Saturday, August 16, 2008

Hidden Treasures - Parpraot L'Chachma

The sefer Niflaos M'Torasecha from Rav Mordechai Nachman Aranovsky, ShLiT"A, is full of hidden treasures that lie beneath the surface. He finds words and phrases that are encrypted in the Torah mostly in consecutve Roshei Tevos and Sofei Tevos and connects them to the places where they are found. There are some very special ones in last week's Parsha that I would like to share.

1. Torah

The word Torah does not appear in consecutive Roshei Tevos in all of Tanach. In consecutive Sofei Tevos it appears 32 times but only 6 times in the Torah (Chumash) itself. One of which is in the following Pasuk from last week's Parsha (Devarim 4:13):

יג ויגד לכם את בריתו אשר צוה אתכם לעשות עשרת הדברים ויכתבם על שני לחות אבנים

Aside from the obvious connection of this rare occurrence in a pasuk that discusses the 10 commandments and the written law, as it says ויכתבם על שני לחות אבנים , the sefer Niflaos M'Torasecha wants to say that this is also a reference to the Oral Torah based on the preceding words ויגד לכם to comply with the gemara in Gittin 60b that says:

א"ר יוחנן לא כרת הקב"ה ברית עם ישראל אלא בשביל דברים שבעל פה שנאמר כי על פי הדברים האלה כרתי אתך ברית ואת ישראל:

and this is enforced in the fact that the same pasuk encrypts the word "Gemara" in the first 5 words at 4 letter intervals:

ויגד לכמ את בריתו אשר

2. Halacha

This word occurs in consecutive Roshei Tevos only 5 times in the Torah (16 times in all of Tanach). Again, one of the rare occurences is in last week's Parsha in the following pasuk (Devarim 6:24):

כד ויצונו יהוה לעשות את כל החקים האלה ליראה את יהוה אלהינו לטוב לנו כל הימים לחיתנו כהיום הזה

I think the connection of this hidden word to the pasuk is self-explanatory.

3. Zohar

The word Zohar (no "vav") does not appear in the Torah at all in consecutive Roshei Tevos (2 places in Tanach) or consecutive Sofei Tevos (3 plaaces in Tanach). But it does appear twice in the Torah in consecutive letters hidden in other words. One is in this pasuk (Shmos 18:20):

כ והזהרתה אתהם את החקים ואת התורת והודעת להם את הדרך ילכו בה ואת המעשה אשר יעשון

and the other place is in last week's Parsha (Devarim 5:21):


כא ותאמרו הן הראנו יהוה אלהינו את כבדו ואת גדלו ואת קלו שמענו מתוך האש היום הזה ראינו כי ידבר אלהים את האדם וחי

Niflaos M'Torasecha quotes from the Zohar (Shmos 94a) that at Mount Sinai, HKBH revealed his glory (כבדו) and all the secrets of the Torah and that these secrets were from within the fire (מתוך האש ) . Also the word שמענו also spells out שמעון and is a reference to the author of the Zohar - rabi Shimon Bar Yochai. He also notes that the word Zohar is again hidden in the following pasuk in a 3 space ELS again in last week's Parsha (Devarim 4:44):

מד וזאת התורה אשר שם משה לפני בני ישראל
4. Shema

Last week's Parsha is well acclaimed for the location of the opening paragraph of the Shema. The 3- letter word "Shema" actually appears in consecutive Roshei Tevos about 17 times in the Torah (though 11 of them are repeats of the phrase במספר שמות מבן עשרים in Parshat BaMidbar) and 53 places in total in Tanach. Yet, it seems ominous that one of those 53 places is the beginning of the concluding pasuk of the Haftarah that is always read in Parshat V'Eschanan (Yeshaya 40:26):


כו שאו מרום עיניכם וראו מי ברא אלה המוציא במספר צבאם לכלם בשם יקרא מרב אונים ואמיץ כח איש לא נעדר



אם תבקשנה ככסף וכמטמונים תחפשנה: אז תבין יראת יהוה ודעת אלהים תמצא

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