The Periodic Bible

the periodic bible the key of david. it was through the study of the book of psalms which led f. w. grant into the discovery of the numerical structure of scripture. two things in the psalms led grant into this discovery. the first of these was pointed out by a remark in franz delitzsch’s (1813-1890) commentary, that the jews called the book of psalms the “pentateuch of david.” this division of the psalms into five books is found in in the hebrew arrangement and is reflected in most modern versions. delitzsch pointed out some similarities between the fourth and fifth books of the psalter which correspond with the fourth and fifth books of moses - numbers and deuteronomy. in pointing out the resemblances, grant found that this correspondence runs through all five books of the psalms and the five books of moses. and so, book i of the psalms corresponds in scope and character with the book of genesis; book ii of psalms with exodus; book iii with leviticus; book iv with numbers, and book v with deuteronomy. the second thing was the peculiar structure of the acrostic psalms. of the nine of these in the hebrew bible, only one is conveyed to the english reader, which is the one hundred and nineteenth psalm. the new world translation which is the jehovah’s witness’ version is the only exception that i know of that conveys the acrostic psalms as well as the acrostic structure of the book of lamentations. an extract from the introduction of grant’s numerical bible to explains just how the significance of the structure is to be understood: “i have elsewhere related how, some fifteen years ago, the lord led me into the discovery of a numerical structure every-where pervading scripture. i do not need to repeat this here, nor to give proof of the existence of such, as i have there given it. i now call scripture in general to the proof of it. believing assuredly that it has pleased god so to write his word, apology would be entirely out of place for the present attempt to exhibit this in the word for the practical help of his people. “i believed, and therefore have i spoken;” and i speak not hesitatingly, but with the assured conviction of the truth of what i speak. “but what is meant by “numerical structure”? it is this: that if, for example, in the pentateuch we find plainly a series of five books; that is five divisions of moses’ whole work, this fivefold division has a meaning intimately connected with the subjects of the books themselves. the numerals of scripture all students of it believe to have (in many cases at least,) definite meaning,as, for instance, in the number 7 we have “completeness.” the view that i am advocating simply applies this symbolism to such a series as we have here, and affirms that genesis, which stands first among these, has for its special line of truth what would be suggested by the number 1; exodus, similarly, a line of truth connected with the number 2; leviticus, with number 3; numbers, with 4; deuteronomy, with 5. to take of these, perhaps the simplest, the number 4 stands as the number of the world, and the symbol for “weakness” (which may come out in failure), “trial,” “experience;” and so the book of numbers will be found to be characterized by these thoughts. it is, in fact, the testing and failure of israel in the wilderness-the type of our own pathway of trial in the world; and the characters implied in the number are found in it throughout. “now this is not only true of the books as a whole. each one, we find, when we come to examine it, readily parting into similar divisions, and these again into subdivisions, and so to be divided again and again; and in the case of each division, whether smaller or larger, the same rule applies. the number of each in its series is an indication of the line of truth contained in the division to which it is attached. of course it is not meant that these divisions are distinctly given us with their

