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Reviews of 2nd Edition
Rev. Rolf Preus earned both his Master of Divinity and of Sacred Theology from Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN.
The Bible as a book is a topic as wide as the imagination. It serves as a symbol of justice in ceremonies of secret societies that reject the Bible’s central teaching. It is a foil in Hollywood movies about age-old conspiracies coming to fruition in our time. It is a political prop to provide pedigree for whatever ideology of the month passes for orthodox Americanism by the religious right. Praised by the right, denigrated by the left, twisted this way and that in service to carnal ambition – it appears that more energy is expended these days in imputing meaning to the Bible from the outside than in searching the Scriptures to find what they actually say.
Meanwhile, the liberal orthodoxy in the scholarly community is that the Bible is not a book at all. It is rather a collection of books written by men that reflect the evolving religious consciousness of men influenced by other men. The Bible is not treated as a book for the simple reason that it is inconceivable to biblical scholars that it is a book written by a single author. While the lodges, entertainers, and politicians can pretend that the Bible is a Bible for whatever purposes suit their agenda, those responsible for a serious study of the biblical text cannot seriously entertain traditional notions about divine authorship and inspiration.
This is what makes Rev. Cascione’s book so refreshing. He treats the Bible as a book. He approaches it with scholarly reverence. His purpose is not to find validation in the Bible for a theory about this or that. He seeks out no hidden meaning to the biblical text. He consistently stays with the plain sense of the biblical text. His discovery of deeply embedded structure in the biblical text is irrefutable.
Every Christian who goes to church on Sunday is familiar with the biblical order. When we sing the Sanctus before attending the Lord’s Supper we do not sing two holies or four holies but three holies – and every catechumen knows why. Three is the number of God. That this number should be reflected in the structure of the biblical text that we sing in the liturgy of the Church does not surprise us.
Rev. Cascione shows us that this structure exists throughout the canonical Scriptures. The biblical order is simply not found in profane literature. It is found in the Holy Scriptures. The various topics the Bible addresses are structured numerically according to the topic. Lists of three pertain to God. Lists of four pertain to created life and things. Lists of five refer to the full experience of human senses and emotions. Lists of six refer to creation. Lists of seven refer to where God and man meet, resulting in either judgment or blessing. And on it goes. The number of words in a list will correspond to the topic that is being addressed.
In finding the biblical order, Rev. Cascione has debunked the notion that the biblical text was compiled by editors who took strands from one tradition and compiled them together with strands from another tradition to produce what we have in our Bibles today. While the divine inspiration of the Bible is a mystery of the faith that must be taken on faith, the single authorship of the Bible can be demonstrated by showing the same numerical structure or order throughout the biblical books – a structure, it should be emphasized, that is not to be found in non-biblical writings.
Rev. Cascione clarifies much of the muddle that has been caused over the years by those who have interjected Pythagorean numerology on the biblical text. He stays strictly within the numerical structure of the text itself, imposing nothing from outside of it. He shows millennialism to be untenable on the basis of the text, not by an a priori dogmatic opposition to it.
The orthodox Christian view of the divine authorship of the Scriptures suffers from a stereotype of traditionalists as stodgy and boring on the one hand, or somewhat fanatical on the other. Rev. Cascione has brought to bear the aesthetic appreciation of an artist combined with the theological grounding of a confessional Lutheran pastor. The result is a book that inspires a deep appreciation of the divine inspiration of the biblical text, not only as theological dogma, but also as the source of a beautiful tapestry of a divine order and structure evident throughout the Holy Scriptures.
Rev. Cascione’s book is well worth reading.
Anne Betz, adjunct professor and mathematics teacher, New York City, NY.
Finally, someone has taken a thorough look at the mathematics in the Bible. It has been there from the beginning and many have noticed it. It is a wonder to see what Cascione has done with it. The patterns tie together themes and verify and enhance meaning.
Cascione’s method of observation of patterns challenges others to contribute to his work on structure in the Bible. A critical comparison of the standard history of Mathematics with the types of numeration found in the oldest available texts would probably benefit both disciplines.
