In the early years of the Twentieth Century, Dr. Oskar Goldberg published a Torah study entitled "The Pentatuch – A Number Edifice: Discovery of a Uniformly Executed Numerical Script". The Pentatuch, or the Torah, is the collection of the first five books of the Bible – Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy.

Just before World War II a Jewish rabbi, apparently following the study of Dr. Goldberg, made an interesting discovery. Rabbi Michael Weismandel noted that the word "Torah" appeared if you started with the first Hebrew letter "Tav" in Genesis 1:1 and counted every fifty letters. Rabbi Weismandel called this Equidistant Letter Spacing, or ELS. This was done manually, without the aid of a computer.

Next Rabbi Weismandel found the same thing in the first verse of Exodus. The word "Torah" appeared in spaces of fifty letters. When he came to Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy it did not work. Then he found that in the beginning of Numbers and Deuteronomy the word "Torah" appeared backwards in spaces of fifty letters. Finally, in his studies he found that the Name of God, Jahweh or JHWH, appeared in Leviticus, beginning in the first verse, in equally spaced letters of eight.

What we have is a design in which the word "Torah" points toward the center book, Leviticus. In the first two books, it is written forward. In the last two books it is written backward. In the center book is the Holy Name of the Lord. Remember, there are NO coincidences in God's Word.

Mathmaticians in Israel took the work of Rabbi Weismandel and applied the power of a computer. Michael Drosnin wrote about their work. They discovered a fascinating array of names in the Torah. For instance, they found the names of twenty-five plants native to Israel encoded from Genesis 2:7 through Genesis 3:3. This passage contains the account where the Lord created the trees. The surface text confirms the encoded words.

This is an important principle. The encoded words are confirmed by the surface text. This also eliminates much speculation.

ELS only works in the Hebrew Massoretic text Bible. There is a Hebrew Samaritan Bible. It does not work. ELS does not work in the Hebrew translation of War and Peace. It only works in God's Word, and only one version at that.

The weakness of Michael Drosnin's book is that he was looking for predictions. Drosnin sought a way to tell the future with God's Word. In fact, the Word specifically prohibits using any method, mediums, soothsayers, or horoscope, to determine the future.

Interestingly, you cannot tell the future by these encoded words and phrases. An example is: the names "Diana" and "Paris" and the word "tunnel" have been found in close proximity encoded in the Bible. However, until the event of Princess Diana's death, no connection could be made between these words. The surface text of the Bible takes precedence over any "hidden codes".

In Daniel 12:4 and 12:9 we are told that the words of the book are closed up until the Time of the End. The Hebrew word for "closed" means "to keep secret". Daniel's words were encrypted until these times when "many go to and fro and knowledge is increased" (Daniel 12:4). That sounds like today!

The Bible Codes discovered by Rabbi Weismandel and written about by Michael Drosnin in his book of the same name are a fascinating confirmation of the Hand of God in His Word. All the information found goes far beyond mere chance or probability. The Lord is wise and powerful beyond our comprehension. Praise His Holy Name!