Symmetrically Designed Sifrei Torah: A Quantitative Analysis - Hakirah

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180 : Hạkirah, the Flatbush Journal of Jewish Law and Thought פרשיות as well as those in the first few חומש number of words in each ‏:ויקרא of Table 1 Number of words in the Torah # of # of חומש Words פרשה Words בראשית 20,614 ויקרא 1,673 שמות 16,714 צו 1,353 ויקרא 11,950 שמיני 1,238 במדבר 16,408 תזריע 1,010 דברים 14,294 Total 15 79,980 According to the actual word count of 79,980, the middle words are words 39,990 and 39,991, i.e. יצק אל in ח׃טו ‏.ויקרא The Gemara’s choice, דרש ‏,דרש are words 40,923 and 40,924. How do we explain a discrepancy of over 900 words? The existing literature addressing this issue is sparse. R’ Isaac Zilber, as he did with respect to the middle letter, again offers a novel 15 The 79,976 number given in the back of standard Chumashim is 4 less than our actual count (the סימן is עט סופר מהיר יפיפית based on the underlined letters). While we know all of the words in the Torah, there are instances in the Torah where there is some question as to whether the letters form 1 or 2 words, e.g. • Devarim 32:6: The first letter in the verse - see Rashi. א 117a: • Pesachim ‏"ר חסדא א"ר יוחנן הללויה וכסיה וידידיה אחת הן רב אמר כסיה ומרחביה אחת הן רבה אמר מרחביה בלבד איבעיא להו מרחב יה ‏.לרב חסדא מאי תיקו ‏(בראשית יד)‏ את כדר לעומר דפסק להו ספרא • 65a: Chulin אלא מעתה ‏.בתרי הכי נמי דתרתי שמי נינהו as well as others. Regardless of whether 79,976 or 79,980 is correct, the discrepancy between the actual middle word(s) and the one the Gemara gives is so great that it cannot be explained by “missing” words.

Symmetrically Designed Sifrei Torah: A Quantitative Analysis : 181 solution. He suggests 16 that the Gemara in Kiddushin is dealing not with words but rather with pairs of words. He proceeds to list 89 places in דרש דרש the Torah where double words are employed and shows that is the 45 th pair. 17 As with his solution with the letters, many have challenged this answer 18 by showing that any list of double letters is arbitrary, 19 e.g. R’ Zilber himself first counted 77 pairs and then 85 pairs before settling on 89. And, as in the previous section, we once again raise the question as to why anyone would be interested in making such a list and finding the center of it. Merzbach tries to address this question by offering the following rationale for R’ Zilber’s general approach: “We have to remember that the purpose of the soferim in the different counts of letters, words, verses and parashiot was to preserve the uniformity and precision of the Written Torah. They wanted to give all the holders of Torah scrolls simple testing methods that would enable them to check that nothing was omitted or added to the Torah scrolls that they hold. It is not practical to ask a person to count 80,000 words, so they suggested much simpler checks, though they are less certain.” Considering: the length of the Torah and the type of errors that can occur, the fact that the Torah is usable even if the “odd” letters are written normally; 20 and that the double-word test is by no means that easy to apply and of very limited usefulness, we find this justification of R’ Zilber’s approach unconvincing. 21 אהבת תורה 16 R’ Zilber says he originally found this idea in a book entitled written by R’ Pinchus Zalman Segal Ish-Horowitz published in 1905. 17 For a list of the 89 “doubles” דף שבועי מספר see 334 by Eli Merzbach at (hereafter referred to as Merzbach). 18 E.g., McKay and Cohen. 19 For example: Should: ) - words from different roots be counted? – No. Yes. - words in successive verses be counted? – ‏(שמות ז׃טז - יז)‏ כה כה * 20 See Rambam ז׃ח - ט ‏.ס״ת Note that he never mentions which letters are big or small. 21 See McKay for a much more critical assessment of the value of these “supposed” tests. The author asserts that the actual middle letter, word and verse would have been much more helpful. ברא שית יב׃א)‏ לך לך *

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