The reading of Cascione’s work led me to the reading of many other works on the history of doctrine and Christian dogmatics. His work should challenge others to be better students of the Scriptures.
Rev. Steven Flo, Grace Lutheran Church, DeSoto, MO, earned his Master of Divinity from Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN.
Charles Darwin, contemplating the pattern of bees, once said, “Such simple instincts as bees making a beehive could be sufficient to overthrow my whole theory.” Jack Cascione has done just that! He is a bee flying right up the bonnet of every Higher Critic from the last 150 years…making monkeys of them all. Jack has discovered a beehive of highly organized “word patterns", starting in Revelation and going all the way back to Genesis, suggesting not only supernatural preservation of the original texts, but even more - “Divine Inspiration”! And get this: it took not so much a theologian to discover this, but an artist. And why not? God is THE ARTIST PAR EXCELLENCE who delights in painting pictures with words, and in so doing, leaves behind a "Divine literary style” that is just now being discovered. The buzz is, this bee has stirred something really big…and it’s not going away!
Rev. Herman Otten, Editor of Christian News.
This is a great book!....The Second Edition of Gioacchino Michael Cascione’s In Search of the Biblical Order is Pastor Cascione’s magnum opus. It deserves to be reviewed in every theological journal, Lutheran, Roman Catholic, and Protestant, and in every religious newspaper and blog. We challenge liberals, conservatives, Israel First Millennialists, Sacramentalists and Sacramentarians to find an error in what Cascione has so ably shown with the use of the latest computer technology. This pastor has long had a high regard for the careful scholarship of Professor David P. Kuske, editor of In Search of the Biblical Order. And an author whose first edition was highly praised for its brilliant scholarly yet Scriptural findings by such confessional Lutherans as Dr. Waldemar Degner, Professor David Kuske, Dr. Robert Preus, Dr. James Voelz, Pastor Paul Burgdorf, Dr. John Drikamer, Dr. Phillip Giessler, Dr. Arthur Sekki, Dr. Otto Stahlke and others, deserves to be widely read. It’s time to get the computer and read this book by a truly Lutheran scholar.
Pastor Cascione should also be commended for supporting the great work of the Hebrew scholar and author of Who Really Wrote the Bible, who shows that the first five books of the Bible were written by Moses, and did not come from the fictitious J-E-P-D sources accepted in almost all seminaries today. Cascione’s disclosure of Dietrich Bonhoeffer (who is hailed by Concordia Seminary, St. Louis, as the greatest Lutheran since Martin Luther) as a liberal who out-demythologized Rudolf Bultmann should be widely publicized. His finding of macro-patterns in Revelation deserves careful study.
Rev. Professor Robert A. Dargatz, Past Chairman, Division of Religion, Concordia University, Irvine, CA.
The God Who reveals Himself in the Holy Bible is the creator of all things. His creation is purposeful and good. He has given people their ability to see and hear, to reason and organize, to design and intrigue. We are created in the image of God, and most of our best qualities reflect qualities that are found perfectly in God Himself. Cascione finds patterns in the Bible that reflect the order that one might find in mathematics, and the aesthetics that one might expect from an artist. Although Cascione is a competent student of Greek, he comes, not primarily as a theologian/linguist, but as a theologian who has an interest and background in art, style and patterns. In so doing, he offers unique observations from sensitivity to elements that are usually overlooked by others. With the help of the sophisticated software for the study of Scripture (i.e., BibleWorks), Cascione does research that would have been virtually impossible to carry out until recent times. He finds patterns in the use of the numbers of items in Bible lists. Cascione makes a strong case that the numbers are not random and arbitrary, but instead they are used with consistency in accord with certain Biblical themes that are attached to each number. He finds this consistency throughout both the Hebrew Old Testament and the Greek New Testament. He ascribes this not to the work of the human authors of the Biblical books, but finds these patterns to be a testimony to the work of the one ultimate author of Holy Scripture, the Holy Spirit.
