Number (Hastings' Dictionary)

1. Numbers and Textual Oriticism (jigures). & Numbers and ‘Theology (holy numbers, eymbol numbers, Gematria). Ὁ ‘ The interpreter of Scripture has to look at the numbers which occur in the sacred texts from other points of view besides those that are usually taken account of in grammar (cf. Kénig, Syntax, Ρ. 310-338). He has to ask whether such num- rs do not fall within the sphere of Textual Criticism, of Rhetoric, or even of Philosophy and Theology. 1, NUMBERS AND TEXTUAL CRITICISM.—(a) In the only inscription which has been preserved to us from the earlier times of the Hebrews, the Siloam Inscription, which, notwithstanding the objections of Pilcher, is to be dated in all proba- bility from the days of Hezekiah (ef. Expos. Times, 1898, p. 292f.), the numbers are written in full in words : vw and 5>x) p»nxd (lines2, 5). One sees that we have only a very slender basis for conclusions as to the way in which the ancient Hebrews indi- cated numbers in their writing. Certainly, the dog- matic judgment must not be passed that the above was the only mode. On the one hand, no doubt, this view is supported by the circumstance that upon the Moabite Stone also (ef. Socin, ‘zur Mesa- Inschrift’ in Verhandlungen der stichs. Gesellschaft der Wissenschaften, 1897, ii.) the numbers are written in words : 27v, ete. (lines 2, 8, 16, 20, 28 f.). But, on the other hand, it is to be noted that else- where, even at periods when figures were employed, numbers are notwithstanding indicated frequently NUMBER by words. For instance, in the old Aramaic in- scriptions of Zinjirli, we read the numbers ‘yay (Panammu, line 3) and νὸν (WZEKM, 1893, τς 119. It may be noted that the inscription of Bar-Rekub, published by Sachau in Sitzungsb. d. Berl. Akad. 1896, p. 1051 f., contains no numbers). But in the same inscriptions we find also figures, and the same combination of both methods of indicating numbers recurs also ‘on the Assyro-Aramaic lion-weights, where the numbers are expressed first in words and then in symbols’ (W. R. Smith, Academy, 1893, No. 1124, p. 444°). Again, in the S. Arabian inscriptions the numbers are partly written in full and partly indicated by figures, e.g. ‘nyanN) yay, ete., in Halévy, No, 199 (Pritorius, ZDMG xxvi. 748). The Phenicians also employed both words fully written and figures, e.g. | II] - ya. oy in the Eshmunazar inscription (CJS i. 14); 1} pwr, in an inscription of Citium (% 36), and the same dittography is found in an inscription of Idalium (i. 102, cf. 151), II paw (p. 183), Il ΠῚ 1Π] 30%, ete. (pp. 109f., 225). Nay, there are Pheenician inscrip- tions in which the numbers are written only in words: whe (p. 203), ono von, ete. (in a Spanish inscription, No. 166, p. 245), nd (twice in one in- scription, p. 264). The Siloam Inscription may be an stance of an inscription of this kind. This Sealgened must be conceded the more that S. inach also remarks, in his Traité d’épigraphie grecque (1885, p. 219), ‘at all periods the inscrip- tions furnish instances, rather rare no doubt, of figures [read ‘ numbers’] expressed at length in 8; 6.0. Ταμίαις ἔσοδος ula ἐνενήκοντα λίτραι, K.T.r. (CIG, No. 5640).’ (6) If, then, it is possible that the pre -exilic Hebrews also employed signs for numbers, what kind of figures h they? Of such signs four lead- ing species are known to the present writer :— (a) In Assyrian ‘one’ is represented by a vertical wedge (Y), and the other units by combinations of such wedges, but ‘ten’ by a sign which is quite similar to the sign for u (<<, cf. in Delitzsch’s Assyr, Gramm. p. 18 with p. 40). The other numbers are indicated by combinations of this sign for ‘ten’ with the vertical and the horizontal wedge. These Assyrian figures might be called purely linear, were it not that the number ‘sixty’ is expressed by ‘| Susu, or soss’; cf. further, Bezold, Oriental Diplomacy (London, 1893), p. 120f., and, above all, Th. Dangin, Recherches sur VOrigine de Vécriture cunéiforme (Paris, 1898), pp. 82 ff., where the figures employed in the oldest cuneiform inscriptions are collected with great completeness. (8) In the hieroglyphic texts of the Egyptians ‘one’ is indicated by a vertical line, and the num- bers from ‘ two’ to ‘nine’ by vertical strokes placed side by side (e.g. Ill 111). ‘In dates the units are indicated also by horizontal strokes (—, =, etc.).’ But the sign for ‘ten’ is ἢ, ‘hundred’ is repre- sented by C, ete. (cf. Erman, Aegypt, Gramm. 1894, § 140). Essentially identical is the Phanictan system of figures: | to III III ΠῚ; ‘ten’ is indicated by “τ or by a similar obliquely drawn and curved line which evidently arose from O, the earlier form of y, with which the word roy ‘ten’ begins. Then follows a special sign for ‘twenty’ and for ‘hundred’ (ef. Schréder, Die Phin. Sprache, Pp 186 ff, and CIS i. 30, 40, 43, 50, 94, ete.). Only the sign O for ‘ten’ has been found up till now in the Zinjirli inscriptions, namely ‘of = 30,’ and #900°=70’ (Sachau, Ausgrabungen in Sendschirli, 3893, p. 71). Upon the same principle the signs for numbers are chosen in Minwo-Sabeun, where one” is expressed by a vertical stroke’ (Priitorius, ZDMG xxvi. p. 750), but ‘five’ by J, the initial letter of ry (i) 94, if the Minwo-Sabwan letters VOL. I11,—36 NUMBER are transcribed in Ethiopic. The number ‘ten’ is indicated by the sign O, an older form of (7 (y), with which the word for ‘ten’ begins which answers to the Ethiopic ΠΟΘΈΝ. (For the other figures see Priitorius, /.c., and Hommel, Siidarab. Chrestomathie, 1893, p. 8.). Only slightly modified is the system of figures which one finds employed in the Palmyrene inscriptions, namely | to III; ‘five’ = a sign which appears to the present writer to be a simplification of the above 5. Arabian © ; ‘ten’=a sign which may have arisen from O (y), etc. (cf. Merx, Gramm. Syr. p. 17). This second rinciple upon which numbers are indicated may called the lineo-acrostic. (y) In India an older system of figures was dis- placed by that which is adopted in the Sanskrit texts: Y, 3,3, ete. (cf. e.g. Stenzler, Hlementar- buch der Sanskrit-Sprache, §7). This way of in- dicating numbers is the pure acrostic. For the sign % represents the vowel Ὁ, with which the word &q_ (eka, ‘one’) begins, ete. These figures are employed also by the Arabs (ef. |, Γ΄, I~, ete.), who themselves call this method of indicating numbers ar-rakmu-lhindijju (Caspari-Miiller, Arab. Gramm.