corresponding numbers. had it been so, the numerical structure would not have needed proof today. we have to discover these divisions in most cases for ourselves; but when we have discovered them we shall find that their numerical place is the sure indication of what is contained in them, and gives us the point of view from which to see them aright. “if this is true, its exceeding importance ought to be plain at once. god has not wrought all this into the web and woof of scripture to be a mere wonder-a matter of curious inquiry only, but for deepest, truest blessing to all his own. if it be only there, then it is there for a purpose worthy of himself, and cannot be overlooked or rejected without serious loss. nor does the fact of its having been hidden up to the present time affect the importance of it. how long was the great doctrine of justification by faith hidden from the mass of christians? for all such things, we have but to blame our own careless unbelieving reading of god’s inspired word. let us bless him for his grace, and not refuse his present mercy. “another objection will doubtless be, that this numerical system is too artificial - too mechanical seems to make the interpretation of scripture too independent of the spirit of god to be of him. the perfectly sufficient answer to this would be that it is there; and being there, it must be of him, of course. god’s ways are often strange enough to us, and we misjudge strangely. who would have thought that the alphabetic psalms would be worthy of the spirit of god to write? probably no one, if he had not confessedly done so. and these alphabetic psalms are but the indication of that very numerical structure which in the hundred and nineteenth stamps it every where with that number 8, which reveals easily one of its main features. “if it has pleased god to give us helps to the consistent interpretation of his blessed word, it is no wonder if they should be something that we might call unspiritual. the more easily they strike the eye, the better for the purpose. if they are to conduct to the spiritual meaning, they must not be as hidden as the meaning, surely. and in fact, the divisions are often to be discerned without any difficulty, where their meaning is nevertheless hard enough to discern. for it is here that the need of spiritual judgment is still found; and without god, we shall go widely astray. “the fact remains: the numbers are there. let criticism do its work thoroughly, and prove if they are not. let it be as severe as the subject demands, and let the pretension be exposed, if it be merely that. certainly it ought to be easily disproved if untrue, for never did a system submit itself to more rigorous test than does the present one. in the book of genesis alone there are over two hundred divisions. the numerals must in all these cases characterize plainly the divisions; they must elucidate the spiritual meaning of each part; they must harmonize with one another so as to make the interpretation of the whole harmonious; and they must bring out the teaching of the book as really one from end to end. these demands are neither few nor small. if they are met in even any tolerable way, then it is useless to deny the truth of what meets them. no human ingenuity could accomplish such a result. “let it be remembered, however, that, from the immensity of scripture, no complete success is or can be claimed for what is but a beginning-a first survey of a field so vast and new. it should be no cause for disappointment here if the faithful investigator of divine truth according to this method should soon outgrow his primer, and subsequent attempts-if the near coming of the lord should yet leave time for them, -- soon supersede the present. god would ever lead us on: to be with god is to be led on. “the use of the numerical structure is not simply as an aid to interpretation, though for the child of god that is its great use. it confronts the deniers of the complete inspiration of god’s book, and much more the rationalist and the infidel, with an argument they can never meet. it shows the one mind of the spirit in all these various writings of so many men of so many generations. the pentateuch it demonstrates, instead of being the piece of literary forgery so commonly now imagined, to have given shape to the whole volume of inspiration; while the same delicate tracery is found every where in it, declaring the hand whose workmanship it is. its almost mathematical precision, easily to be discerned substantially by the most unspiritual, challenges the infidel to

account for what he cannot conceive to have been done by the contrivance and connivance of man. the very fact that there is nothing spiritual upon the surface will enable it to be looked at outside of all the questions with which every thing else is sure to be mixed up. here is a simple easy problem, which is as open to the unlearned as to the learned to all classes at once. yet, settle it as it must be settled, you are brought face to face with god. it is the finger of god. this simple enumeration this babe’s arithmetic is a web that goliath’s sword can never pierce, and whose meshes will hold powerless the stoutest champions of unbelief. try it, gentlemen! learn how god has mocked all your philosophy with the mere enumeration of 1, 2, 3! to despise it will be safer for your pride, but in result your real suicide. the child will understand enough to laugh at you: the most ignorant will be sheltered from your grosser ignorance. “nor can you afford to despise it, when you remember how all the natural sciences in the present day are ranging themselves under arithmetical law; when, as herschel says, every law of nature tends to express itself in terms of arithmetic; while astronomy preaches it to you from the starry spheres, the plants in the arrangement of their leaves and the division of their flowers, the animal kingdom shows its partiality among its different tribes for different numbers, the crystal talks mathematics to you from the window-pane. why should not a law of numbers pervade scripture also, and link god’s work and his word together; or show his word also to be his work? and remember, nothing more simply expresses mired than these arithmetical series. i find a dozen stones in a line exactly three inches apart, and i say this is the work of mind. and the eternal mind would thus make itself manifest to the minds of his creatures. “every sound that wakes our hearing has its arithmetical law; every ripple of light no less. seven notes make all our music; and god’s word is musical with this numerical impress, which tells every where of a master’s hand, that can alone unite all discords into harmony. see how in the events pictured in the closing book of scripture god’s sevens ring their chime throughout. they are celebrating before it comes the victory of god and good in the strife now nearing its end. they are meant to cheer amid it those drooping in the heat and toil of the day. measured are the hours as they go by; measured all that remains; measured is the cup of sorrow; “sufficient” - not too great “is the evil” of the day. “and “i am not mad, most noble festus,” when i affirm that the scripture science of numbers is able to put meaning into all chronology, and to interpret largely nature in every department of it. it is only saying that where things are, they will speak; and that all things are full of reason, infinitely fuller than any mere disciple of reason can ever know. but my point now is scripture, and scripture must be the key to all the rest. “there is one thing that makes all this solemn yet joyful to the saint: the assurance that it seems to give that the end is nigh at hand. the very power of demonstration that is in this numerical system seems to mark it as a closing testimony; faith almost coming to an end, god coming face to face with man. here it becomes us not to go too far in assumption. his ways are not as our ways. but in any case, the end cannot be far.”

