Another feature of ancient scrolls is the presence of unusual, additional, or altered taggim and/or letter forms.   These unusual features were almost always predicated upon kabbalistic traditions and reasoning…

Examples of Odd Taggim and Letter Forms From the Ancient Sefer ha-Taggim

Almost all of these oddities have vanished from modern practice because we lack expertise in the field of, well,  applied kabbala.    Therefore, it is extremely rare to ever come across  any actual examples of these altered forms or taggim.  The only ones I have seen were in a very unusual 200 year-old Hungarian Sefer Torah.

Further Examples of Kabbalistic Scribal Oddities From the Machzor Vitry

Yesterday,  Sotheby’s held a large auction of historical Judaica.  Of particular interest to Soferim and safrus-fans alike is a late 13th-century Spanish Sefer Torah up for auction.

See here for a brief .PDF overview of the Sefer Torah.

What blows me away about this sefer is that it is 1) in EXCELLENT condition, and 2) is replete with these aforementioned anomalies.

Also,  the Shaatnez Getz taggim (see Here, Here, and Here) were left out by the original sofer (the Rambam holds that Shaatnez Getz taggim are only required in mezuzos) and written in by a later scribe.

It is also apparent that the Sefer has been “corrected” several times; kabbalistic letter forms have been scraped away and replaced with their standard counterparts.   Nevertheless, you can still see the shadow of the original letters.   Luckily, many of the most impressive features remain untouched.

Please take a look at the Sotheby’s overview of the Sefer – it is fascinating and offers a rarely seen glimpse into the ” powerhouse”  Sifrei Torahs of the past!

While we do not place vowel markings in a Torah scroll, there is a tradition to place dots over the letters of certain words in ten verses:

• Bereishis (Genesis) – 16:5; 18:9; 19:33; 33:4; 37:12.

• Bamidbar (Numbers) – 3:39; 9:10; 21:30; 29:15;

• Devarim (Deuteronomy) – 29:28

What is the purpose of these dots?

The Talmud Yerushalmi, Pesachim, 9:2 explains as follows:

“The Sages say, when there are more undotted letters than dotted letters, expound upon the undotted letters and don’t read the dotted letters, and when there are more dotted letters than undotted letters, expound the dots and don’t read the letters. Rabbi says, even when there is only one dot above them, expound the dot and don’t read the letters.”

The Medrash in Bereshit Rabba 48:16  and  Rashi to Bereshis 18:9 both quote the rule of the Yerushalmi, writing: “Rabbi Shimon ben Elazar says, any place you find more  undotted letters than dotted ones, you expound the undotted letters; more dots than letters, you expound the dots.”

In other words, certain pesukim contain layers of meaning that are revealed by alternate, homiletical reading of certain words.  These alternative readings are indicated by our helpful friend: the Dot.

For example, in this section of the Torah, the three visiting angels who arrive at the tent of Avraham address their host: “…Vayomru eilav ayeh sarah…”  They inquired of him: ‘Where is Sarah…?”

In this passage, the word eilav, of him, has dots over the letters Alef, Yud, and Vov.   The letter Lamed is the only letter not dotted.  Based upon the aforementioned rules of interpreting dots, we can read the word eilav as if the Lamed is not present.  Read as such, the passage is: “… Vayomru ayo…” They said: Where is he?

Rashi interprets: not only did the angels ask Abraham, “Where is Sarah?” but they also asked Sarah, “Where is he; where is Avraham?”  For us, this teaches that one should always inquire of a man as to the welfare of his wife and of a woman as to the welfare of her husband.

There are other deeper, mystical interpretations of this reading, Where is he?,  in addition to Rashi’s interpretation, that reveal even further layers of meaning.

Now, you may have noticed that my dots over the word eilav in the above photo are shaped like small diamonds.   This was purely unintentional; the mere product of the placement of quill upon parchment.