° § 33), while Europeans are accustomed to call it the Arabic method. (5) The fourth leading method of shortening the expression of numbers is the alphabetic. The following traces of it have been noted by the resent writer: the Greek inscriptions of older ate show the following figures, I, 11, III, Ill, Γ (S. Reinach, l.c. p. 217, recalls the Π of ITENTE), Tl, ete., A (cf. AEKA), ete. Similar signs are found in inscriptions from Epidauros belonging to the 4th cent. B.c. According to B. Keil (in Hermes, xxv. p. 319), as the present writer’s colleague, G. Kérte, has pointed out to him, the latest specimens of this system are found in CJ Attic. ii. 2, No 985 (written c. 90 B.c.). But somewhat earlier than B.c. 50 the alphabetic hopes of figures appears to have been introduced, according to B. eil (in above-cited art. p. 320), and it is found, e.g., in CI Attic. iii. 644 (the time of Augustus or Claudius), ete. ‘In the oldest system of this class, the letters possess the following values: A=], B=2, T=3, A=4, E=6, T=6, H=7, 9=8, I=9, K=10, ete.’ (Reinach, 1.6. p. 220). It is clear from all this that Gow (‘The Greek Numeral Alphabet,’ in Journal of Philology, 1884, p. 278) has rightly rejected the hypothesis of a Pheenician origin for this Greek method of indicating numbers. The alphabetic method adopted for Greek figures was copied in Coptic-Arabic and in Ethiopic writ- ings (Pritorius, deth. Gramm. § 14). Further, in many Syriac manuscripts (cf. the Codices Musei Britannici enumerated by Land in his Anecdota Syriaca, p. 94) one finds signs for numbers which have a genetic connexion with the above-mentioned figures of the Palmyrene inscriptions (cf. further, on the notation of the Syrians, Gottheil, ZD./c, 1889, p. 121 ff.). But these figures, which occur pretty frequently in the Codices of 5th-7th cent., afterwards fell into disuse (Merx, Gramm. Syr. p. 16), and the alphabetic method of indicating numbers was adopted (¢.g. Jiid=10; Kaph =20, etc.) ; cf. further, Néldeke, Syr. Gramm. pe 279. This alphabetic method was, and is still, largely employed by the Arads (Caspari-Miiller’, § 33). It was also partially adopted by the Nabateans, in whose inscriptions one finds ‘a mixed system’ of figures (Sachau, ZDMG, 1884, Ρ. 541: ‘ten=Jod, and gence a wet and the same method is not unexampled even in New Persian (cf. Salemann-Shukowski, Neupers. Gramm. p. 4f.). The alphabetic method of abbreviating the ex- pression of numbers is what is employed in the 562 NUMBER later Hebrew inscriptions and books. On those coins which are with the greatest probability dated from the Maccabean period we find fully written numbers (¢.g. y27 or nnx) and also figures (x, etc.) In the Mishna it is stated that three chests, used in connexion with the cultus of the second temple, were inscribed with nde, ma, "ὋΣ (Shekalim, iii. 2). This usage grew as time went on, and instead of 7 or “n one wrote 1’, to avoid suggesting the name mm, Traces of this practice are found in Origen (cf. Strack, ZATW, 1884, p. 249; Nestle, ZDMG, 1886, p. 429f.), in the Cam- bridge MS of the Mishna (ed. Lowe), and in the Jerus. Talmud (Dalman, Jiid-Pal. Aram. 1894, p. 99). Other instances are read in inscriptions from Aden, which are now in the British Museum (cf. Chwolson, ΟἹ Heb. col. 126: 63 nov; col. 129: noir, i.e. 1628). But this alphabetic method of indicating numbers need not have been the only one employed bd the Hebrews in the course of centuries. They may have in earlier nee employed one of the lineo-acrostic systems which were in use among their eastern or western neighbours, and may have passed from this to the alphabetic method, just as the Greeks and the Syrians did. It is, indeed, almost more probable that the Hebrews copied than that they avoided the practice of their neighbours. (c) From all this it results that the relation of numbers to Textual Criticism is as follows: the possibility is not excluded that the integrity of the numbers of the Old Testament has suffered, seeing that during an earlier or a later pod a species of figures was used in the MSS of the biblical text. When, for instance, we read in25S 9.415 ‘seven years,’ but in the parallel passage, 1 Ch 214 ‘three years,’ it is natural to suppose that a confusion has taken place between! and 3. Again, when ‘15,000 men’ is the reading of MT in Jg 8", but ‘18,000’ in Jos. Ant. V. vi. 5, there may be a confusion between 7° and m. Cf. a5()v, Gn 491% (Samar. av), with the Vulg. rendering ‘qui mit- tendus est,’ as if Jerome had found in his exemplar a form of που, 2. NUMBERS AND RHETORIC.—In the exegesis of the Bible, numbers come, further, under various view-points, which can be ranged under the wide category of the stylistic or rhetorical. (a) A species of synecdoche consists in individu- alizing, putting forward an example in place of the whole class, og. ji? ‘the tongue,’ Ps 12> [Eng. 39], or ps || oye] Pr 12)», A cognate phenomenon is specializing, t.e. the use of a definite number for a total which, in the mind of the writer, approxi- mates to that number. It is not enough to say with Hirzel (1.6. p. δ) that ‘the concrete expression is readily preferred to the abstract.’ (a) It may be said that this employment of a definite number is already present in the use of 1nx or nnx ‘one’ for ‘a’ or ‘some one’; e.¢. in Gn 228 ane is read by some Heb. MSS, and is supported by Sam., LXX, Pesh. (pv); see other examples from OT and NT, and from Arabic, et«., in Kénig’s Syntax, § 73, 29lde. The same tendency to specialize a total of objects led to the use of two definite numbers instead of one indefinite expres- sion. Thus we find ‘one (and, or) two’ in Dt 32”, Jer 34, Ps 62", Job 3315 40°; cf. the coupling of sing. with dual (Ec 21”, Jg 5” 15"), or of sing. with plural (Ee 2°); ‘¢wo (and, or) three’ in 2 Καὶ 93, Is 17% (‘ two or three berries’), Am 4° (cf. Hos 62), Job 33%, Sir 231° 268 50%, Mt 18%; Arab. jémén teldte, ‘two, three days’ (Spitta, Gramm. des Arab. Vulgardialects in qupten, § 1325); Syr. ‘two, three believers’ (Niéldeke, Syr. Gramm. § 240B); ‘bis terque’ in Cicero, et al.; ef. civdy Sinn, ἐχθὲς καὶ τρίτην ἡμέραν, Gn 3155, Ex 57! 14 9139. 86 Dt 443 1955, Jow 394 418 205,1S 47 etc., Ru 211, 1 Ch1l?; NUMBER ‘three (and, or) four’ (cf. Ex 20° || Dt δ᾽), Jer 36%, Am 18-28, Pr 8015. 