In contrast to those who have alleged to find hidden codes in the Bible that deal with bizarre prophecies about human history, personalities and events, Cascione comes up with no new doctrines, revelations or prophecies. His research serves only to undergird the doctrines of the Christian Church throughout all the ages. This is not to say that Cascione does not get into controversial areas where he steps on some toes. His research and findings have led the author to challenge some popularly held theories.
Cascione disagrees with the symbolic interpretation that is commonly put forward in modern “Western” commentaries on Revelation and other apocalyptic literature. He sees it as imposing Pythagorean number theory upon the Scriptures. He traces what he considers to be this error to Philo and Eusebius. Frankly, his suggested alternative appears to be better documented throughout the whole of the Scriptures, and is very well argued.
Another controversial aspect of the book is the favoring of a large number of Byzantine Text readings over those found in the earliest extant manuscripts and papyri of the New Testament. Cascione challenges the theories of textual criticism put forth today in most of the common textbooks on that subject which are used in the majority of scholarly seminaries of today. He sets forth his own “Rot Theory” which contends that just because many older Western manuscripts did not survive climatic conditions, this doesn’t mean that readings in Textus Receptus and other Eastern manuscripts from dryer climates are not the superior readings. Rather, he argues for new criteria to evaluate manuscripts with pattern analysis, or what he calls Aesthetic Hermeneutics. Members of the “King James only” crowd will love many of Cascione’s findings and conclusions. He provides thought-provoking internal evidence to force a re-examination of the theories behind the texts of Nestle, Metzger, Aland, and others used in most seminaries today, and reminds the reader that modern textual criticism is still based on theory and not proven fact. This reviewer has not found Cascione’s theory to be so compelling as to cause him to totally abandon his Nestle text for the “Majority Text,” but the book does have him asking questions about things he has never questioned before.
The book is a worthwhile contribution to Biblical scholarship that should be read by any serious scholar dealing with apocalyptic literature. It has implications for other parts of the Bible, and is never less than God-honoring and Christ-exalting. The second edition adds almost a hundred pages of reflection from almost twenty-five years of additional research. It takes full advantage of modern computer research, without which such a thorough examination of so many Biblical texts would not have been possible. If all pastors spent as much time in this kind of serious study of the Bible, the church would be blessed indeed.
Rev. Brock Abbott, Pastor of Pilgrim Lutheran Church in Decatur, IL.
Rev. Jack Cascione has brought out the heavy machinery of modern technology to dig even deeper into the eternal mine of Holy Scripture. Having hit the valuable ore in the first edition, he established the validity of a serial structure in the book of Revelation and other visions. Now, in the second edition, he continues to dig, extract, process, and refine the ore, and has overwhelmingly demonstrated that the Biblical Order exists “from Revelation to Genesis.” The patterns in the Bible and their meaning give powerful support for the unity and divine authority of the Bible. In an age where the divine authorship and unity of the Bible is incessantly attacked, even the most adamant critics of the Bible will have to give pause and consider the evidence that Rev. Cascione marshals against them. The evidence is so incontrovertible that the critics will have to do extreme academic cartwheels, leaps and bounds, in order to deny what is right before their very eyes. The Bible is no ordinary book. It is the very Word of God. Rev. Cascione powerfully demonstrates what the Bible says of itself in 2 Peter 1:21. The origin of the Bible is not in the will of man, but “men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.”
Martin Steffke, high school sophomore. steffkem@yahoo.com
Gioacchino Cascione's In Search of the Biblical Order is the first-known effort to show that not only are there patterns in the Bible, but that God Himself has written these patterns into the Bible. These intricate book-spanning patterns are evidence of His authorship. Cascione's mission is to fight 150 years of bad theological teaching that claims God did not inspire the entire Bible.
