Seven
and
Seventy (and Seventy-Two)
and
Seventy-Seven
and
Seven times Seventy |
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| Within universal numerology the significance of seven greatly antedates New Testament revelation, though, of course, it does not antedate the reason and order of the universe, the Divine Logos–λόγος of God. Seven appears to be a part of that Divine order. |
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| It is true that one could posit as human constructs, |
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The Seven Oceans of our Planet Earth, the Seven Seas: |
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the Arctic Ocean |
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the North Atlantic Ocean |
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the South Atlantic Ocean |
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the Indian Ocean |
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the North Pacific Ocean |
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the South Pacific Ocean |
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the Southern (or Antarctic) Ocean |
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| Though even in such a case one finds us clinging to seven. After all, one only gets to seven if the Atlantic and Pacific are conceptually divided in two because they are big, or because of the Equator and prevailing ocean currents. |
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| Moreover, this notion of Septem maria – Επτά Θάλασσες – Seven Seas is old. By old, one speaks not of Rudyard Kipling's The Seven Seas (1896). « The Seven Seas » is millennia older even than the Naturalis Historia– Natural History (“Atrianorum paludes, quae Septem Maria appellantur” (3.16. s. 20)) of Pliny the Elder (c. 23 to 25 August 79 and the eruption of Mount Vesuvius). The idea reaches at least all the way back to 2300 Before Christ and the Mesopotamian Sumeria's literature. |
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| But for the Graeco-Romans the Seven Seas certainly did not mean our seven, globe-spanning oceans. No, the circumnavigation of Earth's oceans would have to wait for our Portuguese brother, Ferdinand Magellan, and his Spanish co-seafarer, Juan Sebastián Elcano, and the team they led, and for the years 1519 to 1522 Anno Domin. Accounts vary, but we can say generally that, for the Graeco-Romans the Seven Seas were: the Mediterranean Sea; the Aegean Sea, east of Greece and west of the Greek Asia Minor, later murderously stolen by the invading Mongolic Turks; the Ionian Sea, west of Greece and South of the Italian boot; the Adriatic Sea, east of Italy; the Tyrrhenian Sea, west of the Italian boot; the Ligurian Sea, north of Corsica; and the Black Sea. |
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| By European Medieval times, the Seven Seas meant the Mediterranean Sea, including its constitutive sub-bodies of water, e.g., the Aegean, Ionian, Tyrrhenian Seas, etc.; though the Adriatic Sea was reckoned separately; the Black Sea; the Caspian Sea; the Persian Gulf; the Red Sea (including what are now called the Gulf of Aqaba (or the Gulf of Eilat) and the Gulf of Suez; the Dead Sea and the Sea of Galilee); and the Arabian Sea (part of the Indian Ocean). |
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| A bit of an analogy can be seen in the numbering at seven of, |
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The Seven Continents of our Planet Earth: |
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| And why should the Asians not try to snatch away Australia and New Zealand from the suicidal civilization of dis-United, half-European, post-Christendom? These are, after all, very nice peices of land. A far cry from terra nullius, but still, very sparsely populated, and by European peoples who lost their way. |
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The Seven Heavens |
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Whether in the ancient civilization of the "land between the rivers," Μεσοποταμία–Mesopotamia or elsewhere, and millennia before the earliest telescopes were built, when anicent star gazers looked up into night skies all of the heavenly bodies would appear to be fixed within the immense celestial sphere, not moving relative to each other, all that is, except seven of them: the Sun, the Moon and Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn. Seven, independently-moving, celestial bodies or “planets,” visible to the naked human eye would not needs have meant, or corresponded to, seven, ascending spiritual realms, or even to seven, separate celestial spheres. Still, Creation had supplied thinking humankind — or, as the atheist version of Evolutionistism would, in violation of reason, have it, matter created itself in such a way so as to supply us with — very tangible and enormous reasons to associate the heavens with seven. |
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Thus the heavens and the earth were finished, and all the host of them. And on the seventh day God finished his work which he had done, and he rested on the seventh day from all his work which he had done. So God blessed the seventh day and hallowed it, because on it God rested from all his work which he had done in creation. |
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Genesis 2:1-3 |
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Cain said to the Lord, “My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, thou hast driven me this day away from the ground; and from thy face I shall be hidden; and I shall be a fugitive and a wanderer on the earth, and whoever finds me will slay me.” Then the Lord said to him, Not so! If any one slays Cain, vengeance shall be taken on him sevenfold. And the Lord put a mark on Cain, lest any who came upon him should kill him. |