18 21-9, Sir 26°; Arab. telat arba'e hawdgdt, ‘three, four merchants’ (Spitta, ὃ 1326) ; τρισμάκαρες Δαναοὶ καὶ τετράκις (Odyss. v. 306) ; ‘ ter et quater’ (Hor. Carm. I. xxxi. 13) ; “Ὁ terque qua- terque beati’ (Verg. Aen. i. 94) ; ‘four—five’ Is 17%, Arab. telat arba’ hamas takdt, ‘three, four, five pieces’ (Spitta, /.c.) ; ‘five-six’ 2 K 13", ef. ‘he sent five and six times’ in the Tel el-Amarna letters (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, Bd. v.), 21~™ [cf. 874]; ‘siz-seven’ Pr 6%, Job 5%; ‘seven-erght’ Mic 5°, Ec 112. In all these instances the addi- tion of a second number calls attention to the fact that the first number is not meant to be an exact sum, but one that in the opinion of the writer is approximately correct. ote especially the re- acement of δύο in Mt 18! by δύο ἢ τρεῖς in v.™ Hens such an arrangement of numbers was em- loyed in the so-called middah, a kind of riddle: Pr 615-19 30 105... Sir 2318 (δύο εἴδη. . . καὶ τὸ τρίτον, κιτ.λ.) 25 (ef. ve) ™ (ἐννέα. .. καὶ τὸ δέκατον, K.T.A.) 2658. 19 5025. This employment of a definite number as the approximate equivalent of an indefinite sum is found also in the following instances :— (8) Two’ replaces the indefinite expression ‘a few’ (Germ. ‘ein paar’=‘ einige’), Nu 93, Hos 6%, Dt 32%, 1 S 11} (cf. the Arab. ‘not two were of 8 different opinion’), 1 K 177, Mt 14” 18"; ef. the principle ‘the smallest number that can indicate plurality is two’ (A. Berliner, Beitrdge zur Heb. Gramm. aus Talmud u. Midrasch, p. 42: 027 pys Ὁ"); and it is not altogether without ground that Dathe says in Glassii Philologia Sacra, i. p. 1257, ‘duplum stat (Is 40” 617, Jer 16", Zec 913, Rev 18°) pro multo, vel eo quod plus satis est.’ (y) ‘Three’ is a still more frequent expression for a small total, ef. Gn 3038. 4010. 12 4217, Ex 23 318 58 851 10% 15% (cf. ‘the third,’ 19"), Lv 19%, Jos 1" Q16- 22,2 § 2418 1 K 125, 2 K 115 1318 (205), Is 161¢ 208, Jon 117, Est 416, Dn 15, 1 Ch 2113, Sir 25%, The origin of this use of ‘three’ is not far to seek. Observation of nature and history supplied not a few examples of objects and events made up of three main parts: e.g. root, trunk, and corona of a tree; head, trunk, and legs of a body; source, stream, and embouchure of a river; the right, the left, and the middle portion of an article; heaven, earth, and She’6l (Ex 904}} Dt 5°, Ps 139 etc.) ; morning, noon, and evening; the beginning, the middle, and the end of a process. (6) The number ‘seven’ is not infrequently employed in an exact sense, as in the case of the seven days of the week (Gn 2?, Ex 20%), or of a wedding-feast (Jg 14°17; To 11 ὁ yduos.. . ἑπτὰ ἡμέρας), for such a feast is called ‘the week’ (Gn 2977-29) or ‘the king’s week’ (Wetzstein, Zeitschr. f. Ethnologie, vy. 287 ff.), and a γάμος ἡμερῶν δέκα τεσσάρων (To 8”) is an exception. It is not to be doubted that the exact number ‘ seven’ is meant also in the following p: es: ‘seven priests’ Jos 6; ‘seven locks’ Jg 164 9; 1S 108119 13%, 2S 218, 1 K 18%, Ezk 3", Zec 3%, Pr 91 (cf. 2 Ch 21"); the ‘seven princes of Persia and Media’ Est 1" (con- firmed by Justi, Gesch. des alten Persiens, p. 61). But elsewhere ‘seven’ is merely a round expression for a moderately large number: Gn 416 74 3155 33 (or are we to suppose that Jacob counted exactly the number of times he bowed ?; cf. ‘seven and seven times fell I at the feet of my lord the king’ (Tel el-Amarna letters in KIB v. 38 3948 40° 428 ete. 179°]), Ex 7%, Lv 268 (so taken also by Dillmann-Ryssel, Εα- 1, 1897, ad loc.) 3" 35, Dt 287-, Jg 167, 1S 25,2 9418. 2K 4% (‘the child sneezed until seven times’) 81, Is 41 (‘seven women shall take hold of one man’) 11° 30%, Jer 15, Ezk 39% 12, Pg 128 7912 11916, Pr 6%" (cf. v.%>, Ex 2188 291-8) 2416 9616-2 Job 218 519, Ru 44, Dn 3), NUMBER 1Ch 21}, Sir 75 9011 [Eng. 33] 32" (, 3512) 3719 =v.18) 405, To 35 615 7% 1915 2 Mac 7}, 4 Mac 15, Ὁ 12 187 227 Mk 16%, Lk 174, Ac 19; ‘the seventh heaven’ in Ascension of Isaiah ix. 1; ‘seven visions’ 4 Ezr 3-14; ‘seven days God spoke with Moses in the thorn-bush’ (Seder ‘olam rabba, ch. 5). This characteristic of the number ‘seven’ is shared by its half (Dn 9570 127, Lk 455, Ja 5", Rev 11? ete.) and its double (Gn 465 [2], Lv 12°, Nu 291%, 1 Καὶ 8%, To 8:9, Mt 117), for, at least in this last passage, δεκατέσσαρες is not used in its exact sense. is employment of ‘ seven’ is pretty accurately interpreted in the words of Adrianos (Εἰσαγωγὴ els τὰς θείας γραφάς (cf. Kénig’s Linleitung, 1. 520), § 85): “τὸν ἑπτὰ ἀριθμὸν ἐπὶ πλεονασμοῦ λέγει (ἡ γραφή) εἴτ᾽ οὖν ἐπὶ τελείου ἀριθμοῦ. Moreover, the origin of this usage is not difficult to discover. The regular recurrence of the seven days of the week, which again was a reflexion of the phases of the moon (cf. Philo, Leg. Allegor. i. 4: τροπαὶ σελήνης ἑβδομάσι γίνονται), impressed ‘seven’ so deeply on the human mind that one fixed upon this number almost involuntarily when one desired to indicate a sum of moderate size. The use of ‘seven’ lay all the readier to hand the more clearly this number shone forth from the ‘seven’ stars of Arcturus (Job 9° 3833 ‘with his sons’), which frequently supplied the place of the compass to the shepherd and the traveller. Further, an acquaintance with the Pleiades (72.7 Am 5%, Job 9° 38) and the planets (cf. Schrader, KAT? 18 ff.) may have favoured the use of the number ‘seven.’ But there is no ground for the words of Augustine (de Civitate Dei, xi. 31), ‘totus impar primus numerus ternarius est, totus par quaternarius ; ex quibus duobus septenarius constat. Ideo pro universo sepe ponitur.’ (ε) The number ‘seventy’ also bears not in- uently an approximate sense. The following series of ges appear to the present writer to exhibit this characteristic of ‘seventy’ upon an ascending scale : Gn 467, Ex 15, Dt 1053; Ex 241-9, Nua 116, Ezk 8", Lk 101; Ex 157, Nu 33, Jg 17 8” 9% 4. 18. 24. δ6 1915 9S 2415 2 K 101]; Ps 90! (Solon, ap. Herod. i. 32, says: és ἑβδομήκοντα ἔτεα οὖρον τῆς ζόης ἀνθρώπῳ προτίθημι), Is 23%, Jer 25" 29", Zec 12 75, Dn 93: 4%; ἑβδομήκοντα (Jth 13), and in the same way we must explain the reading ‘170 thousand’ (7?) in opposition to ‘120 thousand’ (2°) ; ‘and he slew seventy relations’ (Zinjirli, Pan. 1. 3) ; ef. the seventy days of the Egyptian mourning (Gn 50°) or their aeemar erod. ii. 86, 88). The same round character belongs to the ex- pressions ‘seventy and sevenfold’ (Gn 433), and ‘seventy times seven’ (Mt 18”); cf. ‘seven thou- sand’ (1 Καὶ 1918, Ro 114, Rev 1113, Mésha’ inser. 