The Lord said to Moses as follows: Speak to the Israelite people and instruct them to make for themselves fringes on the corners of their garments throughout the ages; … look at it and recall all the commandments of the Lord and observe them… B’midbar/Numbers 15:18-19
With these verses the Torah introduces us to a complex world of string theory and a branch of mathematics called knot theory. Together they are a clue to a deeper understanding of the universe with Knot theory enabling us to understand the way complex molecules such as DNA develop. String Theory is a way of understanding the energy and gravity permeating the universe, not in terms of waves or pulses, but as strings and describes how these strings propagate through space and interact with each other.
Reading our passage from the Torah through these dual prisms we can discern the structure of the moral and religious universe as a construct that connects us to God. Just like in the realm of science, a little bit of mathematics helps unravel the layers of meaning.
As each Hebrew letter is given a numerical value, the numerical value of the five letter Hebrew word Ttzitzit can be calculated as follows: Tsadi = 90 (x2), Yod = 10 (X2), Tav = 400 for a total of 600. Each Ttzitzit ends with 8 strings and include 5 sets of knots. Adding these two numbers to our previous total yields 613, the number of mitzvot in the Torah.
The unique pattern of windings of each Ttzitzit also follows a pattern with 7, 8, 11, and 13 wraps of a Ttzitzit string around the other strings between each set of knots. Here again, the numerical value of the Hebrew letters provides insight. The first three wrappings yield a total of 26, the numerical equivalent of the divine name, the Tetragrammaton, (Yod = 10, Hay = 5 (X2), Vav = 6) followed by the last wrapping 13, which yields the Hebrew word Ehchad, one, resulting in the phrase Adonai is One.
Finally, if we multiply the number of strings, 8 times the 4 corners of our Tallit, we get 32, the numerical equivalent of the Hebrew word Lev, heart. This is a reminder that when we wrap ourselves in the Ttzitzit on the corners of our Tallitot, indeed when we perform any of the 613 Mitzvot referenced by our mnemonic device, we connect our hearts with the heart of the universe.
Shabbat Shalom –
Rabbi David M. Eligberg
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