells the Kenites to leave from among them, for you showed kindness to all the people of Israel (15:6). The same is said of God elsewhere: he has torn, and he will heal us (Hosea 6:1); I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal (Deuteronomy 32:39); in a moment of small anger I left you, but with great compassion I will gather you (Isaiah 54:7–8).

First mention. Jon looks at the first time a word appears for what it will come to mean (the law of first mention, set out on the About page). The Hebrew for good is first at Genesis 1:4. Chen, grace, is first at Genesis 6:8, and Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD, in the verses where the LORD has seen the evil of the earth (6:5), regretted that he made humans (6:6) and said I will blot out (6:7). Chesed, mercy, is first at Genesis 19:19, said by Lot, you have made great your mercy, on the morning Sodom is overturned. The first atonement word, kaphar, is the pitch that covers the ark (6:14); the first rest, nuach, is the ark coming to rest (8:4); and the verb racham first appears in the proclamation of the Name (Exodus 33:19). So in the first places grace, mercy, atonement and rest appear, each stands beside a judgment on many and a rescue of some, which fits Jon’s claim. One caution: Genesis 1–19 is mostly the flood, Babel and Sodom, so first mentions of words about rescue would fall near a judgment whatever they meant.

Noah and grace, 58 each. In Genesis 6:8 the two words stand side by side, ve-Noach matsa chen, “and Noah found grace.” They are mirror images of each other, nun-chet against chet-nun, and each is worth 58. The mirror is a fact of spelling in the text, not a sum, and it is why the sums match. The same two letters run through the passage: Noah’s name is explained by yenachamenu, “he will comfort us” (5:29), the LORD vayinnachem, “regretted” (6:6), and then come Noach and chen (6:8). Noah’s name is also from nuach, to rest, which is how the About page reads it, as rest finding grace. And the New Testament counts the family: eight souls were saved through water (1 Peter 3:20), and Peter calls Noah the eighth, a herald of righteousness (2 Peter 2:5; Noah, his wife, three sons and their three wives, Genesis 7:13). So if the first mention is the guide, the first grace in the Bible is shown to a family of eight, not five.

What the text does not say. It does not say all destruction is mercy. In Corinth the destruction of the flesh is for the spirit’s salvation, and the ban in Deuteronomy 13 ends in compassion. But an eternal destruction and a lake of fire are said with no rescue stated. Olethros is in four verses of the New Testament. In 1 Thessalonians 5:3 sudden destruction comes on those who say peace and security, and the readers are told they are not in darkness (5:4). In 2 Thessalonians 1:9 it is eternal destruction from the face of the Lord (the Greek apo prosōpou can mean away from his face or out from it), and the letter says whom it falls on: those who afflict you (1:6), those who do not know God and those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus (1:8), while those who trusted receive relief (1:7) and are the ones he is glorified in (1:10). The fourth, 1 Timothy 6:9, is a warning about wanting to be rich, with no outcome stated. And Revelation 20:15 says that if anyone was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire. None of those three, 1 Thessalonians 5:3, 2 Thessalonians 1:9 and Revelation 20:15, is said of a believer in Jesus.

Red flag That mercy for some includes the judgment on others, and that God’s goodness and mercy are why we praise him and why he is God. The second part, why he is God, is Charles Nieman’s teaching as Jon reports it; the first, the judgment on others, is Jon’s own suggestion. Part of this is stated. The Hebrew gives goodness and mercy as the reason for giving thanks (the ki, in 42 verses), David’s psalms lean toward them, the judgment is placed inside the refrain at Psalm 136:10–20 and 2 Chronicles 20:21–22, and Psalm 145:9 and 145:20 and Exodus 34:6–7 hold mercy and judgment in one sentence. That the judgment on some is part of the mercy to others is Jon’s own suggestion, not Nieman’s; no verse says it in those words. That goodness and mercy are why he is God is not stated, since the ki gives the reason for thanks. That the first appearance of a word fixes what it means is a method and not a statement of scripture, and the first mentions here fall in the flood and Sodom, which are judgments. That the equal sums of Noah and grace carry a meaning is not stated: they are mirror images, which is why they match. And none of this says all destruction is mercy: 2 Thessalonians 1:8–9 and Revelation 20:15 speak of an eternal destruction and a lake of fire for those who do not obey the gospel and whose names are not in the book of life, with no rescue stated.

Testing a number. Ian Paul (psephizo.com), on the 153 fish of John 21 (Augustine said it is the sum of 1 to 17, ten commandments and seven gifts; Jerome, the kinds of fish; Cyril, 100 Gentiles, 50 Jews and 3 for the Trinity), asks three things of any numerical reading: the claim must fit the data of the text; it must be a possible meaning for the author and his first readers; and any deep meaning must cohere with the surface meaning. This note’s counts are the first test made visible. The Hebrew sages themselves called gematria an embellishment, and later writers used it to support what was known from elsewhere, not to find something new. The same method finds messages in War and Peace, which is the standing objection to Bible codes. The use here is the reverse: the plain statements of scripture come first, the numbers are counted beside them, and what goes past them is flagged.

Where this stops. The note does not say that the Name’s letters, read as pictures, are a witness to the cross; it records that as Jon’s reading and says what stands under and against it. It does not say that any number carries a meaning the text does not give it. It does not say who the number of the animal names. The list of places where people behold Jesus is the result of a search by Greek verb, and it is meant to be added to. And the counts are by lemma, which includes compounds such as fifteen and twenty-five, and measure words nearby, not ideas: a symbol could carry grace with no grace word in sight, but a meaning that never shows in the text cannot be tested either.

The texts used. The Hebrew is read from the Westminster Leningrad Codex, which is in the public domain, by way of the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible project (morphhb). Its word-by-word lemma and morphology data are licensed CC BY 4.0, are what the Hebrew counts here are made from, and are credited to the Open Scriptures Hebrew Bible Project. For the Name, the letters, the hand, the peg, the nail and the tree the Hebrew was read first and the Greek second, and the Hebrew verses quoted here are from it. The Greek is Nestle’s 1904 New Testament (public domain). The Greek Old Testament is Swete’s edition, in a digital edition licensed CC BY-SA 4.0, used only to show what the Greek translators wrote. No English translation was consulted for the wording. Letter values are the standard ones, with final letters counted as the plain ones, and every count is by word.