King
James Bible Investments was established as a place for family,
friends, acquaintances and other Christians to be informed
about world market conditions and as a place to preserve their
capital by investing in the only form of real money, gold
and silver.
Biblical records show that gold and silver are the first and
oldest form of money, the only money that has not failed,
and a source of notable value for over 5000 years! Can you
name one fiat currency that has lasted through even a few
centuries let alone a few millennia like gold and silver? We think
not!
Biblical
reasons why real money and wealth is gold and silver
- The
Hebrew word for money is “keceph”, which is translated
to mean “silver.”
- The
King James Bible mentions gold 417 times, silver 320 times, and money, which is mentioned 140 times, refers to physical
silver and gold. Not once does it mention a paper currency.
- Gold
and silver are mentioned all through the bible as real wealth,
even through the end of Revelation.
- From
Genesis to Revelation, gold and silver are the only God-ordained
monetary assets that will maintain their purchasing power
until the day of the Lord’s wrath.
Biblical Gold
Don Stott
Gold is the first, and most frequently mentioned metal in
the Bible, as at Genesis 2:11. From the beginning, it has been
a noble metal, highly valued for its weight, rarity, durable
non-tarnishing luster, shimmering beauty, ductility, and
malleability. A number of Old Testament Hebrew terms refer to
gold, such as zahav, charuts, kethem, paz, seghor, and ophir.
In the New Testament, the Greek words khrysos and khrysion are
used as reference to ornaments, coins, and gold in general.
Gold's rarity, throughout history, and even in Biblical
times, gave it a monetary value, which made it useful in
commercial transactions, as well as a measure of wealth and
prominence. The color and luster of gold, and its resistance
to oxidation or tarnishing, makes it valuable for jewelry and
ornamentation of all kinds. In early Biblical times, it was
found in its native purity in gravel deposits and riverbeds.
It was easily separated and recovered because of its great
weight. In the book of Job (28:1,2,6) mining and refining
operations are mentioned.
In the construction of the Tabernacle, built by Moses,
Exodus 25, 30, 37, and 39 describes using gold being beaten
into plates for overlay, sheets, and even thread used in
garments used by the high priest. In The Most Holy, the Ark of
the Covenant, was gold.
Solomon's Temple, extensively used gold in its décor. As is
done with several modern coins, even ancient Israel evidently
mixed an alloy with gold to harden it. (I kings10:16). David
set aside 100,000 talents of gold for Solomon's Temple. A
talent is about 75 pounds! The Temple's lamp-stands, utensils,
forks, bowls, pitchers, basins, cups, etc, were all made of
gold and silver, with a very few being made of copper. The
cherubs in the Most Holy, the alter of incense, and even the
entire inside of the house was overlaid with gold. By today's
prices, the gold in Solomon's Temple would probably be valued
at $50 billion.
Solomon received large amounts of gold from the King of
Tyre (120 talents), the Queen of Sheba (120 talents), and from
taxes and revenues from his own merchant fleet. First Kings
says that the weight of gold that Solomon received in one
year, was 636 talents of gold. The incredible amount of gold
that was transacted and used in David and Solomon's day is
unbelievable…but true.
When Israel captured cities, God commanded that they not
use the captured gold and silver for themselves. Evidently the
captured gold was re-refined to purify it. The exception was
Jericho. Its gold and silver were turned over to the priests
and used for sanctuary use, according to Jos. 6:17-19, 24.
Gold was so valuable and cherished, that in the Bible, gold
is likened to wisdom, faith and knowledge. Psalms says that
God's laws and commandments are more desirable than gold.
(Psalms 19: 7-10, 119:72, 127) Psalms also says that while
gold has great value, it is unable to give life. (Psalms 49:
6-8) Job says that no amount of gold can buy the wisdom that
comes from God. (Job 28: 12, 15-17,28) The Apostle peter said
ones' faith is of greater value than gold, which can withstand
fire, but be worn away by other means. (I Peter 1:6,7) No
amount of gold can deliver one in the day of God's anger. (Zep
1:18) The point is that gold is the most valuable thing one
can possess, according to the Bible, other than knowledge,
faith, life, and righteousness.