1. 16). (ὃ ‘Twelve’ is used in an approximate sense, when exactly ‘twelve wells of water’ are men- tioned along with ‘seventy palm trees’ (Ex 15%), This employment of ‘twelve’ might be readily enough suggested by the number of the months (1 K 47, 1 Ch 27') and the twelve stations (mazzaléth or mazzaréth) of the zodiac, 2 K 23°, Job 38" (Arab. al-mand4zilu, ‘stationes lune’). Philo remarks on the ‘twelve wells of Elim’ (Ex 15%): τέλειος δ᾽ ἀριθμὸς ὁ δώδεκα, μάρτυς δὲ ὁ ζωδιακὸς ἐν οὐρανῷ κύκλος, τοσούτοις κατηστερισμένος φωσφόροις ἄστροις. Μάρτυς καὶ ἡ ἡλίου περίοδος" μησὶ γὰρ δώδεκα τὸν ἑαυτοῦ περα- τοῖ κύκλον, ἰσαρίθμους τε τοῖς ἐνιαυτοῦ μησὶ τὰς ἡμέρας καὶ τὰς νυκτὸς ὥρας ἄγουσιν ἄνθρωποι (de Profugis, ὃ 33). Compare the twelve discharges of water (Apoc. Bar chs. 53-68: ‘aque duodecime lucidw quas vidisti,’ etc.) ; the twelve socles on the tombstone of Cyrus at Persepolis (Justi, Altpers. Gesch. p. 46) ; the ‘duodecim tabule legum’; ‘twelve men’ (Tel el-Amarna letters, é.c. 81°) ; and the modern ‘dozen.’ (n) That ‘forty’ serves as a round number may be gathered from such facts as the following: NUMBER 563 Isaac and Esau marry at the age of forty (Gn 25 26%) ; peering to Ex 2" ‘Moses went out unto his brethren when he was grown,’ but according to Ac 7 ‘when he was full forty years old’; Caleb says (Jos 14”), “ Sorty years old was I when Moses sent me,’ etc., and Ish-bosheth was forty years old when he began to reign (2S 910), Again, we meet with 3 times forty years in Gn 6%, and in the life of Moses, Ex 77, Ac 7+, Dt 347; οἵ, ἔτεα és ἐείκοσι kal ἑκατὸν τοὺς πολλοὺς τῶν ᾿Ιχθυοφάγων ἀπικνέεσθαι (Herod. iii. 23). Further, reigns and other periods of forty years present themselves in Jg 34 5% 3! 3% 13', 1S 4'8, 2S 54, 1 K 2" 114 (| 1 Ch 2977, 2 Ch 9%) 24), and a reign of forty years is attributed also to Saul in Ac 137! and Jos. Ant. VI. xiv. 9. Then we have the ‘forty’ years of the wilderness wanderings, Ex 16%, Nu 14%". 3213, Dt 278? 294, Jos 5%, Am 219 5, Ps 95", Neh 92, But in other instances than these the number ‘fori ἐν ᾿1β used with not less surprising frequency, see Ex 9418 2619 34% (cf. Lv 12%), Nu 13”, Dt 9% 12-1835 1010 953, Jg 12% 18 1716 (in 2S 167 ‘forty’ as a familiar number has certainly been written in place of ‘four’; ef. the \O35| of the Pesh. and the τέσσαρες of Jos. Ant. vil. ix. 1), 1 Καὶ 5° 7® 198, 2K 8%, Ezk 45 29-13 413 462, Jon 3%, Neh 5", 1 Ch 12%; τεσσεράκοντα Mt 42, Ac 13 2318. 2), Jth 14, Bel (LXX)?2, Apoe. Bar 764, 2 Es 14%; syanx ‘forty years,’ Mésha' inscrip. 1. 8; ef. the ‘forty’ days of the Egyptian embalming (Gn 50; Diod. Sic [ed. Bekker], 1. 91: πλείους τῶν τριάκοντα) ; Herod. 1, 202 (ὁ ᾿Αράξης στόμασι ἐξερεύγεται τεσσεράκοντα), ii. 29 (ὁδοιπορίην ποιήσεται ἡμερῶν τεσσεράκοντα), iv. 73 (among the Scythians ἡμέρας τεσσεράκοντα οἱ ἰδιῶται περιάγονται, ἔπειτα θάπτονται. Many other in- stances from Greek and Roman writers have been collected by Hirzel (1.6. pp. 6ff., 57f.). Further, Brugsch (Steininschrift, ete. p. 313) remarks that ‘forty years’ means in the Persian language even at the present day nothing more than ‘ many years.’ ‘The well-known animal which we call centipede (Ger. Tausendfuss) bears amongst the Persians the name Tschihil-pdi, i.e. ‘‘ forty foot,” and the Turks call the same creature Kyrk ajakly, i.e. “ forty- footed ”’ (Hirzel, U.c. p. 41). Note, also, the ‘ fort thousand’ in Jos 4%, Jg 58, 2S 10%, 1 Καὶ 4%, 1 Ch 12%, 1 Mac 124), 2 Mac 5%, Jos. Ant. VII. xiii. 1. The way to understand this use of the number ‘forty’ is indicated in the OT itself. A whole eneration, with few exceptions, was doomed to ie in the wilderness (Nu 1453: 26%), and this sojourn in the wilderness of the Sinaitic Peninsula lasted for (about) ‘forty’ years (Nu 14% 20%". 3218 33%, Dt 27 ete.). Consequently forty years is the approximate expression for the duration of a generation (called in Heb. τ; Arab. ddrun, lit. meplodos). Besides, from the frequent notices that such and such a one married at the age of forty or entered upon an office at that age (Gn 25” ete.) and that a somewhat prolonged life consisted of three times forty years, we gather that the notion pre- vailed that the full ἘΕΞΘΉΞΟΝ of human life was reached about the fortieth year, the so-called ἀκμή. In any case, this thought is expressed in the words ‘till he reached his full strength (‘asuddahu) and attained the age of forty years’ (Koran, xlvi. 14)—words which explain the tradition that Mohammed received his call to be a prophet at the age of forty, as well as account for the very fre- quent employment of ‘forty’ by the Arabs as a round number (Hirzel, /.c. p. 39). The idea of the ἀκμή of human life is the source from which Hirzel (1.6. p. 62) derives the explanation of the remark- able prevalence of ‘forty.’ Perhaps, however, it ought to be added that Lepsius (Chronol. der Egypter, p. 15) assumes that the Heb. ‘arba'im ΡΥ have ound favour on account of its assonance with rabbim, ‘many.’ But the view of Pott NUMBER ὑδέ (Zahlmethode, p. 99), that ‘forty’ as the product of 20 x 2 abeeniet preference because of the earlier predominance of ‘twenty,’ cannot be established at least for Semitic peoples. Too slender a basis belongs also to the theory of J. Grimm (Rechts- alterthiimer, p. 219), that ‘forty’ arose from 3x 13+1 (see, more fully, Hirzel, /.c. p. 61), and as little are there clear grounds for the supposition that ‘four, as the number of the square, of the uarters of the globe, and of the four parts of the ay (ἢ, is the number of completeness’ (Bir, Symbolik des mos, Cultus, i. 155 f.). The approximate sense we have claimed for ‘forty’ ἘΣ recently been denied by J. Ο. A. Kessler (Chronol. iudicum et primorum regum, 1882, p. 12) in the words, ‘fides historica numeri 40 annorum non dubia est; nam spius huius spatii artes commemorantur (Dt 24, 2S 5°, 1 K 24,1 Ch ) et in eo singuli anni vel menses numerantur (Ex 19', Nu 10" 20', Dt 15). But these data would invalidate the approximate value of the number ‘forty’ only if the portions of time enumerated made up exactly a duration of forty years; cf. the τεσσεράκοντα ἔτεα of the reign of Battos of Cyrene, which, according to Herod. iv. 157-159, were made up of 2+6+32 years, and which are wrongly regarded by Hirzel (1.6. p. 50) as a fictitious number. Would the Hebrews and other peoples have used the number ‘forty’ so frequently if it had not been a roundsum? Julius Oppert, again (Salomon et ses successeurs, 1877, p. 11), fas adduced many historical parallels in defence of the exact- ness of the ‘480 years’ of 1 K 6. He considers that the Roman epublic lasted from 510-30 B.c., and the Parthian Empire from 256 B.c.