PRIME Minister Portia Simpson Miller’s apparent fixation with the number 7 has been criticised by sections of the country’s religious community, with some suggesting that her perceived reliance on numerology – the study of numbers – borders on occultism.

At a mass rally in Half-Way-Tree on Sunday, where she announced that the dates for Nomination and Election days would be August 7 and 27 respectively, Simpson Miller made much of the fact that she was the country’s 7th prime minister and that Jamaica had 7 national heroes.

The prime minister’s play on the number 7 and the perceived good fortune associated with it stems from references to the number in the Bible espoused by Christians and in the Torah, espoused by members of Judaism.

“The number 7 in scripture stands for perfection, completion and totality, so for example, scripture that deals with other numbers like the 666 are less than perfect,” Rev Gary Harriott of the Jamaica Council of Churches said yesterday, in confirming the significance of the number 7 in the Bible.

Similarly, Ainsley Henriques, director and honorary secretary of the United Congregation of Israelites, said “all the numbers (in the Torah) have some significance but 7, is more important than most”.

But despite the positive references, some church leaders said the prime minister’s focus on the number 7 in her election campaign had no real significance and was tantamount to her manipulating the church and its beliefs to suit selfish purposes.

Pastor Milton Gregory, a vice-president of the West Indies Union of Seventh-day Adventists, said there was no more significance in Simpson Miller’s use of the number 7 than there was when the 16th century seer Nostradamus prophesied the clash of the 7s.

“The number 7 in the Bible speaks to completeness, with some examples being the end of creation and the march around the walls of Jericho, but it was symbolic. So when you just put the 7s together it doesn’t make sense and can become cultic,” Gregory told the Observer.

“I’m not saying the prime minister is cultic,” he quickly added, “but unless the number is used symbolically, it just doesn’t make sense.”

Pastor Gregory said the use of numbers outside of a Biblical and symbolic scope originated with the Egyptians and was practised by astrologists in contemporary society.

At the same time, former president of the National Democratic Movement and member of Jamaica’s Baptist congregation, Hyacinth Bennett, agreed with the pastor that the prime minister’s use of numerology bordered on superstition and occultism.

“The prime minister is in the habit of preambling in most of her public speeches, and last evening (Sunday) when she talked of the importance of 7 in terms of 7 national heroes and her being the 7th prime minister, among the things I deduced and which I think will anger many Jamaicans, was the barefaced reliance on what is more than a mere tinge of superstition and giving pre-eminence to numerology in her politics, and if that is the trend for the PNP then it is degenerating into an occult,” said Bennett.

“It is as if she is inviting and compelling the nation to worship at the shrine of numerology. and (she is) giving numerology a pre-eminence above an honest assessment of the party’s standing and not paying much attention to poll findings,” she added.

Bennett said that the prime minister’s use of numbers was a suggestion that “the party has already spent its intelligence and is relying on puffery”.

Henriques, however, did not bash the prime minister, neither did he endorse her fixation with the number 7.

“I have no problem with her,” he said. “I wouldn’t quarrel with her. If she wants to use numbers like that, then that’s her prerogative.”

Meanwhile, head of the Errol Rattray Evangelistic Association, Errol Rattray, told the Observer he did not think most Jamaicans would be swayed by the prime minister’s focus on the number.

“As a religious leader,” said Rattray, “I don’t want to guide people to believe that because a politician uses certain numbers, that’s the end of it. I believe the Jamaican electorate is more mature than some people give them credit for, and so the whole question of the ‘7’ will not carry a lot of significance for the majority of Jamaicans, but there are people within Christianity and those who are superstitious (for whom) it will.”