Even in Biblical times then, TANGIBLE WEALTH, as opposed to
spiritual wealth, has always resided in gold, and silver.
Throughout recorded history, gold and silver have been actual
wealth, as opposed to currencies made of various things, such
as mulberry leaves, bark, cigarettes in WW II, sea shells, and
other trivia, but mostly PAPER. History, in all faiths and in
all books of wisdom, and various holy books, have all used
gold and silver as the ultimate form of tangible wealth. In
all races, and throughout all of recorded history, gold and
silver have been wealth, stability, and irrefutable riches.
Today, as well as in past history, governments, kings,
rulers, and charlatans of all types, sizes, and sorts, have
used paper "instruments," as the sophisticates call them, to
hoodwink, steal, and defraud innocents. Be they paper dollars,
promises from hundreds of treasuries throughout history and
the world, or worthless bonds and stocks. All such
"instruments," are as good as the issuers of such, and no
more. A piece of paper, with scribbling or a beautiful
imprimatur, is only as valuable as its issuer. An IOU on a
piece of scrap paper, given you by a trustworthy individual,
is far more valuable than a million pieces of currency from a
bankrupt kingdom or nation.
Promises from a used car salesman or government bureaucrat,
can be honest or dishonest; valuable or worthless. The same is
true with papers of all sorts. A home is a tangible thing,
which can be lived in, raise kids in, sleep in, love in, and
die in, but a piece of paper can be destroyed with the flick
of a match. Tangible vs. fluff, in other words. Leadville
Johnny Brown, on a cold morning on Fryer Hill, in Leadville,
Colorado, burned a hundred thousand paper dollars, when he
started fire in his stove. Molly had hidden it there so he
wouldn't waste it. Gold and silver won't burn, and if Molly
Brown had hidden an equal amount of gold and silver, Johnny
couldn't have started that fire.
It continually amazes me, that by far the majority of all
populations of all nations, throughout history, have believed
the empty promises of their elected officials and leaders. The
common man, has always been fooled by those richer, smarter,
or better dressed than themselves. They have gone along with
the shallow plans and edicts, and used their rulers monies to
save. They have sent their kids to their ruler's public
schools, while they sent their own to private ones. The
majority, has usually been wrong in all matters of state, it
seems. Throughout history, this has been so, be it in Biblical
or modern times, the majority has usually been proven wrong in
their choices of rulers or savings devices. When everyone does
something, I usually do just the opposite. I look at all the
new cars whizzing by my door, and am appalled at the wealth
poured into them. They lose value with every mile. My three
old Mercedes ('73, '74, and '85) give me great joy, incredible
reliability and economy, and go up in value with each month.
My two '41 Plymouths, equally. New cars, T bills, bonds of any
kind, and paper dollars, are absolutely the worst thing one
can do with surplus assets.
If you are religious or an atheist, one can determine from
any holy book or history, but especially the Bible, that gold
and silver are true tangible, physical wealth, which will not
burn, and have never lost their desirability, or ability to
purchase things. Gold and silver have always been a measuring
rod to determine value, and compare things with, or scads of
graphs and charts wouldn't be comparing how many stocks one
can buy with gold, or how many dollars it takes to buy gold
and silver. When long lost ships are discovered beneath the
oceans or seas, their recovery isn't for their rudders or deck
planking, which long ago have disappeared. It is for the gold,
which after a thousand years beneath the briny deep, is still
brilliant, beautiful, and untarnished. History is not wrong.
I am always amused by the expression, "When everything else
fails, try reading the directions." Us guys hate reading
directions or asking for advice or directions when we are
lost. We think we are so damned smart. My clients and other
dealers' clients may be, but most guys and gals are as dumb as
wedges when it comes to investing and protecting themselves is
concerned. They all consort with their advisers who have fancy
offices and nameplates on their doors, with diplomas neatly
framed on the walls. When one is a "licensed financial
advisor," one might think that they might contact me
occasionally, rather than the continual in and out of stocks
and bonds. Not so. One might think that the majority of people
everywhere, might notice that "Gold Medal Flour," or the Lone
Ranger's horse and bullets, weren't named for dollars or
euros. When an Olympic medal winner stands proudly to receive
his or her award, they aren't given hundred dollar bills. They
are given the gold medal. Yet the public continues to ignore
what continually stares them in the face, and even in the
Bible's pages. Gold and silver are true wealth, with which to
protect yourself.