-225 A.D. Now, let us grant that both these calculations are absolutely certain, although one may cast doubt both on the year B.C. 30 as the last year of the Republic of Rome and on the date assigned for the beginning of the Parthian Empire ; nevertheless, doubts are awakened when the statement is read in the Hebrew Scriptures that two events were separated by an exact space of 480 years, for, in view of the series of passages we have cited, it must be evident that ‘forty’ in Hebrew usage bore an approximate sense, and, besides, twelve eae are counted in 1 Ch 5% (Eng. 65:8] rom Moses to Solomon. (9) The number ‘five’ also has at times the character of a familiar (Gn 43%, Jg 183,1 S 17“ 218) and approximate number: Ly 22 268 1S 175, 2K 7%, Is 1918 (against Hitzig, ad loc.) 30%, Mt 14-2 (| Mk 6®-4, Lk 9%, Jn 6°), 1 Co 14%, 2 Es 1435, Could the number of the fingers fail to give rise to such a usage? (So, too, Hirzel, J.c. p. 2, derives this employment of ‘five’ from ‘the constant beholding of the fingers’). Cf. ‘five’ in the Tel el-Amarna letters (/.c.), 918 1012 165%- 269 8527, It may be noted that analogies to the ‘six’ fingers of 25 21” (11 Ch 205) and the ‘sedigiti’ of Pliny (Nat. Hist. xi, 43) have been collected, especially by Zéckler in Lange’s Bibelwerk (on 1 Ch 905). (:) To the same source must be traced the frequent use and the round sense of ‘ten,’ which one may note in Gn 31’, Lv 26%, Nu 14" (? Jg 6”), LS 15 (17%, 2S 18", 1 Καὶ 145, 2 K 55), Is 618, Am 58, Zec 853, Job 198, Ec 7 (Neh 518), Mt 251, Lk 158, Rev 2”, To 4”, Enoch 93; and the ‘ten tempta- tions of Abraham’ (Book of Jubilees, ch. xix.) set in SP a a light the ‘ten’ temptations of Nu 14” (J. H. Kurtz, Gesch. d. Alten Bundes, ii. 398, has rightly said, ‘the attempts to reckon exact] ten historical temptations cannot be carried throu without violence’). Cf. the ‘ten persecutions’ in Augustine, de Civitate Dei, xviii. 52. It is interest- ing to note that even in the book Jestrah the ‘ten’ spheres are deduced from the number of the fingers (ch. 1. § 3, ed. Rittangel, p. 195: rey 1500 mp0 (wy NUMBER ΓΟ ΣΝ}; ef. for ‘ten times’ the Tel el-Amarna letters, 17%: 82021 (obverse) 4+(reverse) #225 46, 569312. 18 ate, (x) It was no less natural to employ ‘fifty’ (5x 10) as a round number. Examples of its use in this way are found in Gn 6% 7 8° 18%, Ex 1831] etc. 26° ete., Lv 2315 9510 etc. 278, Nu 455. 163, Dt 22%, Jos 74, 18 6%, 2S 24%, 1 Καὶ 184, 2K 1°, Is 3% ete., Ezr 8° ete.; πεντήκοντα in Jth 15; 3won in Mésha‘ inscrip. 1. 28. a (A) Such approximate quantities were naturally also the numbers ‘hundred’ (e.g. in Lv 268, 1 S 245, Pr 17”, Ec 6° 813, 1 Ch 218, Mt 19” (TR), Mk 10”, Lk 88; ἑκατόν To 14" (cf. v.2), Jth 10:7; nxo Mésha’ inser. 1. 29) and ‘thousand’ (Ex 905 347, Dt 1" 79 32%, 1 S 187 2111 29°, 2S 1813, Is 8017 60%, Jer 3218, Am 5%, Mic 67, Ps 5010 8410 904 917 1058 11972, Job 9 33%, Ec 6° 7%, 1 Ch 12 1618), and 4>y has also, according to its etymology, the general sense of ‘union, association.’ The remark of Hirzel (i.c. p. 2) may, further, be noted: ‘the numbers “ ten,” “hundred,” ‘‘thousand,” each commence a series which in a certain sense is dominated by them.’ (Ὁ) At least the number ‘thousand’ has a rhetorical use of a second kind. Numbers of this kind are not infrequently due to the tendency to hyperbole, traces of which may be observed in the comparison of Abraham’s seed to ‘the dust of the earth,’ etc. (Gn 1315 ete.), as is admitted even By Flacius (Clavis script. sacre, ii. 152, 383 1f.). To the same department of rhetoric belong many larger numbers, 6., ‘seven thousand’ (1K 19' etc.), ‘ten thousand’ (Ly 268, Dt 32%, 1S 187 21% 295, Ezk 16’, Hos 8, Mic 6’, Ps 3° 687 917, Ca δ᾽, μυριότης Wis 12”), ‘seventy thousand’ (2 2415), ‘thousand thousand’ (Dn 7,9, 1 Ch 215 9919, 2 Ch 14°), ‘thousand myriads’ (Gn 24°), “myriads of thousands’ (Nu 10%), ‘a myriad of myriads’ (Da 7), and ‘myriads of myriads’ (Enoch xxxix.). Cf. πῶς οὐ δεκάκις, μᾶλλον δὲ μυριάκις δίκαιός ἐστ᾽ ἀπο» λωλέναι (quoted from Demosthenes by R. Volk- mann, Bhetorik der Griechen u. Romer, 1874, . 374). Other analogies are presented by the atin phrases ‘sexcenti, sexcenties,’ etc., collected especié ἣν by Hunziker, Die Figur der Hyperbel in den Gedichten Vergils (1896), p. 37 ff. A measure of truth lies also in the remark of Hirzel (/.c. p. 3), that the general numbers give requisite scope to the human imagination. 3. NUMBERS AND THEOLOGY. —A special rela- tion of biblical numbers to theology has yet to be considered, in connexion with the question whether many numbers do not possess either a certain sacredness or a symbolical meaning. (a) The reverence for, or sacredness attached to, certain numbers. — The latter quality has its natural sources and degrees. For instance, the connexion of a number with an important element either in the national fortunes or in the religious conceptions, might procure for that number a lower or a higher respect. Traces of this so-called sacredness of numbers are not wholly wanting in the Bible. Let us follow these traces, in order that we may use the possible sources and degrees of this phenomenon as normative. (a) An extremely important feature in the national recollections of Israel was the number of the tribes, which may have originated substantially as is indicated in the Book of Genesis, in spite of the opinion to the contrary held by many recent commentators (ef. art. by the present writer on ‘Israel’s Historical Recollections’ in Expos. Times, 1898, p. 349). Hence we might explain a certain loftiness of character attaching to ‘twelve’ as well as the frequent use of this number. The instances we have in view are not those where ‘twelve’ manifestly stands in direct or indirect relation to the tribes of Israel, as in Ex 24428"! (‘ twelve stones in the breastplate of the high priest’), Lv 245, NUMBER Nu 7°-, Jos 4%, 1 K 1851, Ezk 4851, Ezr 617 8%, Mt 19%, cf. the 24 classes of the priests (1 Ch 244) and Levites (25%) and the 24 elders (Rev 4‘); the 48 Levitical cities (Nu 357); the 