About the KJV
There are 66 books
There are 1,189 chapters
There are 31,102 verses
The shortest verse is John 11:35
The shortest chapter is Psalm 117
The longest chapter is Psalm 119
There is a mathematical demonstration for the infallibility of the 1611 King James Bible
Why bother? Who cares? What difference could it possibly make? Answer: If God exists, if He is holy and omnipotent (as the human heart craves Him to be), if He is just, if He truly loves His creatures, then He should give those creatures an absolutely reliable revelation of Himself. Not only ‘should’; He must. Shall not the judge of all the earth do right? Genesis 18:25
If it seems presumptuous to examine the King James Bible by the numbers, remember that the Lord Jesus Christ invited Thomas (who had reasonable doubts) to “Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrust it into my side; and be not faithless, but believing.” on John 20:27. The Book and the Man Christ Jesus are both called The Word of God. His physical body is not available to those who want to believe; but the written body is present in ‘hard copy’. “For we walk by faith, not by sight: . . ” (2 Corinthians 5:7) is the only one of 138 mentions of ‘faith’ in the church letters that can even faintly be construed to mean we are expected to show unreasoning emotional behavior. Hebrews 11:1 brazenly states that “faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” We can reasonably expect ‘evidence’ to be tangible, not an emotional figment.
The “teachings of Jesus”. What about that? “But I say unto you, that every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment.” Matthew 12:36 ”He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day.” John 12:48 These two statements from the mouth of the Lord Jesus Christ indicate that our words will be compared to the words of God. Therefore, in justice, the words of GHod must be available in reliable written form. “Come now and let us reason together, saith the Lord:” Isaiah 1:18, is not a suggestion to turn off your brain and believe whatever someone else tells you. The God Who created geniuses and mathematicians knows their minds. The God Who created everything is greater than everything (the cause is greater than the effect), by definition. If the physical creation reveals something of Him (and it does: Romans 1:20), then the perfect order of that creation requires a perfect, articulate revelation.
Once we accept the premise that God wants us to believe what He said, and that He has provided ‘what He said’ in hard copy, the the next step is finding and demonstrating THE hard copy of ‘what He said’. There can only be one perfect revelation in any given language. Think about it: once the perfect revelation is given, any change makes it imperfect.
Remembering that God plans to judge us by His words, in justice He must have given us some way to be positive that we have His words. The proof system must be available to anyone, anywhere, any time, because God is “not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance.” 2 Peter 3:9 The historical effect/power of the KJV, or any other book, are not available in reliable form. Books and newspapers consistently distort facts, therefore our information sources are not reliable. The proof system must be in the book itself, in the hard copy. Traditional exhortations to “trust your instincts”, ”in your heart, you know it’s true”, etc., are fatuous. Your heart/emotions can be overwhelmed by physical pain, by personal tragedy, by riots in your neighborhood, by uncounted circumstances. The proof system must be tangible, independent, not subject to human frailties. Even the traditional exhortation to ‘trust the Holy Spirit to reveal Christ to you’ is suspect: how can you try the spirits until you have a reliable measurement by which to try them? The tangible, independent proof system should be in the Bible.
The King James Bible is numbered. Every chapter and verse has a number on it. This makes it supremely easy to find any given sentence, provided you know the reference you want. This numbering system has been in place for nearly 400 years. Is it possible that this numbering system could provide a mathematical proof for the infallibility of this Book? Mathematical proofs are “elegant”. They are objective and provable; they are not open ended. There are plenty of mystics, Cabalists, numerologists, who have looked at the numbers in the KJV. But according to a logician named Kurt Godel, we need an external proof because the KJV is a “closed system”. It has only 66 books, 1,189 chapters and 31,102 verses. Is there an absolute reference point we can use to prove or disprove the infallibility of this closed system?
Yes. Digress a minute with me. Back in the 1940s, I read a short science fiction story. The thesis was: if we find extra-terrestrial life, how can we communicate with them? And the author proposed this solution: the table of elements. Any life form capable of achieving space travel must be able to understand and manipulate the elements of the physical world. They must be able to examine the atomic structure, and will therefore have developed a table of elements similar to ours, showing atomic numbers and weights. This is an easy-to-display visual basis for information exchange. Communication.
The fiction writer had an ingenious solution and a valid premise. The elements are basic. The atomic weights and numbers are now as they were in 1611, when the KJV was produced. They are now as they were thousands and thousands of years before the KJV was produced. If the numbers and characteristics of the elements of creation match the numbers and concepts of the KJV, then we can demonstrate a positive, mathematical proof.
“For the invisible things of Him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even His eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:” Romans 1:20 now sounds like an augmented statement of Hebrews 11:1. The visible is evidence of the invisible. At this point, all we are looking for is a mathematical proof for the absolute reliability of the King James Bible. However, the abstract concept here would be exhilarating to examine. “In the beginning was the Word, . . All things were made by Him. . .” John 1:1-3 Who now “(upholds) all things by the word of His power, . . ” Hebrews 1:3 presents the concept that the words are the cause of the elements. However, we will use the elements’ atomic numbers to prove the words. For now.
Four items must match.
1. The Bible number, as used at Book/Chapter/Verse
2. The concept or information encoded at that number
3. The element having that same number
4. The characteristics of that-numbered element
What constitutes a ‘match’? A. The words must give the necessary information. No spiritualizing. B. Exclusivity: i.e. characteristics true of nitrogen are not true of rubidium.
What are we looking for? What if we get a ‘match’ at 5 or 6 of the elements? What does it mean? Answer: By the numbers, the probabilities of each ‘match’ are only 1 out of 2. There are only two possibilities: the element will match the Bible, or the element will not match the Bible. Using the Law of Probabilities, each verified match yields one out of two possibilities. If we find 20 match-ups, then the result is two to the 20th power. A very large number, a positive proof, using Goedel’s theorem, and simply not possibly a co-incidence. Beginning back in the 1980s, I have conducted an ongoing study toward answering my own question: Is the numbering system of the King James Bible an information encoding system? In spite of having very little training in chemistry, I found 23 positive matches. At about the time I charted those 23, my personal life imploded. During the course of multiple relocations, I lost notes, notebooks, and things I really wanted to keep that applied to this Bible study. But I have perfect confidence in this: I found positive proof, mathematical proof, at two to the 23rd power, that the King James Bible is an infallible Book.
