Der Bibel- Code.

The Bible Code #1

by Michael Drosnin

Der Bibel Code - bk1561; Heyne Verlag; Michael Drosnin; pocket_book; 2002

Genres: Nonfiction, Religion, Christian, History, Spirituality, Philosophy, Christianity

Paperback

First published January 1, 1997

Reviews

[Alejandro · Rating 5 out of 5]

Engaging reading!


THE SECRET MESSAGES FROM GOD

I read this, back then, in 1999, and I found out that there are several sequel books of this, but I haven't read those (so far), but I can assure you that, at least, this first book, is totally amazing to read.

The "Bible Code" idea is a theory that God put secret messages in the used words in the Bible, in its original Hebrew format, specially on the Pentateuch, the first 5 books of the Old Testament and it's understood that they were written by the very hand of God, so from all the books in the Bible, those are the most likely books to be applied to this theory.

Also, more than "secret messages", ths idea is that the Pentateuch is actually like the "program" used by God to do the whole creation, all that was, all that is, all that will be, so...

...using modern computers, it has been transcribed the Pentateuch in a spherical way, making interconections with all the words of those 5 books, that it would be impossible to accomplish in any other way to make it, and you can "ask questions" to the Pentateuch and you get "answers"...

...and technically you can ask not only about past events, but also the future...

...of course, verify or more like it, find a meaning, when it's about something that already happened, it's kinda "easy"...

...but when you tried to ask something about the future, well, without a context, it's not so easy to understand the "answer"...

I found this reading quite astonishing and overwhelming, obviously I can't say if it's true beyond any doubt, but honestly, what I read about here, and the "answers" that they were obtained from the test done to the "Bible Code", certainly gave me a lot to think and feeling that...

...indeed the hand of God is there.

[bup · Rating 1 out of 5]

A lot of the dazzle of this book is gone once you realize that, if you can read Hebrew, the horizontal text is just plain text. So he's just playing find-a-word vertically (without vowels, so, for instance, DALLAS would be DLS), and then looks for words 'crossing' it - of course words cross it! It's plain text!

Looking at what I've written so far, breaking at every 32nd letter:

Alotofthedazzleofthisbookisgoneo
nceyourealizethatifyoucanreadHeb
rewthehorizontaltextisjustplaint
extSohesjustplayingfindawordvert
icallywithoutvowelssoforinstance
DALLASwouldbeDLSandthenlooksforw
Ordscrossingitofcoursewordscross
itItsplaintextLookingatwhatIvewr
ittensofar


Look! 'Die' crosses 'Dallas'! That 'proves' my text magically knew about the Kennedy assasination!

He does the same thing - he's very impressed that he found "Kennedy" crossing "president." What he found was "KND" crossing the Hebrew word for "chieftain" which he loosely translated as "president." And again, of course "chieftain" is in the text - it's plain text.

Add in to that that he rearranges these things constantly (look at every 20th letter. Nothing? Look at every 21st letter. Nothing? Look at every 22nd letter. etc.) Then he goes even farther than that, accepting diagonal words (and words at various slopes).

It's garbage, garbage, garbage, and has never predicted anything before the fact (which is, in fairness, included in the definition of predict).

[Lee Harmon · Rating 1 out of 5]

You knew I’d get to this book eventually, right? Well, I’m here to tell you it’s absolutely brilliant. Drosnin is my idol. With a savvy grasp of human nature, a little computer programming, and a mathematician’s insight into probabilities, he put together a best seller.

The book’s premise is that the Bible contains a secret code, and that he has cracked the code to reveal its hidden messages. Simply start at any letter in the Bible, skip ahead a fixed number of letters to the next, and continue until it spells out … well, whatever you like. Start with the first T in Genesis, skip 49 letters to an O, skip 49 more to an R, 49 more to H. Lo and behold, you’ve spelled TORH, the Hebrew word for the first five books of the Bible. Miraculous, isn’t it?

No, it’s neither miraculous nor unexpected. As Keith Devlin demonstrated about a year after The Bible Code hit the bookstores, the word TORH appears 56,768 more times in the software, searching just the book of Genesis alone. TORH appeared in an issue of the Wall Street Journal 15,000 times. But might there be more impressive words than TORH? Yes, several! The first encoded phrase the book mentions is “Yitzhak Rabin,” which he uncovers in Deuteronomy. Drosnin carefully lays out his analysis in matrix form so that it looks like a word find puzzle, and crossing Yitzhak Rabin is the phrase “Assassin that will assassinate.” Need more evidence? The phrase “Rabin assassination” crosses “Tel Aviv” in the book of Exodus. Yep, that’s where Amir assassinated Rabin. Oh, the name “Amir” appears in the book of Numbers.