Cascione does this by answering the question, "Does the style of writing in the Bible have a consistent structure from Genesis to Revelation?" This is the question that Cascione seeks to answer throughout his sixteen-chapter book. In Chapters 2 through 9 Cascione explains the symbolism behind numbers that appear throughout the Bible, and how we can use these numbers to find patterns. Essentially all of the individual numbers by themselves are a part of their own pattern. For instance, three represents the triune God. Those numbers combine and form into specific lists or macro-patterns that span across verses, chapters, and books of the Bible, such as apocalyptic-related patterns in Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, and Revelation. These numbers also can be divided into split lists which have compounded meaning. In such verses of the Bible, God could be praised three times and then He could give seven judgments. This is a total of ten which symbolizes God’s complete judgment. The seven judgments could be further divided into sections of three and four or two and five. Each of those numeric divisions also has an easily interpretable meaning (i.e., three is the triune God, seven is judgment, and five deals with the senses). In regard to the earlier question, he answers yes, that there is a divine style, but it is not hidden as some would lead you to believe. It is an open door for anyone who is willing to look for it. He merely shows you how.
Cascione is not a Millennialist, or an advocate of any false doctrine. He spends a great deal of his book fighting the misleading and corrupt theories of Gnosticism, Gematria, Numerology, Notarikon, Kabala, Pythagorean and Neo-Pythagorean number theory. The difference between Cascione and these groups is that they believed they would find secret messages in the text, whereas Cascione believes that these patterns can only show what is already in the text, and, more importantly, that identification of these patterns brings us closer to the original text, proving that we believe in the one true God. These patterns are continuous throughout the Bible, showing that there is one true Author, and that His original book is still being read today.
Rev. Paul H. Burgdorf†, expert in Revelation and former editor and publisher of The Confessional Lutheran.
In 1840, the Hebrew-Christian scholar Franz Delitzsch, an associate of C. F. W. Walther at Leipzig University during their student days, wrote a most interesting tract titled The Wing of the Angel (Der Fluegel des Engels). The title of the tract was taken from ch.14:6f. of the Revelation of Jesus Christ which was signified to John and, upon the Lord’s direction, recorded by him, to constitute the concluding book of Holy Scripture. The tract which was written by Frans Delitzsch (who was at that time an enthusiastic Lutheran) emphasized the fact that if it had not been for the providential invention of the modern art of printing, the publication of the many works of Luther, and thus the rapid spread of the Reformation of the Church in the 16th century, would hardly have been possible.
There is a similar reason for the choice of the title of the article in hand, which appears above. In His revelation of Himself and of His will, God has left footprints of Himself, so to say, as the Author of the universe and as the Lord of history. Cp. Acts 14:16f. In the Christian hymn “God Moves in a Mysterious Way His Wonders to Perform,” its author, Wm. Cowper, has expressed the fact of God’s unmistakable revelation of Himself in nature, as follows:
“He plants His footsteps on the sea,
And rides upon the storm.”God has similarly left imprints of His Authorship of the Bible in that wonderful, sacred Book of Books. This fact has always been recognized. Indeed, its study, and the study of further facts which are more or less intimately related to it, has long-since constituted one of the main branches of the study of Christian Theology—namely, Isagogics, or Introduction to the Bible.
Now a pastor...seems at long last to have discovered some hitherto apparently unrecognized, additional incidental evidence of the fact that the Bible owes its origin to a final single Author. It is the pursuit of this principle that constitutes the work set forth in the recent publication In Search of the Biblical Order by J. M. Cascione.
Just as the work of the Reformation of the Church in the sixteenth century could hardly have been undertaken without that ‘Wing of the Angel’—the modern printing press, so, one may assume, the work which is represented by the publication which is under discussion could not well have been undertaken without that modern invention—the computer. Thus one may conclude that God, to Whom are known all His works from the beginning of the world (Acts 15:18), seems to have kept to Himself until now the little secret of His apparent incidental footprints in the Bible—in addition to the numerous other evidences of its divine Authorship. The validity of such an assumption being granted, unbelieving critics of God’s Holy Word must now be expected to be all the more put to it in their endeavor to reconcile themselves to the fact that the Bible is the work of a final single Author—that hitherto unrecognized footprints of God are to be found throughout its many pages.