72 men (Nu 115" 35); the 144,000 sealed ones (Rev 72); the twelve baskets (Mt 14”); the twelve legions of angels (26™); the twelve gates of the heavenly Jerusalem (Rev ΣῊ ther have we in view especially the twelve generations that are enumerated from Aaron to Ahimaaz in 1 Ch 5°“ and 6% [Eng. 68 and ©-°8), Another important element in the national consciousness of the Israelites was the recollection of the [about] forty years of the wilderness wanderings, as is proved by the frequent allusions to these (see the passages cited above in 2, a, n); and this recollection was of a very serious and mournful character. Hence it is intelligible that the round number 40 should be chosen just in those passages where the duration of a serious situation was to be indicated, as, for example, in the 40 days of punishment, of fasting, and of repentance, Gn 7 12-17 86 Ex 2418 3425, Dt 9% 1.18 10”, 1S 17", 1 K 19, Jon 34, Mt 43. (8) A fundamental element in the religious ex- perience of Israel was the receiving of the ‘ten’ commandments (Ex 2077 || Dt 5% ), which three times are expressly called ‘the ten words’ (Ex 34%, Dt 4 10); cf. also the ten candlesticks in the sanctuary (1 Καὶ 75). It would be no wonder, then, if the sanctity of those fundamental command- ments over to their nwmber, a process which may have been favoured by the circumstance of the ten times repeated ‘and God said,’ by which the world was made (Gn 1°), unless, indeed, the ten repetitions of this formula were themselves due to the significance of the number ‘ten.’ The present writer feels disposed to adopt this last suggestion, because the combination of those ten sox) with the seven ‘and God saw that (it was) good’ (Gn 1+ 10-12-18. 21.25.81), and with the three “and God blessed’ (17+ 2°), appears too striking to allow the concurrence of those three numbers, ‘ten,’ ‘seven,’ and ‘three,’ to be set down as for- tuitous. Thesame conclusion is specially favoured by the fact that the formula of approval, καὶ ἴδεν ὁ θεὸς ὅτι καλόν, is repeated in the X eight times, the additional instance being 1%. It is more likely that the number was reduced to seven from an original eight than, conversely, that seven occurrences of the formula were expanded to eight. (y)_ If we are right in the above supposition, the sition is all the more established that ‘seven’ ad, in the estimation of the Hebrews, a certain measure of sanctity attached to it. This position is, however, very probable upon other grounds as well. For instance, next to the ark with the ten com- mandments, which of the fittings of the sanctuary was counted more sacred than the seven-branched candlestick (Ex 25%, 1 K 7, Zec 4%)? Was it not this which symbolized the illumination bestowed by the Spirit of God (cf. Is 11%)? And how the reverence for the number ‘seven’ must have been augmented by the circumstance that this number, derived from the revolution of the moon, etc. (see above, 2, a, 5), was connected with the Sabbath and many of the festal seasons! Finally, what a powerful contribution to the sacredness of ‘seven’ was supplied by the act of swearing, which, through the ceremonies practised (Gn 21%) and the name (nishba') applied to it, connected itself with the number ‘seven’ (sheba'), a number which could be read off from the stars! Even if this con- nexion of ‘seven’ with holy utensils, seasons, and transactions was itself a secondary one, yet, once it was established, it must have tended greatly to promote the frequent use of the number ‘seven,’ and it is perhaps to the sacredness of ‘seven’ that we must attribute its selection in the following NUMBER 565 instances : the fitting up of the place of worshi (1 K 17, Ezk 405: 418, cf. Pr 9'); the detailing o acts of ritual (‘the priest shall sprinkle of the blood seven times,’ etc., Ly 4°17 811} 147@ 164 Nu 19%, 2K 5"), or the specification of the objects required in the cultus (‘seven’ lambs, ete. Nu 28", Ezk 45%, 2 Ch 291); cf. the seven sons of Saul who were ‘hanged before the Lorn’ (2 S 219); and the seven locks of the Nazirite Samson (Jg 1018.19) appear to the present writer to have a necessary connexion with the act of swearing. Besides, this connexion of ‘seven’ with re- ligious conceptions was common to the Israelites and those peoples in whose neighbourhood they lived at different times. Note, in the Bab.- Assyrian poem ‘ Die Héllenfahrt der I8tar’ (ed. A. Jeremias, 1887), the seven gates through which Ishtar descended to the ‘land without return’ (Ob- verse 1]. 63, Reverse ll. 14, 45). Further, note the seven altars which Balaam, who was sent for from Mesopotamia (Pitru on the Euphrates), caused to be erected in Moab (Nu 23!+14 2); the seven sacrificial victims directed to be offered by the three friends of Job ‘in the land of Uz’ (Job 495); and the circumstance that ‘with the Egyptians also ‘“‘seven” was a holy number’ (Ebers, ΣΡ ΡΣ und die Bicher Mose’s, p. 339). The combination of this number with the cultus was, therefore, probably an inheritance which the Hebrews brought with them when they migrated from their home in the East. Now, we observe that this combinin of ‘seven’ with religious conceptions shows itse in an augmented measure in the post-exilic period. For instance, ‘ox and fatling’ of 2 S 6” is replaced in the parallel passage, 1 Ch 1535, by ‘ seven bullocks and seven rams,’ and ‘the seven holy angels’ are mentioned in To 12. This may, of course, be the roduct of a process of development within Judaism itself. It is the Esoteric-Priestly source (P) of the Pentateuch that has first to tell us that 70 descendants of Jacob went down to Egypt (Gn 46”; cf. on the 70 or 72 names in Gn 10 Kénig's Einleitung, p. 231), and the Chronicler means to enumerate 70 descendants of Noah (1 Ch 15:3) and of Abraham (νν. 3.9) ; ef. the 70 disciples (Lk 10"), the seven spirits of God (Rev 15 etc.), the ‘seven prophetesses’ (Seder ‘olam rabba, ch. 21). But if a ees source is to be sought for the growing disposition to connect ‘seven’ with religious notions, the influence of Babylonia suggests itself most readily, for we read ‘the names of the angels came in their hand from Babylon’ (Jerus. Rosh hashshanah, i. 4: 5330 703 ὧν ον οπ mow). Hence, if the notion of ‘seven’ angels is to be attributed to foreign influence at all, the present writer prefers to trace this influence to Babylonia rather than to Persia, whose claims Riehm (HW 3! p. 17794) sought to establish. Riehm’s view is all the less certain because elsewhere only ‘four’ supreme ene are mentioned (Enoch ix. ¥o, Apoe. Bar 62), and in considering the Persian origin of the ‘seven eyes’ of Zec 3° 4 one must not leave out of account the language of Is 457 (‘I form the light and create darkness,’ ete.) and of Zec 8°. (δ) Finally, the thrice repeated ‘and God blessed’ (Gn 133. 