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The Number Seven

As Henry Morris records in his book The Genesis Record, Genesis was not put together in a haphazard way. In fact, God has put His numerical DNA not only on Genesis, but also on the entire Bible and the man who discovered it was Ivan Panin. He was born in Russia on December 12, 1855. As a young man he participated in plots against the Czar and his government and at an early age was exiled from Russia. After some years in Germany spent in study, he came to the United States and entered Harvard University from which he graduated in 1882. Being an agnostic, he traveled extensively and debated Christians on the truthfulness of the Scriptures. But, like Josh McDowell, he was saved in the process and as he himself expressed it, he “was brought out of the darkness into His marvelous light.”

The original texts of the Bible are Hebrew, Aramaic, and Greek. Not only was Ivan Panin fluent in precisely those three languages, but he was also a mathematical genius. He was the right man at the right time. In 1890 he discovered the unique mathematical symmetry, or multiples of the number 7, underlying the Greek text in the Renewed Covenant. Later, he found that the Hebrew and Aramaic texts of the TaNaKh had a similar structure. This numerical symmetry could not have been designed by man and does not appear in any other Greek or Hebrew books, but is found only in the Bible.

All three of these languages have a numbering system that corresponds to their alphabet. In other words, the letters of these alphabets are also used for numbers. For example: alpha has a numerical value of 1, beta has a numerical value of 2, gamma has a numerical value of 3, and so on. And what Ivan Panin discovered was that when you plugged in the numerical equivalents for each letter, the LORD’s numerical DNA produced multiples of seven with astounding frequency. He spent the next fifty-two years of his life making the calculations by hand. He stayed with a verse just long enough to verify its numerical DNA, and then went on to the next. He found that the sixty-six books of the Bible formed one complete mathematical unit and he did it all without computers. Mr. Panin died at Aldershot, Canada near Ontario, on October 30, 1942 at the age of eighty-seven. His original documents are in the Smithsonian Institute in Washington, DC.

Just what did he discover? The Bible begins: In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth (1:1). In the Hebrew it is exactly 7 words. The 7 words have exactly 28 (4 X 7) letters. There are 3 nouns (God, heavens and earth). Taking the letters of these nouns and substituting their numerical equivalents and adding them up, you get a combined total of 777 (111 X 7)! There is one Hebrew verb, created. Its total numerical value is 203 (29 X 7). The first three words contain the subject with exactly 14 (2 X 7) letters. The Hebrew words for the two objects (heavens and earth) each have 7 letters. The value for the first, middle, and last letters in the sentence is 133 (19 X 7). The value of the first and last letters of the first and last words of the verse is 497 (71 X 7). The value of the first and last letters of each of the words in between is 896 (128 X 7), and so on and so on. In this verse alone there are 30 variations of the number 7 and Panin listed only 11 of them here. The chance of this happening accidentally is 1 in 33,000,000,000,000, or 33 trillion.

The Bible has objective proof of its truthfulness in each verse. A mere human author, let alone forty-five authors could not have done all this over two thousand years. While it is true that salvation comes by faith alone (see the commentary on Hebrews, to see link click Cn – The Faith of Enoch), our faith is not a blind faith. It is an intelligent and reasoned faith based on sound mathematical and scientific facts, as we shall see in this study of Genesis.

As an aside, the number seven recurs throughout the Scriptures and Jewish tradition. Here are just a few examples:

1. God rested on the seventh day of creation.

2. God ordained Shabbat as a day of rest during a week of seven days.

3. There are seven universal laws given to mankind (sheva mitzvot bnei noah).

4. The seven species of produce with which the land of Isra’el is blessed are known as shivat ha’minim: wheat, barley, grapes, figs, pomegranate, olives, and dates (Deuteronomy 8:8).

5. There are seven ordained holidays in the Jewish calendar: Pesach, Hag Ha’Matzah, Rasheet, Shavu’ot, Rosh Ha’Shanah, Yom Kippur, and Sukkot.

6. The seventh month of Tishri was to be holy (the Jewish New Year of Rosh Ha’Shanah occurs in the seventh month).

7. On Yom Kippur, the High Priest sprinkled the blood in the Temple seven times.

8. There are seven weeks in the counting of the omer (the period of 49 days between the day after the Passover and Shavu’ot) before Shavu’ot.

9. In Isra’el, there are seven day of Passover and Shukkot.

10. Every seventh year there is a Shabbat rest for the land (see the commentary on Deuteronomy Cy – The Year of Release). 

11. After seven cycles of the Year of Release, there is a Year of Jubilee called Yovel.

12. The Menorah in the Tabernacle and the Temple had seven branches.

13. The were seven gates to the Temple.

14. At a Jewish wedding, seven blessings are recited and the bride circles the groom seven times under the chuppah (wedding canopy). Weddings are followed by seven days of celebration.

15. Jewish tradition calls for a seven-day mourning period that starts immediately after the funeral. This period is known as shivah, literally, seven.

16. Each Shabbat, seven people are called to the Torah reading (aliyot).

17. Joshua led the Jewish people around the walls of Jericho seven times before the walls fell.