A code of equidistant letters buried within the Bible is not a new idea. See Wikipedia for a full discussion. But with a little computer programming, Drosnin pushes it to the limit. He uncovers prophecies about Watergate, Hitler, Shakespeare’s writings, Edison’s inventions, the holocaust, Roosevelt, Kennedy, communism, Armageddon, and, amazingly, the promise of a future book named “Bible Code.”

It all sounds convincing, until a little experimentation verifies the same probabilistic expectations in other works of literature. Moby Dick revealed much of the same prophecies and many more. So, mathematicians turned back to the Bible to see what else they could learn by the using the software. Several more startling prophecies surfaced: “Code is bunk.” “Drosnin Fraud.” “Darwin was right.” Sigh.

Please don’t read the book, but do gain inspiration from the genius of Drosnin. Millions of dollars are waiting for the next great sham.

[Forgoszel · Rating 2 out of 5]

…és ebből van második és harmadik rész is…
Amilyen jól, érdekesen és már már tudományosan kezdődött, annyira pocsékká vált. Olyan szinten válik redundánssá, hogy az ember vérnyomása észrevétlenül felemelkedik. Vajon, ennyire hülyének nézi az olvasót? Ennyire nem volt mit írnia, de kellettek az oldalszámok? …és végül, nem szól semmiről… Kb. 10 oldalban összefoglalható az egész és kész. Ne pocsékoljátok rá a drága időtöket…

[二六 侯 · Rating 1 out of 5]

中學的時候看覺得好像很厲害，幾年後想來覺得幽默：字母能橫向縱向排成單字難道不是機率問題？總之聖經那麼多字，你電腦設定下去想圈哪就圈哪嘍。（倒）

總之，還是很佩服作者跟研究者的想像力。

[David · Rating 1 out of 5]

It is a mathematical inevitability that computers can find patterns in a large text, especially when you don't declare what you're looking for ahead of time, or the distance between the letters. Without constraints, any pattern you wish to find is there. This is as useful as finding your telephone number somewhere within the digits of PI, and just as revealing. The book claims that the Wright Brothers are in Genesis 30:30, Newton is in Numbers 18:30-21:5, Watergate in Genesis 28:21 through Numbers 19:18 (this is a LARGE span), President Kennedy in Genesis 34:19-50:4, and so on.

[Antonia]

Found it hard to stay interested plus the conclusion of the book is anti-Christ.
It suggests we can save ourselves when the bible clearly depicts the impossibility of that.
And if we could...why do we want to live forever in a never ending cycle of suffering and sorrow.
Cannot recommend.

[Cell · Rating 1 out of 5]

忘記當年看的那本垃圾是第幾集
就當作是這本吧

[mina · Rating 1 out of 5]

This isn’t the usual type of book that I read; usually it’s the type I take from the library because it seems interesting but never actually finish reading it. I thought with this book that wouldn’t be the case, however things haven’t changed that much. I haven’t read the book from cover to cover, but I read most of it, all up to the Notes that’s where I stopped.

At the beginning I was intrigued by the idea that everything was somehow coded in the bible, that everything that happened and what is going to happen was already written 3.000 years ago. If it’s true it is fascinating to say at least. But I’m a skeptic. And after the first chapter I lost interest.

[Kristal · Rating 1 out of 5]

The Bible Code. It sounded so outrageous, I was positive it was fiction. It is not. It's such a groan. The author is one of many who claim that there is a hidden code in the Bible that predicts all the major events of the future. The only redeeming quality is that it has dozens of pages that are mostly or entirely taken up with examples of this code, like a crossword puzzle. So there's that much less to read. It's also super repetitive, and some of the "prophecies" seem super vague.
I have never rated a book 1/5 before, and the only reason I read this book is because I'm participating in a challenge this year, and one of the categories was "a book with bad reviews". Two pages in, I knew why this one fit that category.

[Ana]

nabavite mi ovu knjigu pls

[Remo · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bazofia que empieza a barajar los caracteres de la Biblia hasta que algo aparece (a posteriori, claro y sin saber qué va a aparecer). Por ejemplo, si parto el texto en líneas de 23 caracteres, en algun momento tengo en vertical KND y eh horizontal "jefe de la tribu" (las palabras horizontales son normales, son el texto de la Biblia, solo cambio los saltos de línea), por lo que "la Biblia acaba de predecir que Kennedy iba a ser presidente". Muy absurdo y, por supuesto, Best seller. Así nos va.