Why would someone want to buy real gold or silver or other
precious metals?
Why would someone want to buy real gold or
silver or other precious metals? There are two primary
reasons. The first is that coins or bars of these metals have
a durable, tangible and intrinsic value which derives from
their future utility in industry as well as their perceived
value as a financial instrument. Owners of precious metal
coins or ingots may use them as a form of savings, but they
sacrifice an interest on the savings, since such coins and
ingots bear no interest. An important counterpoint to the loss
of interest is that the asset value of each coin does not
correspond to an obligation of another party which may be
defaulted. The second reason to own precious metal coins is to
have an asset which is private or anonymous. One man may
choose to spend $100 on a dinner out, the other may choose to
buy $100 worth of gold. The one man has spent his money, the
other has saved it, privately. Although we live in a
computerized world with ever less financial privacy, the owner
of a precious metal is exercising a long tradition of
financial privacy.
An observation which justifies the ownership
of precious metals as a form of savings is that over time, all
printed monies of all nations tend to experience inflation.
Prices rise slowly, and the purchasing power of the money
falls slowly. Governments and their citizens tend to enjoy
inflation at low levels since it allows them to pay long term
debts back with inflated currency. A positive side of mild
inflation is that it tends to encourage savers to place their
money into interest bearing investments and assets such as
homes and stocks, in the hopes that the value of their
investments will grow faster than inflation. A corollary to
that is that everyone knows that only a fool would stuff their
money into a mattress for 20 years. But precious metals, over
the long term, tend to generally hold their value just about
even with inflation. There are occasionally periods where the
value of precious metals does not rise with inflation, but
those are usually followed by periods where the price of the
precious metals rises, sometimes suddenly, and usually finds a
new equilibrium price near the level dictated by inflation.
For persons living in smaller countries where
governments have a history of destroying the value of the
currency, precious metals, primarily gold, represent an asset
which can easily be sold but which will not suddenly lose
value in a currency collapse. Even in modern times, families
in many nations in economic trouble have been able to preserve
their savings, through holding that savings in gold, rather
than their local currency. Those families did not do this by
suddenly converting their savings into gold during a financial
collapse, they did this during the good times preceding the
collapse, by slowly buying gold each time they had spare
savings.
Small countries who get into trouble with
their national debt, and print up a lot of new money trying to
fix things, and then see a dramatic collapse in the value of
their currency, are usually able to let a bunch of folks go
bankrupt, borrow a few billon dollars from the International
Monetary Fund, print a new currency and start over. They are
usually much more concerned about arranging bailout loans than
they are about the option to confiscate gold or regulate or
tax sales of gold.
America is in a very different situation. We
are already borrowing about $500 billion dollars per year from
foreigners. This is about 5% of our entire economic activity
(GDP). If America would get in trouble with the national debt,
print up a lot of new money trying to fix things, and then see
a consistent drop in the value of the currency, yes, many of
us could go bankrupt, but who would bail us out??? If the
dollar upon which we all have relied is losing value, the
central banks of the world might prefer that Americans begin
to save in other currencies such as Yen and Euros, but just as
likely is that Americans begin to consider saving in gold. If
this happens, the US Government and Federal Reserve Bank will
certainly see that a rush away from dollars and into gold, by
American citizens, is a vote of no confidence for the dollar.
The temptation will be to restrict and regulate gold markets
for Americans, trying to force them into holding dollars. But
the real solution is for the Government to manage its spending
and the FED to manage back real trust in the dollar.
The situation in silver is even more dramatic.