The Kesses ha-Sofer 16:4 writes that there is no particular shape for the dots, only that they cannot resemble any of the the Hebrew letters – i.e. yud.

Check back tomorrow for pictures of columns 16 & 17!

In this final (at least for now…) post on taggim we are going to take a look at some unusual examples of taggim and, at the end, some of the deeper reasons for these special “crowns”.

Example #1

These examples of decorated taggim are from a 17th century German Torah scroll in the possession of Yitzchok Resiman, a well-known sofer in New York.

Most of the taggim throughout the scroll are simple, tiny lines without heads (not the “zayins” we described previously).   However, the taggim at the tops of several columns at at the beginnings of several section are embellished, appearing almost like small heraldic shields. 

And a closer view…

Check here for more pictures of taggim oddities…

Example #2

While the halacha requires taggim only upon the letters of shaatnez g’etz, there is a tradition to add taggim to other letters as well.   However, there is some dispute among the Rishonim (early medieval scholars) as to exactly which letters receive these added crowns.

Nowadays, these additional taggim are usually placed in tefillin and mezuzos only.  The following are pictures of additional taggim from tefillin parshiyos:

Note the added taggim on the heads of the "shin" and the right head of the "ayin"

Note additional taggim on the "shin" and "koof"

Note taggim upon the "pey" and "samech"

See added taggim on the "pey" and "tes"

Example #3

There are also varying traditions of elaborating and embellishing certain taggim.   Sometimes these embellished taggim became vehicles for the sofer to express himself artistically, as seen in the following photos from a 130-150 year-old sefer Torah from Romania/Hungary.  These sorts of extremely elaborate taggim are rarely seen in old Torah scrolls and almost never written in modern ones.

Taggim crowning the verse "How beautiful are your tents, O Jacob, your dwelling places, O Israel..."

One of the laws of taggim is that the parts of the crown cannot touch one another or the taggim upon another letters.  The parts of the crowns must all be separate and distinct.  Note the extreme care taken by this sofer in his more elaborate designs to keep each and every tag distinct and unconnected to any other tag.

Deep Stuff

Lastly  – What exactly is the reason for these taggim?  The Sefer Iggres ha-Tiyul brings the only known reason for the taggim, explaining that the letters shaatnez getz form the names of two prosecuting angels: Soton A’z and Getz.  By placing taggim on the letters of their names, the tiny “swords” and “daggers” of the taggim bind these destructive angels and save us from their power.

Rav Yehuda said in the name of Rav: “When Moshe ascended to the heavens he    found the Holy One, Blessed is He, sitting and binding taggim, crowns, to letters.

Moshe said before him: ‘Master of the World, who is holding you back from giving the Torah just as it is?’

He replied to Moshe: ‘There is a certain man who will exist in the future, at the end of many generations, Akiva ben Yosef  [Rabbi Akiva] is his name, who will expound mountains of halachos from each and every point…’” …

… Said Rava: “Seven letters require three ziyunin [taggim] each.  And they are: Sha’atnez Getz“

When Moshe arrived in the heavens, he found that G-D had already completed his Sefer Torah.  Does Moshe’s question, “Master of the World, who is holding you back from giving the Torah just as it is?” imply that the Torah was fit to be given even without affixing taggim/crowns to the letters?

See more here…

According to the Rambam, Meiri, and Rabbeinu Yeruchum, this is exactly the case, and the absence of taggim is not an invalidating factor in Safrus.

Similarly, the Yireim understands that there is no fundamental requirement for taggim to be affixed to the letters.   Rather, when Rava says that “Seven letters require three ziyunin each, ” he is speaking about something else altogether.  According to the Yireim, the word ziyunin is related to the word for “corner.”  Thus, the Yireim understands Rava as stating that the heads of the letters Sha’atnez Getz must have at least four well defined corners.  There is no obligation whatsoever for taggim according to his interpretation.