the pentateuch. the law (the torah) is the foundation of the bible in two ways. first, the law gives the principles of divine government. second, the law, that is, the pentateuch, is the structural basis of the periodic bible. when grant had found such a numerical interpretation in the psalms, and its correlation with the pentateuch, he took up the bible as a whole to see if he could discover a divine arrangement of the bible books. he found that the old testament naturally divided into four easily recognizable parts, the law, the covenant history, the prophets, and the poetry. upon further examination, he found that each of these seemed easily to fall into five parts each, based upon the scope and character of each of the parts. similarly, the new testament also seemed easily to fall into five parts. five pentateuchs make up the whole bible. he goes on to show that these

pentateuchs in form are also pentateuchs also in spirit. and again, each pentateuch, and each part of each pentateuch singularly agrees with the meaning of the number of its order. the five pentateuchs and their correspondence with the pentateuch. as the five books of the psalms correspond with the five books of the pentateuch, each of the five grand divisions correspond with its counterpart in the pentateuch itself. the torah, the law, which affirms the sovereignty and supremacy of god, is just that which lays the foundation of the principles of revelation as well as its structure and corresponds with genesis. the covenant history, a history of conflicts, servitudes, and deliverances corresponds with exodus. the prophets corresponds with leviticus. the poetical section, which gives voice to the various trials through which the writers have passed, corresponds with numbers. lastly, as the name deuteronomy means “second law” and within the text of deuteronomy itself is a “second covenant” (deuteronomy 29:1) so the second covenant - the new testament is the exact deuteronomy. the fundamental passage is romans 8:1-4: there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in christ jesus, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit. 2 for the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death. 3 for what the law could not do, in that it was weak through the flesh, god sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: 4 that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.

so, as deuteronomy was necessary to equip the earthly people to cross jordan and take possession of, and inherit the land, the second covenant was necessary to equip the heavenly people by faith to take possession of their heavenly inheritance. there are three way to illustrate the division of five into four and one. first from nature, the hand of man, the symbol of responsibility, has four fingers - the stamp of creature weakness, and the strong opposing thumb - the symbol of divine strength - consecrated because it is the governing part. again, the first four books of the pentateuch comprise one division. deuteronomy, the “second law,” being in the fifth place is the second division of the five. again, the division of the bible into old and new testaments: there are four pentateuchs in the old testament, which is the earthly part, and is addressed to an earthly people, the most orthodox of which to this day hold exclusively as their revelation, and bears witness to its weakness, and the fifth pentateuch, the new testament, or covenant is the heavenly part and addresses itself to a heavenly people, and is the endowment of divine strength and power. 1. the law. here we have the genesis of the pentateuchs. as the supremacy of god falls under the definitions of number one, just so, the supremacy of god is what the law affirms. so the law displays god as the sovereign lawgiver. 2. the covenant history. this is the exodus of the pentateuchs. as relationship is found under the number two, a covenant is a relational contract. in the case here before us, the