Near the end of World War II, since America had been a large
silver producer, and had also accepted silver as payment for
war supplies, the United States Treasury (including
circulating coin) and the US Strategic Silver Reserve held
close to 10 billion ounces of silver. Since then, silver has
become an essential component in thousands of modern products,
and even though the amount of silver mined each year has
grown, the demand for silver has grown so much faster, that
most of those 10 billion ounces of silver reserve have been
used up. As a matter of fact, the ongoing availability of
silver from reserves has tended to keep the prices for silver
low, and so the global mining industry has not made large new
investments related to silver. In essence, the world has been
experiencing a shortage of silver for several decades, and
this has been hidden by the consumption of reserves. Now,
those reserves are gone. Silver known to exist in vaults is
only about 150-500 million ounces…2% to 5% of the reserves we
once had. Enough to cover a couple short years of typical
silver deficit, but that is not enough time for the global
mining industry to build mines to produce an extra 200 million
ounces per year of silver. A shortage of silver is now
eminent. Certain silver investors have recognized the
emergency situation in silver several years ago.
The situation with silver is that an acute
shortage of silver (leading to certain industrial companies
closing down production lines if they can’t find silver) may
now occur almost simultaneously with inflationary erosion in
the value of various global currencies, particularly the
dollar, and a trend away from financial investments such as
stocks and bonds into commodities such as energy, food,
lumber, metals, etc. In any financial environment, the rise in
price caused by an acute and structural shortage in silver
will attract new interest in silver investment, but this could
even be more dramatic in a poor economic environment where
inflation is once again high. Many of the world’s poorest
nations are still prolific savers. If even 1% of the savings
generated in one year were to attempt to invest in silver, the
price of silver would easily move to over $100/ounce.
Historically, most serious investment advisors would advise
owning about 10% of an investment portfolio in precious
metals. If Americans now tried to convert even 1% of their
portfolios into silver, massive increases in silver prices
could occur.

Did you know that in 1980, 7 of
these 100 oz. bars could buy a comfortable house? Silver at
it's sustained peak was valued at about $45 / oz. It's now
around $6 / oz. Will silver go up in value or will real
estate prices decline? Perhaps both will occur.
Regardless, wouldn't you like to own some physical silver
and buy a house with it in a few years?
“Great
opportunities are not seen with your eyes. They are seen
with your mind. Most people never get wealthy simply because
they are not trained financially to recognize opportunities
right in front of them.”
- Robert T. Kiyosaki - Rich
Dad/Poor Dad.
MORE VALUABLE THAN GOLD?
By James R. Cook
When I started Investment Rarities
thirty-two years ago, silver analyst Jerome Smith was already
a legend. In those years he made a series of price predictions
for gold, silver and platinum that were phenomenally accurate.
In 1967 he recommended his readers buy silver at $1.29 an
ounce. In 1971 he recommended gold at $42.00 an ounce. In 1977
he recommended platinum at $147 an ounce immediately before it
shot up to $1,000. In his 1982 book Jerome predicted that
within our lifetimes silver could very well be worth more than
gold. I recently revisited that prediction to determine the
exact basis for which Smith had made this amazing claim.
In the 1970s Smith and silver were
synonymous. Here’s how he described his uncanny track record.
"In 1972, when I wrote the results of a five-year study of
silver in a book that has since been regarded as ‘the bible’
on silver, I said that in the coming decade, ‘silver would
double in price and then double again.’ Only a few of the many
who read that in the early 1970s believed me. And I was wrong.
Instead of doubling twice, it doubled three times over on an
annual average price basis."
In 1980 silver climbed to $50 and fell back
to under $8 the ensuing year. Then in 1982, Smith claimed, "I
expect the price of silver to be in the $100-plus per ounce
range by 1985." Smith based this bullish conclusion on five
primary causes.
- Industrial demand for silver was exploding.
- Mining production of silver was less than consumption.
- Silver production couldn’t be greatly ramped up because
75% of new silver came as a byproduct to base metal mining.
- Since silver was used in such small amounts in its many
applications, a price rise in silver would not reduce the
demand.
- The government had sold off most of its two billion
ounce hoard in a way that kept the price down. Now that it
was gone, free market forces would re-establish the true
price at much higher levels.
Smith went on to predict, "Fundamentally,
the outlook for silver is more bullish from 1982 on than for
any other commodity I know of – including the much-ballyhooed
strategic metals. Silver in 1982 is a cheap precious metal on
the way to becoming a scarce and expensive strategic precious
metal within this decade."
