Numbers in the Bible

Symbolic numbers

Meanings follow the common Catholic reading: the Catechism, the Fathers of the Church and Catholic biblical commentary.

1. 1

   One: the one God

   The number of oneness: Israel confesses the Lord as the one God (the Shema). Saint Paul carries that confession forward: one body, one Spirit, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, the ground of the Church's unity.

   • Deut 6:4
   • Eph 4:4-6

2. 3

   Three: the third day

   Jesus takes Jonah's three days in the belly of the fish as a sign of Himself, and He rose on the third day. The Fathers also read the number in the light of the Trinity: Jesus sends His disciples to baptise in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.

   • Matt 12:40
   • 1 Cor 15:4
   • Matt 28:19

3. 7

   Seven: completeness

   God completes the work of creation and rests on the seventh day, so seven is the number of fullness and perfection. Jesus asks for forgiveness not seven times but seventy times seven, that is, without limit; Revelation writes to seven churches, an image of the whole Church. Catholic tradition also counts seven sacraments.

   • Gen 2:2-3
   • Matt 18:21-22
   • Rev 1:4

4. 10

   Ten: the Ten Words

   The Ten Commandments, which Deuteronomy calls the ten words, are the covenant God gives His people on Mount Horeb (Sinai). The Catechism of the Catholic Church sets out the Christian moral life along the Ten Commandments, fulfilled by Jesus in the twofold commandment of love.

   • Exod 20:1-17
   • Deut 10:4

5. 12

   Twelve: the people of God

   The twelve tribes are the whole of Israel. Jesus chooses twelve apostles to begin the new Israel. In the new Jerusalem the gates bear the names of the twelve tribes and the foundations the names of the twelve apostles: the Church is built on the apostles.

   • Gen 49:28
   • Matt 10:1-4
   • Rev 21:12-14

6. 40

   Forty: testing and preparation

   Forty days of flood, forty years in the desert, forty days of Moses on the mountain and of Elijah's walk to Horeb: the number of a time of trial that leads to meeting God. Jesus fasts forty days in the wilderness, and every year the Church joins Him in the forty days of Lent. After rising from the dead He appears for forty days before the Ascension.

   • Gen 7:12
   • Exod 24:18
   • Num 14:33-34
   • 1 Kgs 19:8
   • Matt 4:2
   • Acts 1:3

7. 50

   Fifty: the jubilee and Pentecost

   The fiftieth year is the jubilee: those in servitude go free and land returns to its family; the Church's Holy Years grow from this tradition. Fifty days after Passover comes Pentecost, the day the Holy Spirit came down on the apostles.

   • Lev 25:10-11
   • Acts 2:1-4

8. 70

   Seventy: all the nations

   Seven times ten, a number of fullness. Moses chooses seventy elders to share the spirit; the Babylonian exile is foretold to last seventy years. The table of nations in Genesis counts about seventy peoples, so when Jesus sends seventy (or seventy-two, depending on the manuscripts) disciples ahead of Him, the mission points to all the nations.

   • Num 11:16
   • Jer 25:11
   • Luke 10:1

9. 666

   Six hundred sixty-six: the number of the beast

   Revelation calls it the number of a man's name. By the ancient practice of using letters as numerals, many commentators read it as the name of the emperor Nero, persecutor of the Church (a few manuscripts read 616, which fits the same name). Six repeated three times, one short of seven, also suggests a power that claims to be divine yet stays forever incomplete.

   • Rev 13:18

10. 1,000

    A thousand: God's time

    With the Lord a thousand years are as one day: the number speaks of a span beyond human measure. In the tradition that goes back to Saint Augustine, the thousand years of Revelation are the time of the Church between Christ's two comings; the Church rejects reading them as an earthly kingdom (millenarianism).

    • Ps 90:4
    • 2 Pet 3:8
    • Rev 20:2-6

11. 144,000

    A hundred forty-four thousand: the sealed people

    Twelve times twelve times a thousand: the new people of God in its fullness, built on the twelve tribes and the twelve apostles. Right after the number John sees a multitude beyond counting from every nation, so Catholic commentators read it as a symbol, not a limit on the number of the saved.

    • Rev 7:4-9
    • Rev 14:1

The Bible in numbers

Books

73

Chapters

1,334

Verses

35,811

The seven deuterocanonical books (Tobit, Judith, 1 and 2 Maccabees, Wisdom, Sirach, Baruch) belong to the Old Testament of the Catholic Church; the Greek parts of Esther and Daniel are counted with their books.

Chapter and verse counts differ slightly between versions because of how the text is divided; the Vulgate, for instance, gives Esther 16 chapters; the Greek additions (Esther, Daniel) are counted within their books, each verse once.

Kings of Judah and Israel

Chronology after E. R. Thiele, years BC, rounded. Overlapping reigns are co-regencies of father and son or rival kings. Hatched: dates disputed.