Laymen as well as pastors should secure copies of In Search of the Biblical Order. (In the estimation of the Lord of the Church, some of the former are better theologians than some of the latter; Mt. 11:25. Sometimes they need to be—not to speak of some ecclesiastical officials.) This book can help to enrich their knowledge concerning the Word of God, which will endure forever. It can further their devotion to God. It can make them more ready to give an answer to anyone who may ask them concerning the reason for the hope that is in them; I Pet. 3:15. By purchasing copies of this search for God’s footsteps in the Holy Scriptures which are His handiwork, its buyers will moreover be sharing the furtherance of a work which has been undertaken to glorify His Name.
Dr. Waldemar Degner†, Chairman of the Exegetical Dept., Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN. Dr. Degner earned his doctorate in Classical Greek from the University of Chicago.
The author of this big book, Jack Cascione, sets out to demonstrate the relationship between the literary structure of Scripture and the meaning of the text. The literary structure on which he focuses is not the usual simile and metaphor, about which so much has been written, but serial structures of words, phrases, clauses, sentences and even enthymemes. As to the relationship between serial sequence and the meaning of the text, Reverend Cascione both succeeds and fails.
For the purposes of this review I shall mention the positive aspects of this book first. But some negative aspects must be included, even though the failings of the book are offset easily by the virtues of the monograph.
There are literary structures in the Scriptures, even as any piece of writing first into some category. Confining himself to apocalyptic type literatures (“visionary” he calls it,), Rev. Cascione shows that the numerical couplets, triplets, quadruplets, etc., of words and groups of words is associated with a thought pattern. Thus, two’s refer to God’s Word or revelation; three’s to Trinity, God; four’s to creation, man’s actions, etc.; and so on. He lists examples without ending from the Revelation of St. John, from OT apocalyptic writings, and from other biblical writings to support his contentions. These numerical sequences he calls “arithmelogues.” He does demonstrate that these codes or orders are present, that they are repeated in almost monotonous similarity, even over large differences of time, and that a number is somehow related to the length of the list. There is a deeper meaning to these serial sequences than previous numerologists and theomaticists had ever described. In other words, Cascione shows that the codes or arithmelogues are not merely secret symbols for the initiate so that they might be able to tell the future. Rather, he says the “Arithmelogic” structure is shaped around meaning, affirms content, and points directly to it.
Yes, Rev. Cascione succeeds in demonstrating there is a sublime perfection in the Book that is affirmed by numerical schemes. The suggestions which he makes as to the meanings that the arithmelogues convey are well taken. He himself admits to the need for vagueness, especially since he is treading on territory which Lutheran interpreters have generally left untouched. The book helps the reader appreciate the sublime perfection of God’s revelation.
There are shortcomings to the book, however, of a serious enough nature that this reviewer would urge the author to delay publication until certain changes are made. Some of the major changes needed are the following:
1. The text of the manuscript is too heavy. It is very difficult to read, even though Rev. Cascione intends it for average lay people.
2. The thoughts of the book are so diverse, and the evidence for the arguments are so profuse that the reader has difficulty in knowing what the essential argument is.
3. Examples of needed changes: The claims made in the first chapters are wild, and they are not supported until many chapters later. Would it not be better, and in keeping with ordinary human comprehension, that when an assertion is made the evidence is also at once put forward?
4. One chapter or more with detailed discussion of the kais seems better than its frequent mention and postponement of details. Put it all together at a point when you have presented sufficient background.
5. Severe editing would be in order, like the Reader’s Digest condensed book projects. Thus, after the arithmelogue is described, the numerical concepts can be stated much more succinctly.
6. I found many of the examples were not really supportive of the argument. Where the author counted seven, I could only find six. There were numerous examples of such glaring variances.
Yet, in sum, the thoughts are worthy of wide readership. If the formal part could be sharpened and reshaped, and if the material portions could be directed a bit more toward relating the form of Scripture to the form of Christ (rather than getting lost in detail), the book would have tremendous appeal.
(Author’s note: Many of Degner’s suggestions were followed before the first edition was printed.)
Dr. Phillip Giessler, former CEO and editor-in-chief at Luther Bible Society, currently serves as a missionary and professor to students and pastors in Africa.
