Gematria

Also known by the more general name of Hebrew Numerology, gematria is the study of the numerical values of letters and words (including names). This may seem an alien concept in the modern world, in which our exposure to letters as numbers is normally limited to Roman numerals. Yet Hebrew, and Greek to some extent, support a far more elaborate system of numerology. The following chart lists the 22 letters of the Hebrew alphabet along with three values that may be used with each:

The three categories of value may be described as follows:

1. A position, which we shall describe as the letter's ordinal value,
2. A standard value, which falls into one of three ranges: 1, 2, .. , 9 (nine values); 10, 20, .. , 90 (nine more values); and 100, 200, 300 and 400, all of which assumes the same order as the ordinals,
3. A reduced value, which is the non-zero part of the standard value. These are always in the range 1 to 9, so up to three letters may share the same reduced value (eg letters beyt (2), kaf (20) and reysh (200) all take a reduced value of 2.

(note that all three values are identical for the first nine letters).

An interesting consequence of the 'standard' scheme of numbering is that the value of the last letter (ie Tav: 400) is the square of the value of Kaf (20), which is the last letter of the first half of the alphabet.

The Hebrew scheme of numerology is most commonly used for the straightforward purpose of representing numbers and dates. But the merits of gematria go beyond such mundane functions. It is perfectly acceptable for standard letter values to be added to one another to derive whole-word values. The rationale for doing so lies in the richness of the relationships that can be recognised between the values of words that often also have related meanings. It is also often revealing to represent consecutive letters as consecutive reduced values, and to treat them as a single multi-digit number as in the modern positional number system. These processes and substitutions have meaning only with words and names that feature in the Hebrew Bible (not in modern Hebrew), and the many significant outcomes are generally seen as evidence that the Bible and the Hebrew language in which it is written are of divine origin.