However, Rabbeinu Tam, the Rosh, and the Ravya’h all understand Rava’s requirement for taggim, crowns,  as intrinsic to the kashrus of whatever is being written.  According to them, if one forgot to put taggim on even one of the letters of Sha’atnez Getz, the mezuza/Torah/tefillin at hand is rendered invalid.

The Shulchan Aruch decides in favor of the Rambam, Meiri, and Rabbeinu Yeruchum that omitting taggim from any of the letters of  Sha’atnez Getz does not constitute an invalidation.  However, many of the Acharonim, the Vilna Gaon in particular, are concerned for the strict positions of R’ Tam and the Rosh.  Therefore, the Mishna Berurah requires that any omitted must be corrected.

Another lesson learned from the Talmud here is that the taggim do not need to be written at the time that the letters themselves are written.  After all, we see that G-d was binding the crowns to His sefer Torah only after it was completed.

Indeed a nicer quality of script can usually be produced by writing the taggim in at a later time.   Because of this, many soferim will finish a column and then go back to put in the taggim after the ink has dried.

According to some Ashkenazi poskim, though, it is a hiddur (a beautification,  or a preferable way of writing) to write the taggim concurrently with the letters, lest one forget to do so later or accidentally overlook a letter.    In tefillin and mezuzos, it is a good idea to put the taggim in concurrently for the same reason mentioned by a sefer Torah, but also because the work area is much smaller and there is a greater risk of error when going back to write the taggim.  Errors in tefillin and mezuzos are tricky and usually cannot be corrected, so it is better to try to do everything once and get it right the first time!

Therefore, many Ashkenazi soferim will write the taggim as they go along writing the letters.  However, many Ashkenazi, and most Sephardi soferim will write the letters of a section first and them add in the taggim later.

In the next post I will share some pictures of ornate and unusual taggim.

Please check back soon!

The Letter "Shin" - Note the three-pronged crown on the leftmost head

The halacha (law) is that the Hebrew letters shin (ש), ayin (ע), tes (ט), nun (נ), zayin (ז), gimel (ג), tzaddi (ץ) all must be crowned with taggim.  These letters are known by the mnemonic שעטנ”ז ג”ץ ,  sha’atnez getz.  Both the basic and final forms of the nun and the tzaddi require taggim.

The source for this unique requirement is Menachos 29b:

אמר רב יהודה אמר רב: בשעה שעלה משה למרום, מצאו להקב״ה שיושב וקושר כתרים לאותיות, אמר לפניו: רבש״ע, מי מעכב על ידך? אמר לו: אדם אחד יש שעתיד להיות בסוף כמה דורות ועקיבא בן יוסף שמו, שעתיד לדרוש על כל קוץ וקוץ תילין תילין של הלכות

…

אמר רבא: שבעה אותיות צריכות שלשה זיונין, ואלו הן: שעטנ״ז ג״ץ

…

Rav Yehuda said in the name of Rav: “When Moshe ascended to the heavens he    found the Holy One, Blessed is He, sitting and binding taggim, crowns, to letters.

Moshe said before him: ‘Master of the World, who is holding you back from giving the Torah just as it is?’

He replied to Moshe: ‘There is a certain man who will exist in the future, at the end of many generations, Akiva ben Yosef  [Rabbi Akiva] is his name, who will expound mountains of halachos from each and every point…’” …

… Said Rava: “Seven letters require three ziyunin [taggim] each.  And they are: Sha’atnez Getz”

See more here…

There are a number of fascinating points that jump out from this Gemora, but let’s start with the obvious:  “What are taggim?”  The Beis Yosef 32 & 36 define taggim as three lines, of a hair’s breadth each, connected to the leftmost head of the letters שעטנ”ז ג”ץ,  forming a crown.

Yet, note that Rava’s statement uses the term “ziyunin” to refer to taggim.  The word ziyunin literally means “zayins” as in the letter zayin.  Read as such, Rava is telling us that we must affix three zayins to each of these seven particular letters.