covenant is between jehovah and israel. grant says: the second division gives the covenant-history. it is a history, alas! of sin and discord and division while also of divine deliverances, until even god's patience is at an end, and the people become lo-ammi (not my people). even then, the return of a remnant is permitted, though under the persian yoke, to repeat their old history on a smaller scale. the second book of this section, judges, is morally the epitome of the whole of it. the numerical structure of scripture, page 74. here, grant mentions that judges, the second book morally epitomizes the whole of this second pentateuch and is therefore the exodus of this exodus division. it is remarkable that as the people are in servitude to pharaoh, brought into hard bondage a saviour is raised up to deliver them. likewise in judges, the people, again and again do evil in the sight of the lord, again and again they repent and cry out unto the lord, and again and again the lord raises up judges to deliver them. if you go back and re-read grant’s definition of the number two and see how this singularly agrees with exodus, judges, and the covenant history. difference runs through all of the definitions of number two. two is also the number of competent testimony, the testimony of two men is true. the power of twofold witness is founded upon difference. the weight of evidence of the histories of the bible again are replete with multiple accounts always giving the required two-fold witness. now just as number two is also the number if evil and division, but also of salvation and deliverance, so is the history of the covenant replete with sin and rebellion, decline and departure, interspersed with divine deliverances. in exodus the covenant is established, in this second pentateuch is given the history of the covenant. 3. the prophets. this division holds the leviticus position of the pentateuchs. i simply quote grant: “. . . the books of the prophets, the third division of the old testament, and that in which we are most of all brought face to face with god himself. the vail is of course not yet removed; yet as more and more the condition of the people was discovered hopeless, and even as judgment more and more, stroke upon stroke, fell upon them, to faith god began to speak with increasing plainness. that the just shall live by faith was witnessed by a prophet, and how full and plain is isaiah as to the work and glory of christ! we are surely in the sanctuary in this third division, and the holiness of the place makes itself apparent at every step. “yet the prophets are little studied, little known; and when studied, it is more as predictions than to realize their spiritual meaning: thus, again, they have fallen with many into a disrepute sadly dishonoring to him who speaks in them more undisguisedly then elsewhere in the old testament. “surely the lord god will do nothing,” says amos, “but he revealeth it unto his servants the prophets.” from the numerical structure of scripture, page 86.

4. the poetical books. this division is the numbers of the pentateuchs. again i quote grant: “it needs not many words to show that these books form a series distinct from every other in the bible. they are not history, it is plain, even the narrative in the book of job being quite subservient to the moral problem. nor are they in form prophecy, although the psalms at least are thoroughly prophetic; but in them the prophecy is not announced as such, but left to come out afterward to the faith that can read it there, just as the types of law and history, which last (as in the person of david) are conspicuous in the psalms. “thus, negatively, these books are separated from all other books. as poetical, they are separated also from the historical, but not from the prophetical part of the old testament, or at least by no clear line. they are united together by their character as experience books, which applies clearly to them all, however different the experience may be in each. it is the individual path through the world that is exhibited in them, though the ‘song’ can only be said to be this in a certain sense, and the first three books are all higher in character than the last two. the psalms, however, with the usual genesis-largeness, furnish parallels to all the rest. “ ‘trial’ is stamped fully on all, and exercise of heart is begotten of this, the number 5 not only giving the number of books in the section, but the number of divisions of the books in general, as in the five books of the psalms proper, which the revised version now brings before the english reader. the dark and difficult problems of which the world is full are here allowed to have utterance by the lips of man himself, and their solution is given in some sense or other; not always by the vail being lifted indeed, but always by god being brought into them, and man learning, as in job and in ecclesiastes, his true place before him. “the five books are nevertheless very distinct from one another--necessarily so, i may say, from what they are: for how various are the experiences and exercises through which we pass! this distinctness makes our task proportionately easier. indeed, it is hardly possible here to mistake what is before us.” the numerical structure of scripture, pages 107-108. 5. the new testament. finally, we have the “second law” or the deuteronomy of the pentateuchs. within the text of deuteronomy it presents itself as a second covenant, and it is the type of the new testament. it sets forth the conditions which ultimately enable the people to take possession of the promised land. the text here is found in romans 8:1-4: there is therefore now no condemnation to those which are in christ jesus. for the law of the spirit of life in christ jesus has made me free from the law of sin and death. for what the law could not do in that it was weak through the flesh, god sending his own son in the likeness of sinful flesh, and for sin, condemned sin in the flesh: that the righteousness of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not after the flesh, but after the spirit.