It may be that Cascione’s book is the most important verification of the Old Testament text since the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Whether an overstatement or not will be seen in days to come, but to be sure there will be many an unbeliever rocked by the data presented.
Professor David P. Kuske, professor emeritus of New Testament Theology at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, Mequon, WI.
Wisconsin Lutheran Quarterly
Vol. 85, No. 2, Spring 1988Reviews
One can’t read the book of Revelation without noticing the symbolic use of numbers. Is there a pattern to these numbers and the lists containing a given number of items? If so, does the number of items in a list regularly correspond to a given subject? Cascione not only contends that they do, but he marshals impressive evidence to support his contention.
The author begins the study of each number with the lists found in the book of Revelation since “Revelation is the Rosetta Stone to the Biblical order” (p 11). But he also shows how these same “arithmelogues” (a term coined to designate a numerically ordered series of thoughts on the same subject) appear throughout the Old and New Testaments. Because they are found everywhere in the Bible, arithmelogues also serve as an important witness to the unity of the entire Scripture, the author contends.
Like other literary genres (parables, prophecy, narrative), arithmelogues do not add any meaning to the text. Rather, they only confirm what the text says and help to show that we have understood the text properly (p 18). Cascione also cautions that lists in the Bible are not always arithmelogues. This mathematical structure is used consistently only in visionary literature (e.g., Revelation, portions of Daniel, Isaiah); its use in nonvisionary portions of Scripture (e.g., the historical books, the Epistles) is less consistent.
Each type of arithmelogue is demonstrated by a plethora of examples from Revelation and other books of the Bible. The examples are printed out, and the key point of each passage is highlighted by bold type. In this way the point the author is making is easy to follow.
Lists made of pairs deal with God’s Word (witnessing and confessing). Lists of three items deal with God in some way: the Trinity, divine actions (blessings, warnings, curses), the devil’s actions in opposing God, and believers who act with God’s help. Lists of four have to do with mankind, human activity, the earth, creation or created things. Lists of five items cover the gamut of human emotions and human experiences (suffering, endurance, crying, etc.). Lists of six items involve the process of creation (either God’s creating work or Satan’s attacks on creation) or characterize the nature of what is created (life and order, chaos, destruction and death).
Lists of seven are combinations of four (world and man) and three (God’s blessing or curse); thus seven deals with God’s punishing people in hell or blessing them in heaven. Lists of ten deal with completion, a complete list, or the full scope of a particular subject or event. Lists of twelve always deal with the believers, God’s church.
Another interesting aspect of these lists is the fact that kai (Greek for “and”) is the signal word which indicates an arithmelogue. Cascione calls this “kaimeter” because the linking of all the items in the list by the use of kai gives each list a poetic meter. An appendix prints the entire text of Revelation from the GWN translation (i.e., God’s Word to the Nations in the Language of Today, a new revision of Beck’s AAT). The ands are put in bold print, and the arithmelogues are arranged in poetic kaimeter style. Here the reader can see how this literary structure is the style of almost every verse of the entire book of Revelation!
Besides arithmelogues, Cascione also suggests a “second level of the Biblical order.” The kai’s are counted in multiples of ten (40, 50, 60 and more) to tie “Revelation’s thoughts together like the grid of a crossword puzzle” (p 131). This suggestion is less convincing because there are at least a half dozen places where the kai count does not work out exactly the way Cascione suggests it should. It is true that there are textual variants to consider in each case, but the best manuscript evidence (i.e., the reading most widespread in the early church) does not always support the conclusion the author prefers. In Cascione’s favor is the fact that there are only a few problems out of 1100 possibilities in Revelation, and the fact that the theory seems to work in the OT examples which are cited.
Cascione concludes by saying that the purpose of his study was to prove the existence of a biblical order. He does not claim to have “all the answers about the subject” nor “the one and only correct analysis of the data” (p 170). Nevertheless, his work is a valuable addition to the study of Revelation. But its value does not stop there. It is also worthy of study by anyone who is wrestling with arithmelogues wherever they are found in Scripture, both in visionary and nonvisionary literature.
