Meaning of Numbers
in the Bible

The Meaning of Numbers: The Number 19

Nineteen is a number not without significance. It is a combination of 10 and 9, and would denote the perfection of Divine order connected with judgment. It is the Gematria (substituting numbers for letters) of the names Eve and of Job. The number nineteen is also the smallest prime mentioned a prime number of times in the King James Version Bible.

The Meaning of Numbers: The Number 20

Twenty is the double of ten, and may in some cases signify its concentrated meaning. But its significance seems rather to be connected with the fact that it is one short of twenty-one, 21 - 1 = 20; that is to say, if 21 is the three-fold 7, and signifies Divine (3) completion as regards spiritual perfection (7), then twenty, being one short of 21, would signify expectancy, and certainly we are not without illustrations in support of it:

• Twenty years Israel waited for a deliverer from Jabin's oppression:

  "When Ehud was dead, the children of Israel again did evil in the sight of the Lord. 2So the Lord sold them into the hand of Jabin king of Canaan, who reigned in Hazor . . . And the children of Israel cried out to the Lord; for Jabin had nine hundred chariots of iron, and for TWENTY years he had harshly oppressed the children of Israel." (Judges 4:1-3)

• Twenty years Israel waited for deliverance through Samson, Judges 15:20, 16:31. But his work was never much more than "begun," Judges 13:25.

• Twenty years the Ark of the Covenant waited at Kirjath-jearim:

  "Then the men of Kirjath Jearim came and took the ark of the Lord, and brought it into the house of Abinadab on the hill, and consecrated Eleazar his son to keep the ark of the Lord. So it was that the ark remained in Kirjath Jearim a long time; it was there TWENTY years. And all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord." (1Samuel 7:1-2)

• Twenty years Solomon waited for the completion of his house and the temple, after which he gave 20 cities to Hiram, the King of Tyre:

  "Now it happened at the end of TWENTY years, when Solomon had built the two houses, the house of the Lord and the king’s house (Hiram the king of Tyre had supplied Solomon with cedar and cypress and gold, as much as he desired), that King Solomon then gave Hiram TWENTY cities in the land of Galilee." (1Kings 9:10-11)

What are the 20 dreams recorded in the Bible?

Twenty dreams are recorded in the Bible (several people had two dreams recorded in scripture):

1. Abimelech, Genesis 20:3
2. Jacob, Genesis 28:12
3. Jacob, Genesis 31:10
4. Laban, Genesis 31:24.
5. Joseph, Genesis 37:5
6. Joseph, Genesis 37:9
7. The butler of the king of Egypt, Genesis 40:5
8. The baker of the king of Egypt, Genesis 40:5
9. Pharaoh, Genesis 41:1
10. Pharaoh, Genesis 41:5
11. The man in Gideon's army, Judges 7:13
12. Solomon, 1Kings 3:5
13. Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel 2:3.
14. Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel 4:5.
15. Daniel, Daniel 7:1
16. Joseph, Matthew 1:20
17. Joseph, Matthew 2:13
18. The wise men, Matthew 2:12
19. Joseph, Matthew 2:19
20. Pilate's wife, Matthew 27:19