after wandering in the wilderness forty years, deuteronomy gives the moral results of trial and is the necessary preparation for the people to cross jordan and take possession of the promised land. so, in the fullness of time the new testament equips the people of god to take possession by faith, of their inheritance. before giving the pentateuchs, i think it profitable first to give the columns or groups in order to show first the similarity of the books of each group, before the contrast of the divisions of each pentateuch. i believe that this cross-examination of the parts will clearly illustrate that there can be no confusion as to the place of each book by its contrast with the books of its row, and comparison with the books of its column. the groups of the periodic bible. grant composed a chart in the introduction to volume i of the numerical bible. in that chart each pentateuch is a column in five columns. five rows result from the five parts of each column. however, because each of the grand divisions - the pentateuchs - are analogous to the periods in the periodic table, the chart “the periodic bible” places the pentateuchs in rows instead of columns. as electrons are added to the shells of successive atomic numbers of elements of the periodic table. the five columns of the periodic bible, as the corresponding numerical positions of each of the divisions line up in columns, are analogous to the groups in the periodic table. the chart “the periodic bible” differs only in form, not in substance, from grant’s layout. group i:1.1genesis; 2.1 joshua; 3.1 isaiah; 4.1 psalms; 5.1 the four gospels. group ii:1.2 exodus; 2.2 judges/ruth; 3.2 jeremiah/lamentations; 4.2 job; 5.2 acts. group iii:1.3 leviticus; 2.3 samuel/kings; 3.3 ezekiel; 4.3 song of solomon; 5.3 pauline epistles. group iv:1.4 numbers; 2.4 ezra/nehemiah/esther; 3.4 daniel; 4.4 ecclesiastes; 5.4 catholic epistles. group v:1.5 deuteronomy; 2.5 chronicles; 3.5minor prophets, 4.5 proverbs; 5.5 revelation. the pentateuchal arrangement of each of the five pentateuchs. each of the pentateuchs can be examined to show that there is a progression of meaning wholly differing from the progression of meaning in the columns.

1.the law. 1. genesis. 2. exodus. 3. leviticus. 4. numbers. 5. deuteronomy.

2. the covenant history. 1. joshua. 2. judges - ruth. 3. samuel - kings. 4. ezra - nehemiah - esther. 5. chronicles.

3. the prophets. 1. isaiah 2. jeremiah - lamentations 3. ezekiel 4. daniel 5. the minor prophets 1. hosea, amos, micah 2. joel, obadiah, jonah 3. nahum, habakkuk, zephaniah 4. haggai, zechariah, malachi

4. the poetical books. 1. psalms. 2. job. 3. song of solomon. 4. ecclesiastes. 5. proverbs.

5. the new testament. 1. the gospels. 1. matthew. 2. mark. 3. luke. 4. john 2. acts 3. pauline epistles division i 1. romans. 2. galatians. 3. ephesians. 4. colossians, philemon. 5. philippians. division ii 1. thessalonians. 2. corinthians. 3. hebrews. 4. timothy. 5. titus. 4. catholic epistles. 1. peter. 2. james. 3. john. 4. jude. 5. the revelation of jesus christ.

but before we can describe the significance of each of the books and their placement, a basic understanding of the definition of the numbers is necessary. all of the foregoing can be re-read after the acquisition of a general understanding of the meaning of these numbers. in the periodic bible, note that there are five rows and five columns, the minor prophets being an expansion of the third row of the fifth column, and the pauline epistles being an expansion of the third column of the fifth row, kind of neat, huh? but note, too, that the significance of the meaning of the numbers runs through the five columns of paul's epistles.