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Genesis 4:13-15 |
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And Lamech said to his wives Ada and Sella: Hear my voice, ye wives of Lamech, hearken to my speech: for I have slain a man to the wounding of myself, and a stripling to my own bruising. Sevenfold vengeance shall be taken for Cain: but for Lamech seventy times sevenfold. |
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Genesis 4:23-24 [emphasis added] |
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The Patrilineage of Jesus as set forth in the Gospel According to Luke (Luke 3:23-38) includes seventy-seven names, Beginning with Jesus as the Fulfillment and tracing backward to God as the Origin. |
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Then the Lord said to Noah, Go into the ark, you and all your household, for I have seen that you are righteous before me in this generation. Take with you seven pairs of all clean animals, the male and his mate; and a pair of the animals that are not clean, the male and his mate; and seven pairs of the birds of the air also, male and female, to keep their kind alive upon the face of all the earth. For in seven days I will send rain upon the earth forty days and forty nights; and every living thing that I have made I will blot out from the face of the ground. And Noah did all that the Lord had commanded him. ... And after seven days the waters of the flood came upon the earth. |
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Genesis 7:1-5, 10 |
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But God remembered Noah and all the beasts and all the cattle that were with him in the ark. And God made a wind blow over the earth, and the waters subsided; the fountains of the deep and the windows of the heavens were closed, the rain from the heavens was restrained, and the waters receded from the earth continually. At the end of a hundred and fifty days the waters had abated; and in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, the ark came to rest upon the mountains of Ararat. |
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Genesis 8:1-4 |
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At the end of forty days Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made, and sent forth a raven; and it went to and fro until the waters were dried up from the earth. Then he sent forth a dove from him, to see if the waters had subsided from the face of the ground; but the dove found no place to set her foot, and she returned to him to the ark, for the waters were still on the face of the whole earth. So he put forth his hand and took her and brought her into the ark with him. He waited another seven days, and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark; and the dove came back to him in the evening, and lo, in her mouth a freshly plucked olive leaf; so Noah knew that the waters had subsided from the earth. Then he waited another seven days, and sent forth the dove; and she did not return to him any more. |
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Forty
for
Trials and Troubles |
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Genesis 8:6-12 (And NB, like the forty days and forty nights of the deludge, here again after the rain, as the saved remnant of humanity in the Ark awaits livable conditions, we see the number forty representing more trials and trouble. And so further in the Scriptures [with emphasis added]:
- Moses fasts: And the Lord said to Moses, Write these words; in accordance with these words I have made a covenant with you and with Israel. And he was there with the Lord forty days and forty nights; he neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote upon the tables the words of the covenant, the ten commandments. – Exodus 34:27-28 –
- Spies send to Canaan by Moses at God's command take forty days and then cower before the challenge: The Lord said to Moses, Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I give to the people of Israel; from each tribe of their fathers shall you send a man, every one a leader among them. ... Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan, and said to them, “Go up into the Negeb yonder, and go up into the hill country, and see what the land is, and whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many, and whether the land that they dwell in is good or bad, and whether the cities that they dwell in are camps or strongholds, and whether the land is rich or poor, and whether there is wood in it or not. Be of good courage, and bring some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes. ... At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh; they brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us; it flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. Yet the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large; and besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.” But Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, “Let us go up at once, and occupy it; for we are well able to overcome it.” Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we.” So they brought to the people of Israel an evil report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are men of great stature. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim); and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”
