I am afraid that my answer may be just a bit confusing.  What I mean is this.  It is certain that the Jews were aware of numbers and the symbolism attached to those numbers, and that they used them in constructing the Bible.  For example, the number 12 is symbolic of God’s people, which explains why there were twelve apostles and twelve tribes.  The number seven is the number of completeness or perfection.  There are too many things in the Bible which happen seven times (the seven I Am statements in John, the seven miracles in John and MANY other examples) for this to be a coincidence.  Did humans put decide to have seven things or did God, through inspiration, cause there to be seven things?  There is also the symbolism of four, which represents the earth, and six, which represents evil, and so on.  So, there is a sort of symbolic numerology used in the creation of the Bible which is apparent and is surely not accidental. I believe all scholars will agree that this kind of number symbolism is found in the Bible.

But then there are what I am convinced are bogus attempts to apply numerology to the Bible.  The little I listened to you from the articles you found are, in my opinion, coincidences dressed up to look like something supernatural.  We can apply computers and numerical analysis to any text in the universe and discover patterns if we look for them.  Muslims do this with the Koran, and convince themselves this “proves” the Koran is inspired by God.  It is not.

Here is the hard thing.  I will have to be honest.  There are numerologies which I am convinced are used by the Bible writers (the symbolic use on numbers such as 7, 10, 12, 40, etc.).  And then there are numerologies that I am convinced are just fishing.  However, it is possible that there are other legitimate kinds of numerologies which God, through inspiration, has placed into the Bible, but which I am not aware of.  I want to be careful to not pre-judge all such things without investigating them.

For this reason, I am leaving you in a bit of a quandary.  I am saying that some numerical analyses in the Bible are valid, some are not and some might be, but I am not sure.  I am sorry to leave you hanging a bit here.  But let me assure you that, if there are some actual hidden numerologies in the Bible (I am quite skeptical, but…), you really do not need to worry about this.  First of all, the Bible is absolutely, undoubtably, unquestionably inspired by God.  Therefore, we do not need numerologies to prove so.  And, if there are hidden numerologies in the Bible, they are not important to our faith.  Otherwise, God would not have left them hidden!  They will tell us nothing about God we do not already know, and they will not make it any more convincing that the Bible is inspired by God.

So, here is my advice.  Ignore these articles.  They are not going to be helpful to you. Read the Bible, learn from what it teaches, apply it to your life.  Like it says in 2 Tim 3:16, it is sufficient for godliness just as it is.  My advice is to not get caught up into numerologies, most of which are not going to be valid anyway, especially since they will not add anything to your faith.  Put it this way… Peter, John, Paul and the other New Testament writers were inspired interpreters of the Bible, and they said nothing on this topic.  I suggest you find a more fruitful area of study and ignore these people.

John Oakes