[Diya Felton · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent book if you want to learn about conspiracy theorists in or about the Bible. I believe it to be true.

[Amy · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought this book awhile ago, and have the follow-up somewhere on a bookshelf as well. What I've found interesting about this book - and the topic in general - is that it sounds logical and almost believable. That is, until you see the same folks on television, on History Channel or NatGeo, etc., and they seem like utter quacks. Much like saving history from disaster is oftentimes 20/20 when seen through the review mirror, books of this ilk frequently show that they would've been able to 'predict' or 'prevent' catastrophe if only they had known what to look for within the scriptures. I would imagine our own intelligence services could claim the same, and indeed they have, when history has challenged what we knew and when.

The thing about these books - whether we want to believe biblical predictions or not - is that they challenge the limits of our imagination and our faith, and not every book that ever hits bookstores can claim that feat.

[Mike (the Paladin) · Rating 1 out of 5]

I didn't go to the end in detail on this book. the entire premiss seemed strained (though admittedly the idea goes back a long, long way) still. Th Bible either is what it is or not. By that I mean either the Bible is simply a book as some think or it's an inspired set of writings from God through called writers. If it's the former the code would mean nothing more than the happenstance. if it is the latter then understanding the text itself would be quite enough.

Since the text of the Bible in the original is in 3 laguages (Old Test. in what we call Hebrew, New Test. In Aromaic and Greek) which manuscripts are the ones we should use for counting the code etc.

No I know a lot are into this but I find it a distraction from what the Bible is.

[Joseph · Rating 1 out of 5]

"The Bible is not only a book - it is also a computer program." (25)

I cannot speak, read, or translate Hebrew, but from my personal experience reading the Bible, it reads as if it is written by multiple people, not one singular "God."

"But Joseph cannot be the encoder." (101)

The Hebrew crossword puzzles are like finding images in the clouds. What does your mind perceive? Would you prefer to live in fear of the "End of Days" or continue going about leading your own insignificant life?

Michael Drosnin conveniently publishes a sequel to this book in 2002, opening with the 9/11 tragedy.

No thank you.

[Gaelyn Whitley · Rating 5 out of 5]

He uses the profound to teach the simple, and the simple to teach the profound. The Bible Code is certainly profound, but to understand it coming from our Creator, it seems simply perfect. I know it seems like a hoax to some, but you can never understand something or have a true opinion about it until you know what it is. I encourage you to read this work for yourself.

[Laurey · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is written by a reporter and is about a code that was discovered in the bible that has predicted the future. It's hard to believe but once you read it and learn the science behind it, it's hard to ignore. I loved this book.

[Jacky · Rating 1 out of 5]

RUBBISH! I read this before reading the Bible. A lot of the 'interpretations' are nothing short of far-fetched coincidence to idiotic.

[Scott · Rating 2 out of 5]

I bought this crap for a long time. You can do this with any book.

[Peter · Rating 1 out of 5]

read it ages ago, nonsense

[C.A. Gray · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting concepts. Drosnin did not discover the Bible Codes he describes here; he's a reporter (and an atheist one at that) who stumbled upon the discovery via a computer program discovered by a Jewish rabbi. He then cross-referenced it with numerous mathematicians who could not disprove it. (Incidentally, Isaac Newton was convinced such a code existed, and spent more of his time searching for it than he did on any of his scientific theories. But as Drosnin points out, perhaps it was time-locked; Newton could not have found it because computers had yet to be invented.) Through the code, which used some of the same code-breaking techniques employed during WWII (and probably far beyond) such as very complex skip sequences and such, he found prophecies of major world events which did indeed occur. Still he was skeptical, until he encountered the prediction of the then-Israeli prime minister's assassination. He happened to have a connection to the PM (Rabin), and warned him of the potential danger. Rabin ignored the warning, and he was assassinated right on schedule. After the fact, Drosnin saw that the name of Rabin's assassin was in the code too--they just hadn't known to look for it beforehand.