From this fact, the Rambam in Hilchos Tefillin 7:8, the Agor,  and other Rishonim learn that the taggim should ideally have the form of small zayins, meaning that each tag should be a line with a head centered and sitting atop it, much like the letter zayin (I’ll mention here that there is a second interpretation of Rava’s “ziyunin” that we will save for later…)

Ayin with three taggim on its left head

Tes with its taggim

Nun with its taggim

Zayin with taggim

Gimmel with taggim

Tzaddi with its taggim

While there is no shiur, or size requirement for the height of these “sha’atnez getz” taggim,  the Mishna Berurah writes that the taggim should be “small and thin, like a hair’s breadth.”  The Sefer Kesiva Tamah is more specific, suggesting that the height of the taggim be like the height of the tip of the quill.   Note that these suggestions are merely aesthetic and practical in nature, not halachic (legal).

In the next post, we are going to take a closer look at our gemora from Menachos and ask:

What is the law if one leaves out or forgets the taggim?

Can taggim be added to other letters besides sha’atnez getz?

Are the alternative forms of the taggim?

Must one write the taggim as he goes along, or may one write his mezuza/tefillin/Torah and add the taggim in later?

What is the true purpose of the taggim and what do they really mean?

The Torah is read publicly every Shabbos of the Jewish year.  The Rambam (known to the rest of the world as  Maimonidies), in his Mishna Torah,  Laws of Tefillin, Mezuza, and Sifrei Torah, Chapter 8, provides a division of the Torah into 54 parshiyos (divisions) based upon Masoretic traditions evidenced by the Aleppo Codex.  Following this division, the public reading of the entire Torah is completed each year of the Hebrew Calendar with adjustments made to accommodate leap years and the schedule of holidays.

The first of these 54 divisions is Bereishis (Genesis 1:1 – 6:8), which spans the creationg of the world to the generation of Noach.

I will be posting photos of the completed parsha tomorrow afternoon along with some new videos.

Check back then!

Why is this letter small?  What must any letters be written small?

There are  several different ways of interpreting these small letters…

• The small letter’s purpose it to split its word into two; these new words are then interpreted (usually midrashically/homiletically) and the small letter ignored.

• Ignore the small letter, reading the word as if it is spelled without it.

• The small letter indicates that the word’s meaning is weakened or diminished from its usual understanding.

• Each letter of the Hebrew Alphabet is a self-contained universe of meaning and associations.  There is some aspect of the reduced letter itself that we are supposed to learn.

The Meor ve-Shemesh explains the reduced “hey” according to the latter method, pointing out that the Gemora in Menachos 29b tells us that the physical world was created via the letter “hey.” The reduced “hey” teaches that a fundamental concept of creation is that  a person should reduce his connection to the physical world and its pleasures.

Alternatively, the Gemora (ibid.) also learns from the letter’s structure that “hey” connotes teshuva, “return to G-D. “  Therefore, the reduced hey indicates that the world was created for the sake of returning to closeness with Ha-Shem (G-D).

Alternatively the Midrash (Bereishis Rabbah) understands the reduced “hey” as a reference to the patriarch Avraham.  If you ignore the reduced hey, then you are left with the letters:

באברם

Which spell “for the sake of Avram,” hinting that the world was created for the sake of Avram, the first person to recognize the oneness of G-d and spread that knowledge to the world.

As we write this sefer together, I intent to post explanations for all of the small & large letters as well as the other assorted scribal oddities that we’ll run into.

Check back here daily for more updates, articles, and features!

The Zohar Chadash’s statement is, however, difficult in light of the fact that our Sifrei Torah only contain 304,805 letters! As far back was can verify, via ancient texts, this has always been the case. There is no evidence nor mention anywhere of there ever having been a 600,000-letter Torah Scroll.