Professor David P. Kuske, professor emeritus of New Testament Theology at Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary, Mequon, WI.
Two things especially impressed themselves on me of being of great value. One is the thorough and quite convincing evidence Cascione has marshaled in regard to the numerical groupings of thoughts and pattern each follows (i.e., twos, threes, etc.), especially in Revelation but also in other books of the Bible. The second is the suggestion which follows out of this, that here is one more example of the inspiration of Scripture, namely, the pattern followed by many writers over a long period of time.
Dr. Robert Preus†, Past President, Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN. Dr. Preus earned his doctorate in Philosophy from Saint Andrews, Scotland, and a second doctorate in Theology from Strasbourg, France.
Jack Cascione has in this short volume done a very meticulous and valuable piece of research. Whereas knowledgeable and sensitive exegetes have always recognized that apocalyptic literature in the Scriptures has its own unique genre (colors, animals, events, numbers, etc., have figurative, symbolic meaning and connotations), Cascione has greatly fortified this fundamental approach by showing that the literary structure of apocalyptic literature supports such a hermeneutical approach. He has done so by demonstrating a definite and consistent serial structure of words, phrases, and sentences. Cascione’s vast data are most convincing. He has covered new ground, and students of the Scriptures can be grateful to him.
Rev. Dr. Arthur Sekki†, earned his doctorate in Hebrew from the University of Wisconsin.
A noted Old Testament scholar once remarked that advances in Biblical scholarship have often come not from the specialists but from those who are able to apply diverse areas of expertise in new and creative ways to old problems. This is what Rev. Cascione has done in this seminal work. Not everyone will agree with all of his conclusions, but it seems clear that in looking at Revelation from an artist’s perspective, Rev. Cascione has uncovered some important patterns of expression which add to our hermeneutical understanding of this book and of the other visionary sections of Scripture. He has charted new ground which needs to be pursued further.
Dr. Otto Stahlke†, Professor Emeritus of systematic theology at Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN.
The author is a pastor at Lakewood, Ohio, LC-MS, a 1981 colloquy graduate of Fort Wayne, M. Div. In his previous years he earned a Master of Fine Arts degree at Edwardsville, Ill., and taught at Indiana State University at Evansville. This previous training is significant for this discussion because the element of form is prominent.
Form in the arts is defined as “the manner or style of arranging and coordinating parts for a pleasing or effective result, as in literary or musical composition.” (American College Dict.) Thus a sermon has a certain form. Poems are governed by and classified according to their form. Cicero had a different form for oratory. If the form is well executed, we thank God for the privilege of hearing oratory (Walter Maier, Sr.).
“This book introduces a discovery concerning the last book in the Bible.” Jack Cascione does not write a commentary on Revelation, but rather makes a special study, a thorough tour de force of the many numbered series, which occur in apocalyptic literatures, which are a characteristic of divine revelation, occurring also in Daniel, Ezekiel, but not in the Apocrypha, in Gnostic writings, or in the Egyptian, Ugaritic, Hittite, and Sumerian literature.
Cascione avoids superstitious interpretations of numbers as those of the Cabbalists, who give a numerical value to the letters. Another Jewish numerology was that of Philo, said to come from Pythagoras, according to which two is the first number, female (all things even are female), and three is the second number, male (all things odd are male). Two times three makes six, the most fertile of all numbers. (You must read Philo on seven in his Genesis. Older commentaries like Langes Bibelwerk indicated the use of certain numbers in Scripture as having special uses, but they ‘failed to identify the logic’ behind these numbered series.
Jack Cascione uses the term “arithmelogue” for the many numbered series. The search for these arithmelogues and their comparison makes up the body of the book. He finds that “the four-part sets...list four things that happen on earth, p. 5, so also on page 3 in the series: “tribe, language, people, nation,” which occurs seven times, but not in the same order. The Bible is not concerned about slavishly repeating or quoting, as the pagan writings do. This is true also of the seven nations in Canaan, or the twelve tribes of Israel.
