Linear Bible Code

I have since 2004 parsed and translated the Minor Prophets. I have offically printed Hosea and Zechariah from this Twelve. Daniel of course in not a part of the 12.
I quote the opening section to Micah for your edification since I cannot think when it will be available in total to the public. I wish I could put the Hebrew text with the English but I cannot on this blog entry. Here I go:

Micah Back Text chapter 1:1-6
The measure of the Adversary is the Sea and Lamentations.
And he came to abhor he who was prepared.
He hastened; he came to trample on the bosom of My Stallion
to bring to an end strength and to bestow Death.
But let Me extend the rampart of My Heap.
‘The Mark’ is to fast; weeping is toward his foundation and the
wail of the jackal and URSA MAJOR its weeping.
The Changeling shall feel shame; he shall cry.
The arrow trod thy bird cages. And here he lapped up knowledge;
he removed the Leading Man and the Tel-City of Grace.
Thou shalt fear he who swallowed up the Low Estate.
The Adversary swelled up and utterly tossed about My firmness.
And the Lowly One is against the Terrible One like a blemish and
his flames. And he rinsed clean his mouth.
And Lamentation is out there and the wail of the people of
superiority.
He rained upon them and he brightened the contracted moisture
of the region of the pure but lowly Tablet.
The Healer smote Ruin but the power is Mine.
The eagle sealed up Lamentation; it leaped for joy.
My Witness became Mediator; and who is the Gift of Man?
The abundance of your spring of water.
And repent thou today.

[The Messiah/Jesus Christ fits nicely into this section and is the Mediator who bears the Gift of Man. The Adversary is Satan who tempted Jesus in the Wilderness and Lamentation is a synonym for him. The reference to ‘Tablet’ is the Law given to Moses. In the book of Hoshea/Hosea back text we learn that it was stripped of its purity by humankind and replaced with false teachings and what was left untouched is filled with error. Here then are few hints as you read this opening section of Micah BT.]

The following Review by Professor Ricks appeared in THE FARMS REVIEW pubished 2007, volume 19 No.1
by “The Neal A. Maxwell Institute for Religious Scholarship” at Brigham Young University, pp.343-345.

In the midnineties, Michael Drosnin’s illuminating book “The Bible Code” appeared. It created an instant
international sensation. In the book, Drosnin- inspired by the researchers of Israeli mathematicians
Eliyahu Rips, Doron Witzum, and Yoav Rosenberg- argued that there is a ‘code’ emabedded in the
text of the Hebrew Bible. This ‘code’ is discovered by searching for equidistant letter sequences (ELS).
Thus, for example, we may begin with a letter (’L’) and read every nith letter (’N’) thereafter in the
book, not counting spaces. If an entire book such as Genesis is searched, the result is a long string
of consonants (the languages of the Old Testament, Hebrew and Aramaic) are represented in the
original biblical text only with consonants, without any vowels). Further, by employing different values
for L and N, one can generate many strings of consonants.

The proximate inspiration for the writing of Gustav Mahler’s ‘The Sealed Book of Daniel Opened
and Translated’ was Drosnin’s 1999 publication of a second volume, “The Bible Code II: Countdown”,
in which he states, ‘read the letters in reverse’. Gustav Mahler- a native of New York, a graduate
of Ricks College (now BYU-Idaho) and BYU, and currently a member of the staff of Utah Valley
State College in Orem, Utah- was first introduced to the Hebrew language under the able tutelage
of the venerable instructors Ellis Rasmussen and Gabriel Tabor.

Mahler created a ‘back text’ of the book of Daniel by stringing the letters of the book-
which is written in both Hebrew and Aramaic- in order, eliminating the spaces between words,
reversing the order, and translating the text of the book in reverse. The result was this
publication, one of a serices of several prospective translations and commentaries on ‘back texts’
of the Hebrew Bible. In his introduction to the book of Daniel, Mahler- who, though claims no direct
religious affiliation, describes himself as “a convert to the Jewish faith”- describes the pattern
that will follow in his translation of the ‘back text’ of Daniel.

As an example, Mahler renders the first verse of Daniel 1 in English as “In the third yeaer of the
reign of Jehoikim king of Judah” (p.20). The ‘back text’, translated into English, reads, “Give you
a joyful shout O Palaces on account they (the oppressed) obeyed. A lamentation of the
Mark-of-All-of-Them is for the dividing into three the jackal. Repent thou!” (p.21). The final
verse of Daniel (12:13), rendered in the ‘forward text’ as “And thou, go thou to the end and rest
thou and stand at thy allotted portion at the end of days” (p.21), is translated in the ‘back text’
as “Wailing is from YAH! Distress is for thee to tread the blood of His Time. The Mark loathes
distress for thee at his chamber” (p.22). The entire book follows this same format. But is
the meaning of the ‘back text’ more compelling than that of the ‘forward text”? Some may be
persuaded that the meaning of the ‘back text’ is more compelling, but I am not convinced.

I have a further question: since much of the book of Daniel (2:4-7:28) is written in Aramaic,
why does Mahler translate the ‘back text’ as though it were Hebrew and not Aramaic? Given
the relatively free syntax of Imperial Aramaic (and the relatively restrictive syntax of Biblical
Hebrew), could it not more easily and justifiably be translated in Aramaic?

“The Sealed Book of Daniel Opened and Translated” is a tetament to the industry and
linguistic skill of the author. Mahler demonstrates great skill and real finesse in his translation
of the ‘back text’ of Daniel. But sometimes Mahler’s renderings of the ‘back text’ press the
boundaries of clear sense. I must frankly confess that I lack Mahler’s neo-Kabbalist
enthusiasm: given the choice between reading the ‘forward text’ of Daniel in Hebrew and
Aramaic (which I regularly do with my biblical Aramaic students) and the ‘back text’, I
prefer the ‘forward text’.