This made a believer (in the code, not in God, strangely enough) out of Drosnin, but it sent him into the tailspin question later posed by the Oracle to Neo in the Matrix: "What's really going to bake your noodle is, would you still have broken it (the vase) if I hadn't said anything?" In other words, now that we know about potential dangers, can we do anything to change it? Thus enters physics concepts of determinism vs quantum physics. As Drosnin and those who knew the code and had the program did more and more searches, they encountered a number of predictions that had yet to occur. Some were very specific, and did not happen... but those predictions also included phrases near them like, "delayed" or "will you change it?" or multiple potential years for said event to come about. Most notably, he discovered years of threatened nuclear war in the Middle East which might lead to Armageddon -- but those years were 1996, 2000, and 2006. Were there other potential years as well? Was crisis effectively averted by choices made by those in power (as a result of knowledge about the code or otherwise)? I was most struck by one such prediction from 1996, when Israel's Netanyahu was to go and visit a neighboring world leader on Tisha B'Av, or the 9th day of the Hebrew month of Av. (Incidentally this date twice marked the destruction of the Jewish temple: once by the Babylonians in 423 BC, and once by the Romans in 70 AD. Traditionally it's also the date that the 12 spies returned from the Promised Land with an evil report, leading to 40 more years of wandering in the wilderness.) The date is considered cursed by the Jews, and they observe it with fasting and prayer -- so it seemed strange to me that Netanyahu would have chosen an important meeting on that date. According to the code, there was a threat that Netanyahu would be assassinated that day, an event which would lead directly to nuclear conflict and the End of Days. But, by happenstance, the other world leader was ill, Netanyahu delayed his trip 10 days, and later those with access to the program saw the word "delayed" across the date of the visit. Nothing happened, of course. Could such a small occurrence have changed world events? As Drosnin pointed out, WWI began with an assassination, which almost didn't occur--Archduke Ferdinand's driver turned down the wrong street, they encountered their assassin who had missed his opportunity earlier that day and was otherwise on the point of giving up, and the rest is history.

I'm intrigued by the concept, bottom line. I hold the Bible as the inerrant word of God, and believe every word is there for a reason. There are no extraneous details. But if that goes for the text as written, could it also go for the structure of the text, too? If it did, though, what would be the reason for it--unless it were possible for those of us with access to its future warnings (after the invention of the computer, and the discovery of the code) to use that information to our advantage?

[M.M. Hudson · Rating 1 out of 5]

It is not too often that I come across a book that I really don't care for. This happens to be one of those books. I got through chapter 7 and quit reading. Frankly it is just too much. I had high hope for this book based on the fact the author is coming from a journalistic perspective and not one from religion (as he claims to be atheist). Here is why I could not continue.

First of all, I hate the repetitiveness of the author. It seemed to me he repeated himself so much that he was trying to convince even himself of what he is trying to prove.

Secondly, It seems that if it was a truly workable "code" that predictions would be seen/available before events happen. Everything that I have read with one exception has been after the fact.What use is a predictive code if you cannot prevent things from happening? Even if the "code" is true, truthfully what good is it because most people are not going to base their life on what it says.

Finally, and frankly, unless you know Hebrew, the code is useless for the common person, the whole code is being interpreted (?) by people who know Hebrew and taken for their word.The author said that you cannot find the "code" in any other language. Honestly, the Hebrew they say are the "code" could be anything. I speak English and a bit of Spanish. How am I to know?

Bottom line, I think this book (and apparently the next two books the author wrote) are a bunch of hooey. This gets a one star from me.

Disclosure: I purchase a copy of this book for my own collections. The views expressed here are 100% my own and may differ from yours. ~Michelle

[Suidpunt · Rating 3 out of 5]

Die boek het ek teen R35,00 gekoop by 'n tweedehandse winkel. As ek nie afgebuk het nie, sou ek nie die boek onder die tafel gesien het nie.

Ek het slegs twee vrae.

Onder andere - gestel jou naam staan daar in die Skrif vasgevang, met 'n datum by... wie se naam is dit dan: joune, 'n naamgenoot, iemand wat was of nog gebore moet word? Is ID-nommers ook in die Bybelkode ingesluit? Maak jy as 't ware ooit saak?

Nog 'n probleem - amper soos 'n palimpses word verskeie gebeurtenisse oor en oor geskrywe. Maar dit sê nie wat jy moet doen nie. Dit gee geen historiese konteks nie. En, met alle respek, hoe ver voordat profesie ontaard in 'n soort spekulatiewe horoskopie?

Ek wil glo, en ek is veral beïndruk dat "dinosourus" en "draak" kruis by Deuteronomium 4:25 (bl. 229). My 2-jarige susterskind het 'n draak met 'n dinosourus verwar toe hy Paw Patrol gekyk het - en ek onthou 'n dosent in die chemie wat gesê het die mense van die Middeleeue het op geraamtes van dinosourusse afgekom en gesê dit is drake. En hier in die skrif het jou nou konkrete bewyse dat dit presies dieselfde dier/wese was.

Die boek is 'n goeie tydsdokument van die 1990's fin-de-siècle: die angs, die onsekerheid, die ontbinding van die Sowjet-Unie, Russiese kernwetenskaplikes wat skielik sonder werk sit en te koop is, die samelewing wat 'n nonchalante houding kry, die rekenaar-oorskakeling, die internet...

