An intricate mathematical code, far beyond the ability of human intelligence, has been discovered imbedded in the fabric of the scripture. Like an ancient time capsule, it remained hidden until our knowledge grew sophisticated enough to decode its intricacies. This code was deciphered by computers.

The discovery of mathematically coded scripture assures us that the verses, words, letters and all parameters of the original scripture were written down in accordance with an intricate pattern that is clearly superhuman.

The first indication of this mathematical composition was in the 11th century by Rabbi Judah the Pious. In a book entitled STUDIES IN JEWISH MYSTICISM (Association for Jewish Studies, 1982, p. 91), Joseph Dan writes that Rabbi Judah and his disciples developed a theory that:

...the words and letters of the various prayers are not accidental, nor are they only vehicles for their literal meaning. Their order, especially their numbers, reflect a mystical harmony, a sacred divine rhythm. This mystical harmony can be discovered in historical events, directed by God; in nature, especially in the miraculous occurrences directly influenced by divine powers; and first and foremost, in the Bible. According to Rabbi Judah and the Ashkenazi Hasidic school in general, there can be nothing accidental in the Bible, not even the forms of letters, the punctuation, the vocalization, and especially-in the numerical structures-the number of certain letters, consonants or vowels in a certain verse; the number of words from the same root; the number and variety of divine names in a certain pericope, the absence of one or more letters from a chapter, and many other elements of the Scriptures besides their content.

Nine centuries after Rabbi Judah stated these elements of the code, the computer has demonstrated each of them. As detailed in this chapter and the next, the original scripture was mathematically composed in a way that encodes and guards every single one of its parameters. If the scripture were tampered with, the code would be broken.

Joseph Dan writes that Rabbi Judah was critical of the French and British Jews when they altered the morning prayer by adding a few words (Ibid., p. 88). Rabbi Judah pointed out that such an addition destroys the numerical structure of the prayer and renders it utterly nullified. He maintained that it is the "numerical combination," rather than the "meanings" of the words that effects the needed contact between the worshiper and God. Even the specific, nineteen-based, numerical system of the scripture was reported by Rabbi Judah:

The people [Jews] in France made it a custom to add [in the morning prayer] the words: " 'Ashrei temimei derekh [blessed are those who walk the righteous way]," and our Rabbi, the Pious, of blessed memory, wrote that they were completely and utterly wrong. It is all gross falsehood, because there are only nineteen times that the Holy Name is mentioned [in that portion of the morning prayer] ...and similarly you find the word 'Elohim nineteen times in the pericope of Ve-'elleh shemot.... Similarly, you find that Israel is called "sons" nineteen times, and there are many other examples. All these sets of nineteen are intricately intertwined, and they contain many secrets and esoteric meanings, which are contained in more than eight large volumes. Therefore, anyone who has the fear of God in him will not listen to the words of the Frenchmen who add the verse "'Ashrei temimei derekh," and blessed are the righteous who walk in the paths of God's Torah, for according to their additions the Holy Name is mentioned twenty times...and this is a great mistake.

Furthermore, in this section there are 152 words (152 = 19 x 8) but if you add "'Ashrei temimei derekh" there are 158 words. This is nonsense, for it is a great and hidden secret why there should be 152 words...but it cannot be explained in a short treatise. ...In order to understand this religious phenomenon, we have to take the basic contention of this treatise exactly as it is stated: every addition or omission of a word, or even of a single letter, from the sacred text of the prayers destroys the religious meaning of the prayer as a whole and is to be regarded as a grave sin, a sin which could result in eternal exile for those who commit it.... (STUDIES IN JEWISH MYSTICISM, pp. 88-89)