How could this premier silver analyst, who
had so accurately predicted the price rise for silver, gold
and platinum in prior years, miss the mark so widely in the
1980s? For one thing, his 1972 book on silver was read by the
Hunt Brothers, who claimed it was instrumental in their
driving up the price of silver. In that sense, his accurate
prediction was a self-fulfilling prophecy more than it was a
shortage of silver. To some extent, Smith underestimated the
above-ground supply of silver going forward.
However, the greatest reason that Smith’s
predictions failed to come to pass has been outlined many
times by today’s premier silver analyst, Theodore Butler. In
the 1980s, the world’s supply of above-ground silver was
rapidly being depleted and the price should have been moving
higher rather than stagnating. Ted Butler became the first
analyst to pinpoint why. The world’s remaining stockpiles of
silver, mostly in foreign government hands, were being leased
out and then sold off at low prices. This selling kept the
price depressed. In this process, the silver market was
oversupplied. No thought was given to getting the best price.
Free market mechanisms that would have lifted the price of
silver were overwhelmed by a glut of silver sold off by the
banks and brokers, who leased the silver from foreign
governments and others. They sold it off differently than
would the true owners. They were more interested in the silver
lease rate than the price. Some might even have wanted the
price to stay low.
Ted Butler also pointed out a second
crucial fact. A few large trading houses and banks had been
able to get a stranglehold on the silver futures market. Their
finances dwarfed the size of the silver market, and it was
highly profitable to take the short side of futures
transactions and cash in when the price dropped. (They could
sometimes engineer the drop by lowering their bid prices.)
This could also be highly profitable for them in writing
options.
These two artificial market tactics acted
somewhat the same as price controls. Ted Butler has pointed
out that, by holding the price down, these manipulations have
made silver all the more attractive to silver buyers because
of the resulting low price. In that sense, he echoes Jerome
Smith’s claim that the market always has its way. Said Smith,
"The longer and greater the interference, the more sudden and
precipitous the market reaction will be. All the more quickly
prices will move all the lower or all the higher – opposite
the direction of the control – to bring the demand made
and the supply offered into balance." This is what Ted Butler
means when he says the price of silver must explode.
In the spring of 1972, I first read Jerome
Smith’s influential book, Silver Profits in the Seventies.
Probably no paragraph I ever read influenced me more than
these words, "Truly outstanding investment opportunities occur
only occasionally. In general, the better they are, the rarer
they are. Such opportunities are normally long term in their
maturation and by careful study can be foreseen long before
they come to the attention of most investors….. The very
highest profit potentials occur whenever there is a
convergence of two or more primary causes. Such as is with
silver today."
Fast forward to 2004 and, more than ever,
silver has a number of primary causes for extreme bullishness.
Not the least is a dangerously low world supply of silver. We
are likely on the eve of a critical shortage, and the price
doesn’t reflect that fact. This shortage has been camouflaged
by an artificially low price brought about by leasing, and by
the big Eastern market makers’ chokehold on silver in the
futures market. (Market-making is supposedly not allowed.)
This is why Ted Butler says that silver offers the greatest
opportunity for gain that most people will ever have. Usually
a shortage is made visible by the price. Not this time.
Today’s silver price signals nothing. We will run out of the
world’s most crucial metal without any warning (except from
Ted Butler) and the price will have to explode. The silver
shorts and the silver users will be blindsided.
One thing Jerome Smith never contemplated
is the huge increase in demand from India and Asia for
consumer products that use silver (electronics, appliances,
autos, etc.) This skyrocketing demand means that the deficit
between silver produced and silver used will remain a problem
into the future and aggravate the coming price rise.
Furthermore, the booming growth in world populations means
that, by definition, this metal, so critical to modern
civilization, will be utilized all the more.
Nor did Jerome Smith anticipate that the
U.S. government would sell off every last ounce of the
billions of ounces of silver they once owned, including the
100 million ounce stockpile for military and strategic
purposes. He would have enjoyed the fact that the government
(which he disdained) now finds it necessary to buy the silver
they need for their coinage programs in the open market.