- Rebellion and forty years of punishment for a whole people, but with exceptions: Then all the congregation raised a loud cry; and the people wept that night. And all the people of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron; the whole congregation said to them, “Would that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! Why does the Lord bring us into this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will become a prey; would it not be better for us to go back to Egypt?” And they said to one another, “Let us choose a captain, and go back to Egypt.” ... And the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron, How long shall this wicked congregation murmur against me? I have heard the murmurings of the people of Israel, which they murmur against me. Say to them, ‘As I live, says the Lord, what you have said in my hearing I will do to you: your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness; and of all your number, numbered from twenty years old and upward, who have murmured against me, not one shall come into the land where I swore that I would make you dwell, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun. But your little ones, who you said would become a prey, I will bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised. But as for you, your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness. And your children shall be shepherds in the wilderness forty years, and shall suffer for your faithlessness, until the last of your dead bodies lies in the wilderness. According to the number of the days in which you spied out the land, forty days, for every day a year, you shall bear your iniquity, forty years, and you shall know my displeasure.’ I, the Lord, have spoken; surely this will I do to all this wicked congregation that are gathered together against me: in this wilderness they shall come to a full end, and there they shall die. – Numbers 14:1-4, 26-35 –
- Elijah (also transliterated into English as Elias) fasts: Ahab told Jezebel all that Elijah had done, and how he had slain all the prophets with the sword. Then Jezebel sent a messenger to Elijah, saying, “So may the gods do to me and more also, if I do not make your life as the life of one of them by this time tomorrow.” Then he was afraid, and he arose and went for his life, and came to Beersheba, which belongs to Judah, and left his servant there. But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a broom tree; and he asked that he might die, saying, “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life; for I am no better than my fathers.” And he lay down and slept under a broom tree; and behold, an angel touched him, and said to him, “Arise and eat.” And he looked, and behold, there was at his head a cake baked on hot stones and a jar of water. And he ate and drank, and lay down again. And the angel of the Lord came again a second time, and touched him, and said, “Arise and eat, else the journey will be too great for you.” And he arose, and ate and drank, and went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb [Mount Sinai] the mount of God.– 1 Kings 19:1-8 –
- Christ Jesus, God Himself, fasts, but here God fasts before a trial of temptations by Evil: Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil. And he fasted forty days and forty nights, and afterward he was hungry. And the tempter came and said to him ..... – Matthew 4:1-11 –
Seven, leads to, represents Grace and success and fulfillment.) |
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Table of Nations or Table of Seventy Nations or Generations of Noah from Chapter 10 of the Book of Genesis |
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And note that in the Old Testament Septuagint text (though not in the Masoretic text), as also in the New Testament genealogy at Luke 3:36, a great grandson of Noah and grandson of Shem, named Cainan, the son of Arphaxad (translitered as Arpachshad in Genesis 11:10-12), brings to seventy-seven the men, that is, the generations from God to Jesus, with God First, then through Adam and Seth and, among many other intervening people/generations, through Lamech and Noah and Shem and Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Judah and Jesse and David and Nathan and Heli and Joseph (husband of the Blessed Ever-Virgin Mary and foster father of Jesus) to Jesus, so God is First and Last, with seventy-seven generations in all. |
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At that time Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army said to Abraham, “God is with you in all that you do; now therefore swear to me here by God that you will not deal falsely with me or with my offspring or with my posterity, but as I have dealt loyally with you, you will deal with me and with the land where you have sojourned.” And Abraham said, “I will swear.” When Abraham complained to Abimelech about a well of water which Abimelech’s servants had seized, Abimelech said, “I do not know who has done this thing; you did not tell me, and I have not heard of it until today.” So Abraham took sheep and oxen and gave them to Abimelech, and the two men made a covenant. Abraham set seven ewe lambs of the flock apart. And Abimelech said to Abraham, “What is the meaning of these seven ewe lambs which you have set apart?” He said, “These seven ewe lambs you will take from my hand, that you may be a witness for me that I dug this well.” Therefore that place was called Beer-sheba [That is Well of seven or Well of the oath]; because there both of them swore an oath. |
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Genesis 21:22-31 |
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Ishmael’s Descendants |
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These are the descendants of Ishmael, Abraham’s son, whom Hagar the Egyptian, Sarah’s maid, bore to Abraham. These are the names of the sons of Ishmael, named in the order of their birth: Nebaioth, the first-born of Ishmael; and Kedar, Adbeel, Mibsam, Mishma, Dumah, Massa, Hadad, Tema, Jetur, Naphish, and Kedemah. These are the sons of Ishmael and these are their names, by their villages and by their encampments, twelve princes according to their tribes. (These are the years of the life of Ishmael, a hundred and thirty-seven years; he breathed his last and died, and was gathered to his kindred.) 18 They dwelt from Havilah to Shur, which is opposite Egypt in the direction of Assyria; he settled over against all his people. |