33 2%) raises the question how far the num- ber ‘ three’ comes into connexion with the religious contents of the Bible. The answer can only be that there are very few traces of ‘three’ in the cultus and the religious conceptions of the Israelites. All that the OT offers on this point is the following : The sanctuary of Jahweh is composed of three main divisions, the Court, the Holy Place, and the Holy of Holies (Ex 26" 27°, 1 K 6 ete.). In the bless- ing formula of Nu 6- the name Jahweh is thrice repeated, and three pairs of actions are predicated of Him. The threefdld mention of the Divine name occurs also in Jos 22", Jer 7‘, and Nah 15, Further, 566 NUMBER Jahweh Zebaoth is thrice called holy in Is 6. This threefold use of a word is a species of Epizeuxis which is found in other instances as well (Gn Q™>. Bd. τὺ, Jer 22% Ezk 21™), and is a circumlocu- tion for the superlative. (So also in Egyptian, according to Brugsch, Steininschrift, etc. p. 310, the use of ‘good, good, good’ serves as a substitute for the superlative, ‘the best’). This relative rarity of a connexion between ‘ three’ and religious notions, which prevails in the OT, should not be made good from other sources. The thunder call, ‘Hear, O Israel, Jahweh is our God, Jahweh (the ἢ one’ (Dt 64, ef. Is 414 44° 4813), drowns the voice of those who refer us to the triads of gods that were adored by the Babylonians, Assyrians (Anu, Bel, and Ea, etc. [Tiele, Bab.-Assyr. Gesch. pp. 517, 523]}), and other nations of antiquity. It was only in the course of the later development of Israel’s religion that the Old Test. ‘I am that I am’ (Ex 3") was parted into ὁ ὧν καὶ ὁ ἣν καὶ ὁ ἐρχόμενος (Rev 14 45); ef. the evolution of the eng en7Q οὐ of Is 6° which meets us in the mysterious sentence ἬΡΟΥ ἼΣΟΙ 702 ΡΟ Ader ow enn (Jesirah, ch. i. § 1). But the original meaning of the OT text must not be modified to suit either heathen parallels or later stages in its own development. The question has still to be put why in one series = passages it is ‘three’ and in another ‘seven’ or some other of the round (holy) numbers that is chosen. The proper answer appears to be that seve+ was preferred to three (e.g. 2 K 131, Sir 25%, Rev 9" the ‘three woes’) when it was desired t> indicate a larger quantity. This seems to be the principle at work, 6.0.» in the first seven of the seventy ‘weeks’ (Dn 9%), or the ‘seven churches of Asia Minor’ (Rev 1‘), or the ‘ seven golden vials, full of the wrath of God’ (15’). (δ) The question of the symbolical character of many numbers.—The biblical numbers would be of immense importance for the material side of exegesis if it could be established that many of those numbers are used to indicate certain ideas. Now, to cast a glance first of all over the history of this question, the Old Testament itself has no positive note as to a secret meaning of the numbers it employs. Such an indication cannot be discovered in the statement that the Tabernacle was constructed after a heavenly pattern (Ex 25°). Nothing more than an inguiry into the meaning of numbers is ascribed to Daniel (9°; cf. ‘the prophets have inguired,’ ete., 1 P 2%). Josephus, too, was content to write in the Προοίμιον to his ᾿Αρχαιολογία (§ 4) that Moses says some things in an enigmatic way (αἰνίττεσθαι). Yet he did not interpret the nun:bers of Gn 1 in Ant. I. i. The same is the case in Midrash Bereshith rabba, and a simple counting of the number of occurrences of ὍΝ in Gn 1” without an explanation of the significance of the number is all that we find in Mishna Aboth ν. 1. But, among the Hellenistic Jews, Aristobulus had already, according to Eusebius (Prep. Evang. xiii. 12, 13 ff.), inter- preted the number ‘seven,’ and Philo followed zealously in his footprints in his work Περὶ τῆς Μωυσέως κοσμοποιίας. Further, the interpretation of numbers was cultivated in the Haggadic portions of the Talmud and other Jewish writings (cf. e.g. Schegg, Bibl. Archéol. 1888, p. 419), and in Jesirah and Zohar. Such a reference of biblical numbers to the sphere of ideas might have its basis in the ape or in the secondary origin of many num bers, ut— (a) The view that certain numbers, on account of their factors or coefficients, came to be used to express ideas, is not a plausible one. Yet Philo (de Plantatione, ὃ 29) says, ἑβδομὰς ἐκ τριῶν καὶ τεττάρων, while he derived ἐννέα from ‘eight’ and ‘one,’ finding the ‘eight’ ἐν οὐρανῷ and the ‘one’ NUMBER ἐν ὕδατι καὶ ἀέρι, τούτων γὰρ ula συγγένεια, τροπὰς καὶ μεταβολὰς παντοίας δεχομένων (de Congressu, § 19) ; cf. ἕν καὶ δύο καὶ τρία καὶ τέτταρα δέκα γεννᾷ (de Plant. 8 29). Let the reader recall the sentences from Augus- tine and Bihr quoted above (2, a, δ, 7). But Philo (de Profugis, § 33) did not attempt to derive a symbolical sense of ‘twelve’ from the possible components of this number, and it is incompre- hensible how a reference to the factors of twelve could be found in the distribution of the precious stones on the breastplate of the high priest (Ex 2848. 39)-) or in the arrangement of the twelve tribes of Israel, etc. (Nu 2°", 1 K 7%, Ezk 4881-84, Rey 21%), In any case, an analysis of numbers has nothing to do with their original sense, and such analyses reveal nothing regarding their con- nexion with the ideas entertained by God and embodied in the universe. Hence it is not clear that certain numbers owe their connexion with the sphere of ideas to the factors of which they are composed. But it may be said more readily that the number 80 which occurs in Jg 3” and in Jos. Ant. VII. vii. 8 (Σολομών.. τλεύσας ὀγδοήκοντα ἔτη) was chosen on account of its coefficient ‘ 40.’ In the same way we may explain the number ‘35’ (5 x 7) which in the traditions about the life of Pythagoras alternates with ‘ 40’ (Hirzel, l.c. p. 47). (8) Still less is it to be supposed that such a simple number as ‘three’ was constructed upon the basis of an idea, for ‘three’ and ‘seven’ are both members of the continuous series of numbers which arose by the constant addition of ‘one.’ But Philo (de Mundi Opificio, § 3, 17£., 31, Leg. Allegor. i. 4, ii. 1: τέτακται ὁ θεὸς κατὰ τὸ ὃν καὶ τὴν μονάδα) describes the numbers 1-7 in such a way as to give rise to the thought that the relevant ideas were disclosed to man cones the numbers, and that the numbers are the archetypes, the first and purest representations of the Divine ideas, nay, the moving principles of the universe, as Aristo- bulus said, δι᾿ ἑβδομάδων πᾶς ὁ κόσμος κυκλεῖται (Euseb. Prep. Evang. Xi. xii. 16). On this path the friends of Haggada and Kabbala advanced further. ‘The Kabbala attaches itself to the symbolical seven years of Gn 41.’ Many Kabbalists found a connexion between the Heb. word saphar ‘ count’ (Gn 41>) and the term gephira. ‘Seven’ of the Sephiroth were, in their view, analogous to the seven years of plenty, so that Ensoph (ηὉ px), ‘the unending,’ ceased to produce more Sephiroth. But there were also ten m5, corresponding to the ten words by which God created the world (Gn 15), and ‘these ten words are ten principles or attributes of God’ (Kolb, Die Offenbarung, etc., 13, 16ff.). The right conclusion to draw appears to be, that while it cannot be said with certainty that the number ‘ten’ in Gn 1 is accidental, it may be denied with certainty that this number is meant to express ideas. (c) There is yet another trace from which one can clearly see the value attached to numbers during the later stages of Biblical Theolo We refer to the so-called Gematria (x7~0"3, a Hebraized form of γεωμετρία used in the sense of ἀριθμητική), i.e. the art of indicating, by means of numbers, words whose letters by their numerical value (see above, 1, ὦ, ὃ ex.) give the sum named in any passage. (a) This can be best explained by examples ; and we may begin with an instance which in all proba- bility occurs in the OT itself, namely Gn 14%, where the number 318 is the equivalent of nyydx, if the numerical values of the different letters of this name are added together: 1+ 30+ 10+70+7 +200=318. It would be a strange coincidence if the number of Abraham’s ‘trained servants’ stood in such a relation to ‘ Eliezer,’ the only name known to us of a trained servant of Abraham. Hence NUMBER Rashi (ad loc.) said long ago, 125 wbx nox M37 tow Se xem. [Ὁ KM AA, te. ‘Our fathers said, Eliezer it was, alone, and this (318) is the Gematrical number of his name.’ Again, the author of the so-called Epistle of Ba as (ix. 8) saw in the 318 of Gn 14" an allusion to τ τ ιη, i.e. the crucified Jesus ; cf. Clem. Alex., Strom. vi. 11, § 84: φασὶν τοῦτον τὸν ἀριθμὸν εἶναι τοῦ μὲν κυριακοῦ σημείου τύπον. This way of explaining a word was already recognized in the 29th of the 32 her- meneutical rules of R. Eliezer ben Jose (see Konig, Einleitung, p. 516). Further, on ’Athbash, etc., ctf. especially A. Berliner, Beitrage zur Heb. Gram. aus Talmud und Midrasch, pp. 12-14. (8) A slight variation from this method consists in the employment, not of a number but of a word in order to indicate another word whose letters have the same numerical value. This method is several times attributed to the OT writers by later exegetes. For instance, the numerical value of the letters of abe xa’ (Gn 49%) is 358, and the same numerical value belongs to the letters of mvp ‘Messiah’ (Buxtorf, Lex. Heb. s.v. ποῦ). What follows from this? That the whole passage was devised in order to furnish a test of Gematrical skill? No; but it is possible that the above- named equivalence was the source of the usual spelling o the word ‘ Shiloh’ in the OT (contrast ποῦ of the Samaritan Pentateuch). Further, the surprising circumstance that Moses married an Ethiopian woman (Nu 12!) engaged the ingenuity of exegetes till they discovered that the numerical value of n> (‘ Ethiopian’ f.) is the same as that of mx nD ‘a fair woman to look upon’ (Gn 124 ete.), namely 736, and hence nx (‘ Ethiopian *) was replaced by Onkelos by x772¥ (‘the beautiful’). Then, δέδια, που (Zec 3°), in respect of the numerical value οἱ its letters, is = 0537 ‘comforter’ (La 115, Sanhedrin 98b). Other examples will be found in Weber, System der altsynagog. Theol. p. 118 [Jiid. Theol. ee Grund des Talmud, ete. p. 121 f.], and Dépke, Hermeneutik der neutest. Schriftsteller, pp. 135, 179f. (y) But the NT also shows a clear trace of this use of the numerical value of letters. We refer to the number of the Beast in Rey 13", where we read τὸν ἀριθμὸν τοῦ θηρίου ἀριθμὸς γὰρ ἀνθρώπου ἐστίν καὶ ὁ ἀριθμὸς αὐτοῦ χξε΄, i.e. 666. Long ago Irenzeus (adv. Her. y. 30) mentions the expla- nation of this number as=AATEINO®, a word the numerical value of whose letters is 30 + 1+ 300+5 +10+50+70+200=666. But the view is to be preferred that the latter number isa veiled designa- tion of NERQN KAIZAR, the numerical value of the letters of top pu _being = 50 + 200+ 6+ 50+ 100+ 60 + 200 = 666. For fuller details regarding this and other interpretations see art. REVELATION. (δ) It is only an indirect analogy to this mysterious use of numbers that is presented to us in Lgyptian texts. According to Brugsch (Steininschrift, etc. Ρ. 314f.), upon the wall of a aes a at Edfu, a notification that the length of the holy place (the middle space in the pangs) is 113 yards, is given in the words, ‘Why? Because a child has gone through the midst of the sanctuary.’ That is to say, the three words we have italicized contain the same letters as are required for writing the number 113. Again, a length of 90 yards in this temple of the sun-god is indicated by the words, ‘ because he, like a sun, beaming shines.’ Lrrerature.—The art. ‘Zahlen’ in Riehm's HWB and in Herzog’s PRE?; Bredow, Untersuchungen zur alten Geach. 1. 108 ff. ; Lepsius, Chronol. der Aigypter, p. 15; Hirzel, ‘ Veber Rundzahlen' in Bericht. d. sdchs. Gesellech, ἃ. Wiss. 1885 (treats, pp. 6-62 the number ‘forty’; p. 68f. ‘four’; p. 6417. ‘thirty thousand’; but gives as biblical illustrations only ‘forty’ and ‘a hundred and twenty’); Brugsch, Steininschry/t und Bibel- wort? (1891), p. 805 ff. ; an Kolb, Die ard betrachtet vom Standpunkt der Weltanachauung und des Gottesbegriffes der NUMBERS Kabbala (Leipzig, 1889), p. 12ff.; 8. Rubin, Heident. Eabbala (Wien, 1893), » Be db: sata On ‘the number of the Beast’ see Bousset (Diz Offenbarung Johannis, 1896) on Rev 1318, and the Literature cited ad loa, and in the Eindeitung to his Commentary. Ep. KONIG.