While some people love gematria, others are skeptical. Whatever your attitude, keep in mind that gematria isn’t a modern-day invention but is prevalent throughout the words of Chazal. One may wonder why Chazal teaches their deep and insightful lessons by making seemingly superficial numerical connections between words?
The thesis of my book, “Gematria Refigured,” is that the essence of gematria isn’t the numerical coincidence but the type of idea that Chazal teaches through gematria. That is, Chazal uses gematria—a method that converts words into quantities—to teach us about the surprising significance of quantity in the topic at hand. In other words, Chazal uses gematria as a hint to direct our attention to a certain type of idea or insight—one involving quantities.
While the book provides many examples supporting this thesis, one is particularly relevant to this time of year and our yearning for the ultimate Geula. In the krias haTorah for Tisha B’Av, the Torah describes the tragedies that will befall the Jewish people when we get “old” (venoshantem) and sinful in the land of Israel. Specifically, Hashem warns us that we will be utterly destroyed. Rashi points out that the gematria of “venoshantem”—“852,” references that we’ll be thrown out of the land and destroyed after 852 years. But in His kindness, Hashem exiled us two years early—after 850 years. This is because if the first half of the pasuk would have come true—we would have gotten old in the land for a full 852 years—the second half would have also come true—we would have been utterly destroyed. By sending us out two years early, we were spared the fate of absolute destruction and remain alive today to yearn for our upcoming Geulah.
What is the lesson of this Rashi? And what does it have to do with gematria and an idea involving quantity? I think the answer is that we often think about evil in qualitative black-or-white terms without recognizing the quantitative shades of evil. We might assume that 852 and 850 years of descent to evil are basically identical. After all, what difference can a mere quantity of two years make? Rashi undermines this simplistic intuition and teaches that two years can make all the difference. While we were very evil at the end of 850 years, we still had the potential for teshuva—we could still find a route back to Hashem. However, two extra years of descent into evil would have represented a tipping point—a point of no return—that would have led to our total annihilation.
The lesson is that Hashem’s judgment doesn’t reduce everything to qualities—good or evil—but pays close attention to quantities of good and evil. Chazal’s usage of gematria points our attention to the important role quantity plays in Hashem’s judgment. “Gematria Refigured” argues that this is not an exception but is the objective of all of Chazal’s gematrias—to teach specific lessons involving quantity.
You may wonder why quantity should be so important that Chazal should devote a method of derash to it. To answer this question, we must realize that quantity is more important than it seems at first sight. In fact, there’s a name of Hashem, “Sha-dai,” that Saadya Gaon and Abarbanel maintain refers to the fact that Hashem fixed the perfect quantities in His universe. This is based on the Gemara in Chagigah 12a which says that when Hashem was creating the universe, it was expanding like two balls of thread until He said, “dai—enough.” Hashem is called “Sha-dai” because He is the one—“sheamar laolam dai,”—who said to the world, “Enough!” The Gemara cites another example of this middas Hashem in that He precisely fixed sea-level to rise just enough.
The message is that quantity is more significant than it may seem at first sight. Because part of the chochama of Hashem’s creation involved setting the perfect balance of quantities to allow the universe to operate, the name “Sha-dai” is devoted to this aspect of Hashem’s creativity. And because Chazal recognizes the unexpected significance of quantity in various areas of Torah, they use the quantitative method of gematria to direct our thoughts towards quantitative ideas.
The middas Hashem of Sha-dai is especially clear in the context of modern science, which has recognized the great role of mathematics and quantity in Hashem’s universe. Specifically, over the last few decades, physicists have discovered that our universe is precisely fine tuned—that there are many constants of nature whose values are so precisely tuned that if they were even slightly different, there would be no atoms, molecules, planets, stars, galaxies or life.
The most extreme example is called the “cosmological constant,” a number that determines the strength of a type of anti-gravity force that causes the universe to expand. Its value has been measured to be about 3 x 10?122—that’s 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000003. Scientific calculations have shown that this number is exquisitely fine tuned to lead to a universe capable of producing galaxies, stars and life. If it were a little larger, the early universe would have expanded too fast to allow galaxies to form; if it were a little smaller, the early universe would have collapsed too quickly for anything complex like life to form. Truly, Hashem fixed this quantity and said to the universe, “dai—enough.”
In the podcast, “Physics to God,” I and my co-host, Rabbi Aaron Zimmer, elaborate on fine tuning in a clear and accessible manner. We demonstrate how the discovery of fine tuning provides a compelling science-based argument for the existence of God—the one who said to the world—“Enough!”
May Hashem—in His abundant mercy—see the quantity of tzaros we have suffered in this long galus, say “dai—enough,” and speedily bring about our final redemption.
Rabbi Elie Feder, PhD is a rebbe at Yeshiva Bnei Torah and a math professor at Kingsborough Community College. He is the author of “Gematria Refigured” (2022) and “Happiness in the Face of Adversity” (upcoming), and is a co-host of the podcast “Physics to God.”