The discovery of numerical structures within the scriptures and the divinely instituted liturgies have resulted in a number of important conclusions. Some of these conclusions appear in STUDIES IN JEWISH MYSTICISM (Ibid., p. 92): (1) No change can be tolerated in the text of the prayers, not even a minute one, because every change-even of one letter-would destroy the numerical harmony inherent in the text.... (2) The liturgy received new importance and new meaning within the framework of religious practice. A completely new dimension was added in this way to the daily prayer service; it stopped being just a reciting of requests and praises of God in ancient formulas, and became a vehicle for becoming a participant in a mystical, divine harmony. The prayers suddenly received a new depth of meaning and importance, which was undreamed of in the thousand years that had passed since they were formulated. Joseph Dan reports that "the fierce polemical tone of Rabbi Judah's criticism of the changes introduced by the `Frenchmen' in the prayers can therefore be explained as a result of his fear that the prayers may be regarded as completely human in origin and meaning, making them secular and meaningless in religious and mystical practices." Rabbi Judah was also fearful that changes to the prayer would disrupt the mystical dimension and break the connection with God that they created: According to him [Rabbi Judah], even if the context and meaning of the prayer is religious, expressing love and devotion to God, it still will be just "a secular song like that of the non-Jews" if it does not have the added mystical dimension of hidden truth [the mathematical composition], which cannot be revealed by the literal meaning of the words alone. In his polemic, Rabbi Judah does not defend only the specific tradition of prayer which he received from his parents and teachers; he also defends prayer as an elevating force, forming a connection between man and God, a connection that no mere words can achieve. (STUDIES IN JEWISH MYSTICISM, pp. 92-93) The divinely instituted liturgies, in their original, unaltered words, are so numerically composed that they can be compared to the combination of a locked safe; we need to dial that specific combination to establish contact with our creator. This is probably why the daily prayers were called in Aramic and Hebrew SLA and in Arabic SALA which means "contact" or "connection." Because of this understanding, Rabbi Judah warned his neighbors in France and England that if they allowed any change in the text of the prayers, their prayers would become "like the songs of the uncircumcised non-Jews." Free expression of feelings, religious or secular, was regarded by Rabbi Judah as a non-Jewish song, which has no place in the framework of worship. Obviously, the slightest change, even of one letter, would destroy the divinely composed numerical system and thus, the "combination" to open the lock and establish contact with God would not work. IMPORTANCE TO OUR SUBJECT The discovery of mathematically authenticated scripture provides a totally unexpected opportunity to explore the validity of our understanding regarding religious disputes such as divinty of Christ or Moses parting the red sea. If there were a scripture which was proven to be unaltered by human beings, it would give us a safe point of reference for our study. The idea of mathematically composing a literary work is certainly novel to human thinking, and unique to the scriptures. The numerical pattern serves both as an authenticating tool and as a guard to protect and preserve the scripture. Obviously, finding original, unaltered scripture is of crucial importance. The slightest change in the text of a mathematically coded literary work would disrupt or utterly destroy such a code; the mathematical pattern would simply disappear. As pointed out by Rabbi Judah, "every addition or omission of a word, or even of a single letter...destroys the religious meaning of the prayer as a whole and is regarded as a grave sin." From a purely mathematical point of view, the slightest change renders the pattern non-existent; 76, for example, is a multiple of 19, but 77 or 75 is not.

Why haven't you heard about this? Here in the West, Rashad Khalifa's work has not received the attention it deserves. Only two `Western' comments on his momentous discovery are noteworthy. The first comment appeared in the SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN of September 1980. Martin Gardner wrote of Khalifa's initial publication in the West: I later discovered that the author of this monograph, Rashad Khalifa, is an Egyptian who received a doctorate in biochemistry from an American university, where he also taught for a time. His monograph was published privately in the U.S. in 1972.... Dr. Khalifa's monograph attempts to show that 19 appears throughout the Koran too often to be there by chance. The number of suras in the Koran is 114, a multiple of 19. A famous verse called the Basmala ("In the name of Allah, most gracious, most merciful"), which opens every sura but one, has 19 letters. Its first word (ism) appears 19 times in the Koran. The second word (Allah) is found 2,698, or 142 x 19, times. The number of times the third word (al-Rahman) appears is 57, which is also a multiple of 19, as is the number of times the fourth word (al-Raheem) appears, 114.

It's an ingenious study of the Quran, but it could have been more impressive if Khalifa had consulted me before he wrote it. Nineteen is an unusual prime. For example, it's the sum of the first powers of 9 and 10 and the difference between the second powers of 9 and 10. (Scientific American, Sept. 1980, p. 22)

Three years later the Canadian Council on the Study of Religion reported in its QUARTERLY REVIEW of April 1983 that the code Khalifa discovered is "an authenticating proof of the divine origin of the Quran."

Since 1983, little notice has been taken of this work. In spite of that, Dr. Khalifa's work has been published in the United States in six books:

1.MIRACLE OF THE QURAN: Significance of the Mysterious Alphabets, Islamic Productions, St. Louis, Missouri, 1973.

2.THE COMPUTER SPEAKS: God's Message to the World, Renaissance Productions, Tucson, Arizona, 1981.

3.QUR'AN: The Final Scripture, Islamic Productions, Tucson, Arizona, 1981.

4.QURAN: VISUAL PRESENTATION OF THE MIRACLE, Ibid, 1982.

5.QUR'AN, HADITH AND ISLAM, Ibid, 1982.

6.QURAN: The Final Testament, Ibid, 1989.

