70: The Importance of Numbers in the Bible

“Our days may come to seventy years, or eighty, if our strength endures; yet the best of them are but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away.” - Psalm 90:10 (NIV)
 
In some Asian cultures, the age of seventy is called the Rare Age of the Olden Times. It is represented by platinum in wedding anniversaries. Copyrights generally expire after seventy years.
 
Seventy is the atomic number of ytterbium. In archery, the archers stand seventy metres from the targets. Both the Canadian and Hungarian Grand Prix contain seventy laps. Seventy miles per hour is the national speed limit, although I am sure some drivers appear to be unaware of this! The Earth’s oceans and seas cover approximately seventy per cent of the planet. 
 
In the Bible, the number seventy appears at least sixty times and is considered to be a sacred number. It is made up of the sum of two perfect numbers: seven, which represents perfection, and ten, representing God’s law. As a result, some theologians say the number represents the universe.
 
The first time the number seventy appears in scripture is in chapter five of the book of Genesis. Here, in verse twelve, we are told that Kenan was seventy years old when he became the father of Mahalelel. Later, in chapter eleven, it is revealed that Terah was seventy when he fathered Nahor, Haran and Abram, subsequently renamed Abraham.
 
Some sources say that the Ancient Egyptians took seventy days to embalm a body. In the Bible, however, we are told the time required for embalming was forty days. This is written in Genesis 50:1-3 following the death of Jacob (Israel). It is reported that the Egyptians mourned him for seventy days. 
 
Several times in the Bible, it is recorded that there were a total of seventy descendants of Jacob in Egypt:

• Genesis 46:27 (NIV): With the two sons who had been born to Joseph in Egypt, the members of Jacob’s family, which went to Egypt, were seventy in all.
• Exodus 1:5 (NIV): The descendants of Jacob numbered seventy in all; Joseph was already in Egypt.
• Deuteronomy 10:22 (NIV): Your ancestors who went down into Egypt were seventy in all, and now the Lord your God has made you as numerous as the stars in the sky.

In the books of Exodus and Numbers, it is revealed that Moses appointed seventy elders. These elders are also symbolised by the number of palm trees the Israelites sheltered under when they reached the city of Elim.

• Exodus 15:27 (NIV): Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve springs and seventy palm trees, and they camped there near the water.
• Exodus 24:1 (NIV): Then the Lord said to Moses, “Come up to the Lord, you and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and seventy of the elders of Israel. You are to worship at a distance
• Exodus 24:9 (NIV): Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abihu, and the seventy elders of Israel went up
• Numbers 11:16 (NIV): The Lord said to Moses: “Bring me seventy of Israel’s elders who are known to you as leaders and officials among the people. Have them come to the tent of meeting, that they may stand there with you.

 
Another important mention of the number seventy is in relation to the amount of time the Israelites were held in captivity by the Babylonians. The people of Judah were also in captivity for seventy years. In the book of Daniel, Jerusalem was given seventy weeks to put an end to their sins. Records of these are found several times in the Bible. Here are a few:

• 2 Chronicles 36:1 (NIV): The land enjoyed its sabbath rests; all the time of its desolation it rested, until the seventy years were completed in fulfilment of the word of the Lord spoken by Jeremiah.
• Isaiah 23:15 (NIV) At that time Tyre will be forgotten for seventy years, the span of a king’s life. But at the end of these seventy years, it will happen to Tyre as in the song of the prostitute
• Jeremiah 25:11 (NIV): This whole country will become a desolate wasteland, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years.
• Daniel 9:24 (NIV): “Seventy ‘sevens’ [weeks] are decreed for your people and your holy city to finishtransgression, to put an end to sin, to atone for wickedness, to bring in everlasting righteousness, to seal up vision and prophecy and to anoint the Most Holy Place.
• Zechariah 1:12 (NIV): Then the angel of the Lord said, “Lord Almighty, how long will you withhold mercy from Jerusalem and from the towns of Judah, which you have been angry with these seventy years?”

 
There are many other mentions of the number seventy but I could spend all day telling you about each one. I have selected a few more verses in addition to those already mentioned to give you a flavour of the significance the number held. Only once is the number seventy mentioned in the New Testament. 

• Numbers 7:13 (NIV): His offering was one silver plate weighing a hundred and thirty shekels and one silver sprinkling bowl weighing seventy shekels, both according to the sanctuary shekel, each filled with the finest flour mixed with olive oil as a grain offering
• Judges 1:7 (NIV): Then Adoni-Bezek said, “Seventy kings with their thumbs and big toes cut off have picked up scraps under my table. Now God has paid me back for what I did to them.” They brought him to Jerusalem, and he died there.
• Judges 8:30 (NIV): [Joash] had seventy sons of his own, for he had many wives.
• Judges 9:2 (NIV): “Ask all the citizens of Shechem, ‘Which is better for you: to have all seventy of Jerub-Baal’s sons rule over you, or just one man?’ Remember, I am your flesh and blood.”
• Judges 9:4 (NIV): They gave him seventy shekels of silver from the temple of Baal-Berith, and Abimelek used it to hire reckless scoundrels, who became his followers.
• Judges 12:14 (NIV): [Abdon] had forty sons and thirty grandsons, who rode on seventy donkeys. He led Israel eight years.
• 1 Samuel 6:19 (NIV): But God struck down some of the inhabitants of Beth Shemesh, putting seventy of them to death because they looked into the ark of the Lord. The people mourned because of the heavy blow the Lord had dealt them.
• 2 Kings 10:1 (NIV): Now there were in Samaria seventy sons of the house of Ahab. So Jehu wrote letters and sent them to Samaria: to the officials of Jezreel, to the elders and to the guardians of Ahab’s children. 
• 2 Chronicles 29:32 (NIV): The number of burnt offerings the assembly brought was seventy bulls, a hundred rams and two hundred male lambs—all of them for burnt offerings to the Lord.
• Ezra 8:7 (NIV): of the descendants of Elam, Jeshaiah son of Athaliah, and with him 70 men
• Ezra 8:14 (NIV): of the descendants of Bigvai, Uthai and Zakkur, and with them 70 men.
• Ezekiel 8:11 (NIV): In front of them stood seventy elders of Israel, and Jaazaniah son of Shaphan was standing among them. Each had a censer in his hand, and a fragrant cloud of incense was rising.
• Ezekiel 41:12 (NIV): The building facing the temple courtyard on the west side was seventy cubits wide. The wall of the building was five cubits thick all around, and its length was ninety cubits
• Acts 23:23 (NIV): Then he called two of his centurions and ordered them, “Get ready a detachment of two hundred soldiers, seventy horsemen and two hundred spearmen to go to Caesarea at nine tonight.

 
Saint Augustine of Hippo (345 AD – 430 AD), a Roman African philosopher, associated the number seventy with the totality of an evolution, i.e. a life cycle being completed. This was mostly in relation to the cosmos, however, other thinkers have connected this theory with the years the Israelites spent in Babylonian captivity followed by the seventy years that Jerusalem thrived. 
 
The fact that the number seventy appears so frequently in the Old Testament suggests that there ought to be a particular reason for its use. Sceptics, however, point out that it could be a rough number to indicate that there were a lot of years, people etc. involved. 
 
What do you think? Does the number seventy hold special meaning in the Bible? I welcome your thoughts.