[Yaotl Altan · Rating 1 out of 5]

Tras leer este libro, no sé porqué nunca se pronosticó la fecha de mi divorcio o aquel 2-1 que Noruega le metió a Brasil en el mundial de Francia 1998 y que me hizo NO ganar cerca de 20,000 USD. Ya, en serio:

No he comprobado si es cierto lo que se menciona en la novela: que la Biblia tiene profecías codificadas que hablan sobre eventos a suceder en siglos posteriores. Así, en ese libro sagrado vendrían anuncios sobre el asesinato del sionista Yitzak Rabin, las Guerras Mundiales, y un supuesto ataque nuclear a la entidad criminal israelí que no ha ocurrido hasta la fecha.

También dice que en el código de la Biblia se pronosticaron aquellos ataques de la secta de Shoko Asahara en Tokio a mediados de los años 1990, los ataques terroristas de Timothy McVeigh en Oklahoma, terremotos, etc.

Habla de combinaciones, números, codificaciones, probabilidades y otros términos vinculados a la estadística. Entretiene, que ni qué, pero no lo sustenta. Podría ser útil para un guion de ciencia ficción de esas películas que ponen en los autobuses de Topolobampo a Tapachula.

Es empalogoso porque al autor parece importarle más la seguridad israelí que el cumpleaños de su esposa o su mamá.

244 págs. publicadas por Editorial Planeta.

[Diane Gerber · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book proves that the Torah is a Divine book given in front of hundreds of thousands of witnesses. It would be impossible for a human being to write even one page of the Torah, particularly given these encrypted codes.

It is easy to have doubts in this world-especially if a person has no real knowledge of G-d's plan or of His blueprint for humanity.

So remembering that the odds of these codes appearing on the exact parsha in the Torah to which the words relate- on even one single page- are astronomical enough to be considered "impossible" by human standards brings enormous comfort during times when faith is tested.

Only a person who is determined to scoff at G-d so he or she can continue to engage in idol worship or behave as they wish would "debunk" these discoveries. The world renowned code-cracker Elyahu Rips who discovered the codes was an atheist, but became deeply religious after these discoveries.

[Sammy Tiranno · Rating 2 out of 5]

Grabbed this at a book sale. It’s one of those books that you’ve seen or heard about but never got around to reading. I was surprised to find that it’s already 20 years old.

The claim is that major historical events, both past and future, have been encoded within the Hebrew Bible. The author discovers/demonstrates this through equidistant letter sequences that reveal related words in both the plain text and hidden text, arranged in proximity to each other horizontally, vertically, and/or diagonally. The appendix contains the scientific article that was published to explain the mathematics behind the code.

At first glance, the idea may be intriguing, but after learning a little bit more about the supposed coding, and how related words/names/dates are being drawn from the text, I’m not confident that there’s some intentional meaning, and it appears much less sensational.

[Supra Dee · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very interesting book about last days and end days...short summary of this book is An Israeli Mathematician decided to decipher the Ancient Hebrew Bible via all spelled out in letters via Hebrew language and then he used a computer program to decipher of their is ancient coded in their to forecast end days.... based on my knowledge he was right about 90% of time, what happened it predicted Yitzak Ruben murder via assassin named Amir and predicts this ancient King Gog and Magog will rise up soon which is looking like Russia and some evidence when Rapture will arrive...and much more.. great book but use your best judgement ...

[Grace Hawkins · Rating 3 out of 5]

Very interesting read. Statistically, the outcomes of some of his examples are beyond chance. I also would not be shocked at all if there were a code to the Bible. Honestly, I believe there is. However, them being wrong about their interpretations doesn’t fall back on them being wrong, they assume the Bible is. I think that maybe they’re over subscribing to the code and don’t know where to draw the line. Lots of “end of the world” prophesies when biblically, no one knows when that’ll happen.
Easy read though and I like that he provided the code within the text to look at. I also think he was onto something, but maybe went about it the wrong way.

[James Hill · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had already read that the ‘code’ was not real, and that other texts of sufficient length show up similar ‘predictions’. That made it difficult at times to stay with the author.

However, I felt that the writing of the story was alright though not great (kept reasonable pace at least), though suffered from repetition and some loose appreciation of quantum physics.

The main reason I was able to score it a 3* was that although the code itself and it’s interpretation can be disputed and the writing was average, it did raise interesting angles on philosophical questions (eg deterministic / probabilistic / free choice) which got my mind turning over.