There are several possible answers to this problem, most of which require the realization that a single Hebrew letter is, more often than not, not a single Hebrew letter. There are two way of understanding this:

1 – every Hebrew letter can be formed by a combination or permutation of six letters: Dalet, vov, zayin, yud, kaf, or nun. For example, the letter mem is a kaf with a vov attached to its front while a alef can be reduced to a vov with yud attached up top and down below. When one counts letters according to their constituent parts (i.e. alef = 3 letters and Mem = 2) instead of as single letters (i.e. alef = 1 and mem=1) you find that the total number of letters is almost exactly 600,000. This understanding is suggested by the Megaleh Amukos, the Pnei Yehoshua to Kiddushin 30a, and the Mishnas Avraham.

2 – The Beis Yosef YD 275 points out that when the Halacha speaks in general terms of “letters,” this usually implies the smallest letter that there is, the yud. Additionally, the Beis Yosef points out that we describe the dimensions of the letters in terms of “yuds.” A shin, for example, is three-yuds wide, while most other letters are two-yuds wide and a few are only one-yud in width. If one totals all of the yud-widths of all the 304,805 letters, the result is supposedly 600,000 letters.

Curiously, I have calculated both of these totals only to find that understanding #1 results in a total of 552,865, while #2 results in a total of only 575,376!

Indeed, very few of any of the proposed solutions to this problem, when calculated out precisely, get us close to 600,000.

Part of the problem may be that don’t fully understand the counting methods described by the sages who have tackled this question. For example, Rav Saadia Gaon wrote that he once counted the letters in the Torah and arrived to a total of over 700,000 letters! We are not sure how Rav Saadia got this number and, to this day, no one has ever duplicated his method of counting.

However, I think that a solution may lay in reexamining the Beis Yosef who proposed that one should count the letter-widths of the total number of letters.

Ideally, the halacho is that a Sefer Torah should be written in 245 columns with 42 lines per column, which translate to a total of 10,290 lines of text. Now, the dimensions of an ideal line of text are such that it should be wide enough to accommodate 62 yud-widths. If we multiply 10,290 lines of text by 62 yud-lengths per line, then the total yud-lengths encompassed by a sefer torah are 637,980.

Now, there are certain places in the Torah text that must be left blank, such as the breaks between the paragraphs of the Torah and the spaces between the lines of Shiras ha-Yam and Haazinu, both of which are written in a different format then the rest of the Torah. The total average yud-widths of these blank sections is about 56.7 yud-widths. If we subtract the total yud-widths of the sections that must remain blank from the total yud-widths of a Sefer Torah, then we arrive at

637,980 (total yud-legnths of lines for writing) – 37,932 (the total number of blank lines) = 600,048 yud-widths.

As far as I can tell, this explanation gets closer to the 600,000 letter count that any other ever offered. But note, that according to this interpretation, the 600,000 letter count mentioned by the Zohar Chadash is not a count of the actual letters of the Torah, but rather an enumeration of the total amount of written space that is occupied by the letters of the Torah. Indeed, as we have just shown, the total amount of writable space is almost exactly 600,000 yud-widths.

Tomorrow, I’ll start posting an overview of the creation of a Sefer Torah, starting with the making of the parchment, all the way though the Siyum ha-Torah and…. Ta Da! Photos of the second amud are coming soon!

Checking, Checking...

Although I finished writing the first amud (column) of the new Torah Friday morning, there was still some work left to do.   Before moving onto a new column, I always  go through the previous column at least twice.    The first sweep of the text is to check for any obvious misspellings or imperfections in the letters.  The second sweep is to remove any flecks or wayward speckles of ink.   These checks are both done with the aide of a good-sized magnifying lens….

Using a Curved Blade to Clean up the Parchment

As I go along, I use a broad, curved blade to gently scrape away anything that has to go.    At this stage, razor blades or X-acto knives are not helpful; they can all-too-easily tear or puncture the klaf (parchment).  Once I’m satisfied with the column, only then do I begin the next one.

The Completed First Amud

  

A Closer View

In the context of the whole project, though, what is the meaning of a single column?