A special study is made of the “and,” which occurs so frequently in Scripture. In Hebrew it is characteristic, but the New Testament shows its Hebrew style many times. Read the story of the young man of Nain, Luke 7:11-17 (19 ands). Cascione finds that the “ands” are essential to the arithmelogues as to form, and that many translations omit some of them. He offers a translation as an appendix, which uses all of them. The appreciation of “form” is very appropriately used, and the author deserves credit for having discovered an important element in the study of Revelation and other parts of the Bible. He [Cascione] is not practicing ‘form criticism’ in the modern sense, but truly enhances our understanding of divine revelation and the inspired Scripture.
Dr. James Voelz, Associate Professor of Exegetical Theology, Concordia Theological Seminary, Fort Wayne, IN; now Academic Dean of Concordia Seminary, St. Louis. Dr. Voelz earned his doctorate in Greek Grammar from Cambridge, England, and is the author of What Does This Mean?
The approach of Rev. Cascione is both literary and artistic. It should not surprise the reader to learn that Jack has earned a Master of Fine Arts degree, worked and taught in the art world, and produced outstanding lithographs himself. It takes this kind of person to see the type of structure he has seen in the artistic literary masterpiece we call the Book of the Revelation of St. John.
Scholar, pastor, lay-reader — all will benefit from this book. It looks at the book of Revelation with a new set of glasses, a set which one increasingly feels might very well be true.
The reader should not be deceived into thinking that this book is involved in numerology (assigning numbers to letters and words and then finding significance in various totals). The Cascione approach is quite the opposite; instead of being mechanistic and alien to the literary meaning of the text, it is artistic and enhances the literary meaning of the text.
This book represents a tremendous amount of inductive research. In reading such material, one always has the feeling that the author has ‘gone too far’ but as one who has done research of a similar scope and depth on a different subject matter, let me say that, taken overall (one can always argue with examples here or conclusions there), Cascione’s results are impressive.
Dr. John M. Drickamer†, earned his doctorate in Theology from Concordia Seminary, St. Louis.
In Search of the Biblical Order by J. M. Cascione (Fairview Park, Ohio: Biblion Publishing, 1987) is easy to read but hard to review. It is easy to understand and discuss. But it is too full and rich to be summarized well. The only solution is for everyone to read it. Then we can all talk about it.
Some of the claims may be slightly overstated. The Bible is a clear book that can be understood on its own terms. But this book deals with the Bible’s own terms. It is very, very helpful in understanding certain parts of the Bible, namely the visions, especially the Book of Revelation.
It is not new to note that the numbers in Revelation are figurative. But this work established the specific figurative meanings of the numbers on a more objective basis than I have ever encountered before. I do not see how anyone could read this book and still honestly deny that the thousand year period in Revelation 20:1-6 represents the whole period up to the end of the world (pp. 160-161). The amount of evidence that Cascione arrays is well worth the price of the book.
I was skeptical when I started reading. I have always been cautious about the symbolic meanings of numbers. There is no explicit Biblical statement about it. But Cascione has shown how these matters can be objectively discussed. This is no guesswork, no speculation. The numbers alone cannot be decisive in questions of textual criticism and exegesis. But they cannot be ignored. All pastors, students, and interested laymen should read this book. It will be a big part of my preparation the next time I teach a Bible class on Revelation.
There are flaws. It is too impersonal to call God “infinitely organized Thought” (p. 19, see p. 173). Nor is it correct to say that time is a creature that will be destroyed (p. 163). Time is not a thing but a name for the way relationships between things change.
But my copy contains many positive notes and few negative ones. The whole approach to Revelation is most helpful. If only the Millennialists could see this clearly! It would end so much confusion caused by the false teaching that Christ will reign on earth for a thousand years. The same is true for 666 and the Antichrist (pp. 93, 96). Maybe this book will help some people see clearly on these issues. It certainly is a bulwark to keep others from being misled by the false teachers.
Cascione has written a book that counts – not only because it deals with numbers, but also because it should make a big difference in the amount of objective evidence we can use in helping people understand the Book of Revelation and other parts of the Bible.
Last Updated: October 24, 2015