One thing that Jerome Smith forecast seems
to be happening only now. He assumed that, because of money
and credit expansion, a rise in the inflation rate would cause
investors to pour into silver. We’ve been inflating for
decades and, for one reason or another, it is just beginning
to catch up with consumer prices. People are definitely buying
more silver than they were a few years ago. The silver story
is getting out, and the surge in buying will definitely impact
the price. In the future these private buyers could very well
be the source of silver for desperate industrial users.
Jerome Smith also made this observation
about the price ratio of silver to gold. "Both gold and silver
emerged in markets as money and served as money, by weight,
long before any government put an imprint on either metal. A
16-1 ratio, or close to that, held from the 4th
century B. C. until the last quarter of the 19th
century – over 2,000 years. The markets quickly adjusted to
the 16-1 ratio when gold was set free in 1968, and again in
1980." Now the ratio of silver to gold is 60-1. A return to
the historic ratio would put silver at $25 per ounce.
From the early 70s to this day there have
been numerous claims that silver usage in photography would be
replaced by new technology. In today’s era of digital
photography, the cheaper throw-away cameras still hold a huge
market share. Jerome Smith seemed to be looking ahead to this
day when he wrote about "new consumer products co-existing
with earlier similar ones while total market demand for old
and new increases."
Jerome Smith was a best selling author. On
the book jacket of his Silver Profits in the 80’s,
there is the following paragraph written by me. "Since I have
prospered as a consequence of Mr. Smith’s predictions, it is
natural to continue to give significant weight to his current
sentiments… If Mr. Smith’s predictions are correct (and his
forecasting record demands that we pay heed) silver may be the
best single investment opportunity any of us may ever be faced
with."
It didn’t work out that way. By 1985 I had
given up on silver. I switched my company’s emphasis to gold,
and kept it there for fifteen years. Then in the summer of
2000 I came across the writings of Ted Butler. He explained
why silver hadn’t lived up to its promise. He showed why Jerry
Smith was more right than wrong. He exposed the price
manipulation of silver and presented a powerful argument as to
why the price of silver was bound to rise dramatically. Ted
Butler replaced the late Jerome Smith as the dominant thinker
in the silver market.
Ted Butler has added fuel to the fire. He
has shown that leasing is bogus. He has argued that the short
sellers will be squeezed and the manipulation must be broken.
He has suggested that the industrial users will panic when
they see a shortage in the silver supply and will have to buy
silver no matter what the price. He has pointed out the
necessity of holding actual, physical silver to get the
greatest gain with the least risk.
Will silver be more valuable than gold some
day, as Jerome Smith suggested? There’s around four billion
ounces of gold above ground and around one billion ounces of
silver. All that gold is worth 200 times the silver. Yet 150%
of each year’s silver mine production is necessary for vital
industrial purposes. Most of the silver ever mined is used up
and gone forever. There’s been a silver shortfall every year
for 20 years but the price has failed to reflect this, despite
the fact that a shortfall is one of the most powerful
influences in establishing a price. Ted Butler believes that
silver is the most undervalued commodity on earth today, and
perhaps ever in history. Jerome Smith was right about silver’s
promise. It may not overtake gold as he suggested, but nobody
who owns it today is likely to ever complain.
“Great
opportunities are not seen with your eyes. They are seen
with your mind. Most people never get wealthy simply because
they are not trained financially to recognize opportunities
right in front of them.”
- Robert T. Kiyosaki - Rich
Dad/Poor Dad.
Acknowledgments
to all those who were instrumental in the construction of
this website.
- Arne
& Lila Britz – Parents
- Bonnie
Britz – Technical help
- Mohamed
Ghaleb – Technical help and friend
- Jason
Hommel -- Jason Hommel of www.linkjesus.com is a fellow
Christian who understands how the unjust fiat money system
is doomed for judgment and that silver and gold will find
favor again as a true form of wealth. He has a rare combination
of understanding gold and silver's role in biblical application
and relation in today’s fiat money system.
- Norm
Franz – Biblical economist who has an extensive background
in business development. As a former monetary economist
and investment company president, Norm is a recognized
authority on money and wealth. His recent book, Money
and Wealth in the New Millennium, is an eye-opening read
and prophetic for today’s world economic situation. I
strongly suggest that every Christian who has any interest
in finance, the stock market, or money in general read
his book!
Bible Investments
631-728-4133

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