Let us step back for a moment and look at some of numbers associated with making  a Sefer Torah.

Almost all Sifrei Torah written today require 62 sheets of parchment with 3 or 4 columns per-sheet.   Producing that amount of parchment requires the slaughter and processing of over 30 cows!  On these 62 sheets are written over 10,000 lines of text, encompassing 669 paragraphs, which equals 5,888 verses, equaling 79,847 words comprised of 304, 805 letters.   This is all arranged over 245 neat columns.

Just one column requires about 7.5  hours of labor, meaning that  the writing of a Torah scroll necessitates over 1800 hours of detailed labor.   But that is only the writing;  sewing and assembling these 62 sheets can also be time consuming.

For Kehillas Torah Chaim of Dallas, this means that their Sefer Torah is now 1/245  (or, if you prefer, 0.00408163…  or 0.04% )complete.  So, in the beginning, there was quite literally 0.00408163….

Tomorrow I will be writing about the question of how many letters there are in the Torah. In particular, why do our Sages tell us there are 600,000 when we only count (and I’m sure that you’ve all sat down and counted them) 304,805 letters.   Hmmmm….

The First Line, First Verse of the CTC Sefer Torah

For a sofer, the prospect of beginning a new Sefer Torah is a little like being a tight-rope walker.  One stands at the edge of the platform, staring down a long narrow rope, peering past any natural apprehension to focus on one thing: balance.  Creating a new Sefer Torah is about just that.

There are, without exaggeration, thousands of halachos a sofer must know and satisy in order to create an object of such incredible kedusha.   Along with these halachic requirements, the sofer must also strike a balance between aesthetic, financial, and material considerations.

The burden upon the sofer is intimidating.  However, Tehillim offers a prescription:

השלך על־יי יהבך והוא יכלכלך

Cast your burden upon HaShem, and He shall sustain you…

Thus the Sefer Hasidim writes: ” Before one starts to write any sort of sefer, he should fast one day and pray to Ha-Kadosh Boruch Hu for success, that nothing adverse should happen in the course of his writing, and by doing so he will be successful and no harm will come to him.”

On June 24, 2009, after having spent a day in fasting and prayer, the time came to step out onto that tightrope and to start writing.   The kulmusim (quills) were cut, the kesses (inkwell) was refilled, and many in the Congregation Toras Chaim family were present as the first word of the Torah, Bereishis, was written.  (The Sheelos U-teshuvos Beer Yitzchok YD 19 states that it is a mitzva to gather for the beginning of  new Sefer Torah and to celebrate, as that the event constitutes the initiation of a mitzva).

It must be emphasized that the process of writing a Sefer Torah is not merely the lonely endeavor of the Sofer.   Everyone who contributes to the writing of the Sefer becomes a partner in the mitzva.

But what does it mean to become a “partner” in the mitzvah of writing a Sefer Torah?   The Shulchan Aruch O.C. 32:31 rules that one must speak each word he writes aloud before writing it.   Rashi and Tosafos to Menachos 30a state that this is purely a practical halacha to ensure that the sofer not err.  However, many Acharonim rule like the Bach, who states that one should speak out each word “so that the holiness of the breath of his words will be drawn upon and imbued into the letters of his writing.”

According to the Bach, the holiness of a Sefer Torah is partially contributed to via the very breath of the sofer.  The human act of reading and speaking the words of the Torah as it is written connect and bind the sofer to the Sefer on a very deep level.

By becoming a partner in and contributing to the writing of a Sefer Torah, one not only gains a portion of the mitzva, but creates an everlasting bond between him/herself and the kedusha of that very Sefer.

Please take the time to bind yourself, your family, and your loved ones to this very special mitzva by sponsoring a day of writing.   A Yom Kesiva can also be dedicated in honor of joyful events, life cycle events, or to the memory of a loved one.  Please go to the buttons on the sidebar for more information.

– Rabbi Avraham Chaim Bloomenstiel, Sofer

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