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Genesis 25:12-18 |
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Η Μετάφραση των Εβδομήκοντα – The Translation of the Seventy – The Septuagint |
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Seven, at any rate since so elucidated and enumerated by Sanctus Gregorius Magnus – Pope Saint Gregory I, the Great,
Doctor of the Church (* 540; r. 3 September 590 to 12 March 604 †) in his Lib. mor. in Job. XXXI, xvii. |
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| SUPERBIA |
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PRIDE |
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ГОРДОСТЬ |
| avaritia |
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avarice/ greed / covetousness |
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жадность |
| invidia |
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envy |
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зависть |
| ira |
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wrath |
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ярость |
| luxuria/voluptas |
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lust |
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похоть |
| gula |
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gluttony |
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обжорство / чревоугодие |
| acedia |
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sloth |
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леность |
| Septem Virtutes Principales |
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Three Theological Virtues |
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Faith |
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Hope |
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Charity |
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+ Four Cardinal Virtues |
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Prudence |
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Justice |
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Temperance |
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Fortitude |
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Twelve
and
One Hundred and Twenty
and
One Hundred and Forty-Four
and
One Hundred and Forty-Four Thousand |
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| Twelve Fruits of the Holy Spirit – Fructus autem Spiritus |
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| Fructus autem Spiritus est caritas, gaudium, pax, patientia, benignitas, bonitas, longanimitas, 23 mansuetudo, fides, modestia, continentia, castitas. |
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Galatas 5:22-23 |
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| But the fruit of the Spirit is, charity, joy, peace, patience, benignity, goodness, longanimity, 23 Mildness, faith, modesty, continency, chastity. Against such there is no law. |
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Galatians 5:22-23 |
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| caritas |
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charity (love) |
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| gaudium |
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joy |
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| pax |
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peace |
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| patientia |
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patience |
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| benignitas |
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kindness |
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| bonitas |
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goodness |
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| longanimitas |
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long suffering (generosity) |
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| mansuetudo |
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gentleness (mildness) |
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| fides |
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faithfulness (faith) |
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| modestia |
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modesty |
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| continentia |
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self-control |
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| castitas |
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chastity |
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When men began to multiply on the face of the ground, and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God [descendants of Seth] saw that the daughters of men [descendants of Cain] were fair; and they took to wife such of them as they chose. 3 Then the Lord said, “My spirit shall not abide in man for ever, for he is flesh, but his days shall be a hundred and twenty years.” |
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Genesis 6:1-3 |
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Genesis 29-35
Twelve Tribes of Israel
Genesis 46:27
Exodus 24:1–9
Septuagint
Seventy or seventy-two translators according to letter of Aristeas (whether letter discredited may not be important. The number symbolized fullness.)
Acts 1:15 (here Twelve times Ten)
During those days Peter stood up in the midst of the brothers (there was a group of about one hundred and twenty persons in the one place). He said, ...