MIDEASTERN KNOWLEDGE OF THE CODE

In the Middle East, the story is a little different. Beginning in the late sixties, this work received wide publicity throughout the Islamic world, rendering Khalifa's name a household word. By the end of 1973, Rashad Khalifa had become a popular hero, commanding full-house audiences as he lectured at the universities, mosques, organizations, and even royal and presidential palaces.
However, his discovery led to unavoidable conclusions which ran contrary to certain basic beliefs of the traditional Muslim clergy. These conclusions boil down to a total rejection of the `Islamic traditions' which have been added onto the religion over the centuries, and a return to the pure teachings of Quran alone. Consequently, Khalifa's popularity was reversed and his life threatened in a number of Muslim countries.
Before Khalifa incurred the wrath of the Muslim clergy, many popular magazines and newspapers in the Middle East, from Morocco to Pakistan, reported his discoveries. Millions of summaries in pamphlet and bulletin form are still secretly circulating among the Muslims of the world.
Khalifa's first publicized report appeared in the most popular magazine of the Middle East, Egypt's AKHERSA (January 24, 1973). Updates of his research were subsequently published by the same magazine (November 28, 1973 and December 31, 1975). Many other magazines and newspaper articles by and about Khalifa appeared throughout the world in many languages.
Then, very early in the morning on January 31, 1990, Rashad Khalifa's life was taken by one or more assassins who had broken into his office in Tucson, Arizona, and waited for him. There is no doubt that his life was taken in an attempt to stem the growing rejection of distorted Islamic tradition and a return to the Quran alone-a movement which he spearheaded.

DETAILS INTRODUCED

The Quran was recorded as it was revealed-in fragments which were separated in both time and place, and positioned like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle into the final scripture. Since the order of revelation is different from the order of final position, two consecutive verses may be separated by as much as two years and 300 miles according to their chronological revelation.

THE CODE - SIMPLE FACTS

Though the code was initially discovered by examining the occurrences of Quranic initials in the initialed chapters of Quran, there is a large number of much less complex parameters to the code. Here is a brief listing of some of them:

1.There are 114 chapters in the Quran, or 19 x 6.

2.The total number of verses in the Quran is 6346, or 19 x 334.

3.Then you add the 30 different numbers which are mentioned in the Quran's text (i.e. one God, two brothers, etc.), the total is 162146 or 19 x 8534.

4.The first statement in Quran, "In the name of God, Most Gracious, Most Merciful" consists of 19 Arabic letters. Known as the `Basmalah', it prefaces every chapter except Chapter 9.

5.Though missing from Chapter 9, exactly 19 chapters later the Basmalah occurs twice. Chapter 27 has this statement at its beginning and in verse 30. This makes the total number of times the Basmalah occurs in the Quran 114, or 19 x 6.

6.Since there are 19 chapters between the missing Basmalah and the extra one, the sum of those chapter numbers is a multiple of 19. (The sum of any 19 consecutive numbers is a multiple of 19.) But the total, 342, is also the exact number of words between the two occurrences of the Basmalah in Chapter 27. This number, 342, is 19 x 18.

7.Every word in the Basmalah occurs throughout the Quran a number of times which is a multiple of 19.

8.The very first revelation that was given to the prophet of Islam, Mohammed, came as 19 words.

9.The total number of letters making up the 19 words of the first revelation is 76, 19 x 4.

10.Though they were the first revelation, these verses are placed at the beginning of Chapter 96. This chapter is atop the last 19 chapters.

11.Chapter 96 consists of 304 Arabic letters, or 19 x 16.

12.The last chapter revealed (Chapter 110) has 19 words, and its first verse is 19 letters.

13.God's name in Arabic, `Allah,' occurs in the Quran 2698 times, or 19 x 142.

14.If you add the numbers of the verses where `Allah' occurs, the total is 118123 or 19 x 6217.

15.The main message in the Quran is that there is only One God. The number of times that the word `one' is used to refer to this concept of One God is 19.

16.The word `Quran' occurs in 38 different chapters, or 19 x 2.

17.The total number of times `the Quran' is mentioned is 57, 19 x 3.

18.Within the 114 chapters of the Quran, 29 of them begin with the Quranic initials discussed earlier. Intermixed between the first initialed chapter (Chapter 2) and the last initialed chapter (Chapter 68) are 38 non-initialed chapters, or 19 x 2.

19.In that same group of chapters, from Chapter 2 to Chapter 68, there are 19 alternating sets of initialed and non-initialed chapters.

20.The total number of verses making up this group of chapters is 5263, 19 x 277.

21.Within this group of chapters there are also 2641 occurrences of the word `Allah', or 19 x 139. Of course, that leaves 57, or 19 x 3, occurrences of that word outside of this group.

22.If you add the chapter and verse numbers of the 57 occurrences of `Allah' outside the initialed section, the total is 2432 or 19 x 128.

23.There are a large number of discoveries having to do with the numbers of the chapters and verses. Many of them are very complex and interrelated. Here is a simple one to give you a feel for these discoveries: If you add the numbers assigned to all the chapters, plus the numbers assigned to all of the verses, plus the number of verses in the Quran, the total is 346199 or 19 x 19 x 959.

24.If you look at the initialed chapters separately and add the chapter numbers, verse numbers and number of verses, the total is 190133, 19 x 10007. Of course it follows that the total for the uninitialed chapters, 156066, is also divisible by 19.

There are a great many more discoveries, most of them more complex than the ones presented above. Additional discoveries continue to be made as Dr. Khalifa's work is carried on by the many students of pure Quran he left behind.

You may already be convinced that this interlocking occurrence of the number 19 is too frequent to be accidental. If not, the next section dealing with the Quranic initials should dispel your doubts.