Acts 6:1-6
At that time, as the number of disciples continued to grow, the Hellenists complained against the Hebrews because their widows were being neglected in the daily distribution.
So the Twelve called together the community of the disciples and said, "It is not right for us to neglect the word of God to serve at table.
Brothers, select from among you seven reputable men, filled with the Spirit and wisdom, whom we shall appoint to this task,
whereas we shall devote ourselves to prayer and to the ministry of the word."
The proposal was acceptable to the whole community, so they chose Stephen, a man filled with faith and the holy Spirit, also Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, and Nicholas of Antioch, a convert to Judaism.
They presented these men to the apostles who prayed and laid hands on them.
Luke 22:28-30
It is you who have stood by me in my trials; and I confer a kingdom on you, just as my Father has conferred one on me, that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom; and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.
Luke 10:1-4
After this the Lord appointed seventy (-two) others whom he sent ahead of him in pairs to every town and place he intended to visit. He said to them, "The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few; so as k the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest. Go on your way; behold, I am sending you like lambs among wolves. Carry no money bag, no sack, no sandals; and greet no one along the way.
[Notes from New American Bible translation: Only the Gospel of Luke contains two episodes in which Jesus sends out his followers on a mission: the first ( Luke 10:1-6) is based on the mission in Mark 6:6b-13 and recounts the sending out of the Twelve; here in Luke 10:1-12 a similar report based on Q becomes the sending out of seventy-two in this gospel. The episode continues the theme of Jesus preparing witnesses to himself and his ministry. These witnesses include not only the Twelve but also the seventy-two who may represent the Christian mission in Luke's own day. Note that the instructions given to the Twelve and to the seventy-two are similar and that what is said to the seventy-two in Luke 10:4 is directed to the Twelve in Luke 22:35.
Seventy[-two]: important representatives of the Alexandrian and Caesarean text types read "seventy," while other important Alexandrian texts and Western readings have "seventy-two." ]
Luke 17:3-4
Take heed to yourselves; if your brother sins, rebuke him, and if he repents, forgive him; and if he sins against you seven times in the day, and turns to you seven times, and says, `I repent,' you must forgive him."
John 20:24
Thomas, called Didymus, one of the Twelve, was not with them when Jesus came.
John 21:1-2
After this, Jesus revealed himself again to his disciples at the Sea of Tiberias. He revealed himself in this way. Together were Simon Peter, Thomas called Didymus, Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, Zebedee's sons, and two others of his disciples. (Seven of them)
Revelation 6:1
Then I watched while the Lamb broke open the first of the seven seals, and I heard one of the four living creatures cry out in a voice like thunder, "Come forward."
[Notes from New American Bible translation: [ 6:1-16:21] A series of seven disasters now begins as each seal is broken ( Rev 6:1- 8:1), followed by a similar series as seven trumpets sound ( Rev 8:2- 11:19) and as seven angels pour bowls on the earth causing plagues ( Rev 15:1- 16:21). These gloomy sequences are interrupted by longer or shorter scenes suggesting the triumph of God and his witnesses (e.g., Rev 7; 10; 11; 12; 13; 14). ]
Revelation 16:1
I heard a loud voice speaking from the temple to the seven angels, "Go and pour out the seven bowls of God's fury upon the earth."
[Notes from New American Bible translation: [1-21] These seven bowls, like the seven seals ( Rev 6:1-17; 8:1) and the seven trumpets ( Rev 8:2- 9:21; 11:15-19), bring on a succession of disasters modeled in part on the plagues of Egypt (Exodus 7-12). See the note on Rev 6:12-14. ]
Revelation12:1
A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
Seven times seven weeks from Old Testament Passover then the Law is given to Moses on Mount Sinai the following, the Fiftieth, day, the Old Testament Pentacost. |
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Leges Duodecim Tabularum – Roman Law of the Twelve Tables |
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| Rise, and have no fear. |
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This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him. |
the Holy Spirit |
Man proposes, God disposes |
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