We are walking in today: Weekend Meditation--
The Biblical Significance of The Number 40, Part 5 of The King Is In The Field Series
Fiveamprayer this season of teshuvah--returning to our original, natural state begins in the month of
Elul and is observed for 40 days.
Reading from Psalms 27 and Song of Solomon 5
Witness immerse throughout the Bible: H7364 rachats spelled resh, chet, tsade--to wash, wash off, wash away, bathe, to be washed
Genesis 7:17 The flood continued forty days on the earth. The waters increased and bore up the ark, and it rose high
The Torah: Genesis 18:4, 19:2; Exodus 29:4, 30:18, 30:20; Leviticus 14:9, 16:4, 16:24; Deuteronomy 23:11
Prophets: 1 Samuel 25:41; 2 Samuel 12:20; Isaiah 1:16, 4:4; Ezekiel 16:9, 23:40
Writings: Ruth 3:3; 2 Kings 5:10; Psalm 30:12; Songs of Solomon 5:3
Prophets: 1 Samuel 25:41; 2 Samuel 12:20; Isaiah 1:16, 4:4; Ezekiel 16:9, 23:40
Writings: Ruth 3:3; 2 Kings 5:10; Psalm 30:12; Songs of Solomon 5:3
This arrangement of the 613 principles, the law of our Lord God Almighty, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is from the book by Rabbi Ralph Messer, Torah: Law Or Grace? Kingdom Principles For Kingdom Living. This book can be ordered online here
The Eighth Commandment--Exodus 20:13 Thou shall not steal
481. You shall not aggrieve one another in your buying and selling -- Leviticus 25:14 And if thou sell ought unto thy neighbour, or buyest ought of thy neighbour's hand, ye shall not oppress one another:
482. You shall not give your brother your money for interest --Leviticus 25:37 Thou shalt not give him thy money upon usury, nor lend him thy victuals for increase.
483. You shall not give your brother food for increase --Leviticus 25:37
484. You shall observe the laws of inheritance --Numbers 27:8 And thou shalt speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a man die, and have no son, then ye shall cause his inheritance to pass unto his daughter.
485. You shall not harden your heart or close your hand against your destitute brother --Deuteronomy 15:7 If there be among you a poor man of one of thy brethren within any of thy gates in thy land which the Lord thy God giveth thee, thou shalt not harden thine heart, nor shut thine hand from thy poor brother:
486. You shall open your hand and lend whatever is lacking --Deuteronomy 15:8 But thou shalt open thine hand wide unto him, and shalt surely lend him sufficient for his need, in that which he wanteth.
487. You shall not move the boundary markers of your neighbor --Deuteronomy 19:14 Thou shalt not remove thy neighbour's landmark, which they of old time have set in thine inheritance, which thou shalt inherit in the land that the Lord thy God giveth thee to possess it.
488. You shall return the lost property of your brother --Deuteronomy 22:1 Thou shalt not see thy brother's ox or his sheep go astray, and hide thyself from them: thou shalt in any case bring them again unto thy brother.
489. You shall not hide yourself from any lost property of your brother --Deuteronomy 22:3
In like manner shalt thou do with his ass; and so shalt thou do with his raiment; and with all lost thing of thy brother's, which he hath lost, and thou hast found, shalt thou do likewise: thou mayest not hide thyself.
490. You shall not take the mother bird with her young --Deuteronomy 22:7 But thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, and take the young to thee; that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days.
491. You shall set free the mother bird when taking the young --Deuteronomy 22:7 But thou shalt in any wise let the dam go, and take the young to thee; that it may be well with thee, and that thou mayest prolong thy days.
492. You shall not cause your brother to take interest --Deuteronomy 23:20 Unto a stranger thou mayest lend upon usury; but unto thy brother thou shalt not lend upon usury: that the Lord thy God may bless thee in all that thou settest thine hand to in the land whither thou goest to possess it.
493. You may cause a gentile to take interest --Deuteronomy 23:20 Deuteronomy 9:11
Yes, after forty days and nights Adonai gave me the two stone tablets, the tablets of the covenant.
The number four signifies completion or fullness. Every time one finds the number forty in Torah, its inner meaning is the ascent from one level to the next higher one. We get a new mission at forty. But the attainment of a higher level can come only after first reaching and fulfilling all aspects of the previous level, and then a making of an emptiness in the middle to allow for the emergence of something entirely new. Why is the number forty so important? Why do we come across this number as a duration of time so often in the Torah? One of the laws of mikveh (a gathering of waters for immersion - baptism) is that it must hold at least forty Seah, or approximately 200 gallons of water. In deriving this quantity of forty Seah, we saw that in a sense, this was based upon a measure of man. The flood of Noah lasted forty days, Moses was on Mount Sinai for "forty days and forty nights" when he received the Torah, and the Israelites similarly spent forty years in the desert. There are many other places where we find the concept of forty in the Bible.
The Jewish people were born anew under the covenant of the Torah, and the Torah itself, in being transmitted to man, had to undergo a birth process. As in the case of man, this was to take forty days. The same reasoning also explains why the Israelites spent forty years in the desert. We find the beginnings of an answer in the laws of childbirth, as they applied in the time of the Holy Temple. The pain and infirmity associated with childbirth are an indication of the imperfection of human reproduction, and therefore, they bring about a state of "impurity" in a woman who has given birth.
Why did the Torah ordain that a woman after childbirth should bring a sacrifice?
When she kneels in bearing she swears impetuously that she will have no intercourse with her husband. The Torah, therefore, ordained that she should bring a sacrifice. (R. Joseph demurred: Does she not act presumptuously in which case the absolution of the oath depends on her regretting it?Furthermore, she should have brought a sacrifice prescribed for an oath!) And why did the Torah ordain that in the case of a male [the woman is clean] after seven days and in that of a female after fourteen days? [On the birth of a] male with whom all rejoice she regrets her oath after seven days, [but on the birth of a female] about whom everybody is upset she regrets her oath after fourteen days. And why did the Torah ordain circumcision on the eighth day? In order that the guests shall not enjoy themselves while his father and mother are not in the mood for it.
Why did the Torah ordain that the uncleanness of menstruation should continue for seven days? Because being in constant contact with his wife a husband might develop a loathing towards her. The Torah, therefore, ordained: Let her be unclean for seven days in order that she shall be beloved by her husband as at the time of her first entry into the bridal chamber.
Our sages teach us that these forty days represent the time that an embryo takes to attain human form. From a standpoint of Jewish Law, an embryo does not have any status as a human being until forty days after conception This concept is also sound from a scientific viewpoint since it is well known that the human embryo begins to assume recognizable human form around the fortieth day after conception. This helps explain why the flood described in the Torah lasted for forty days. According to the traditional interpretations, the main sin that brought about the flood was sexual immorality. The Midrash thus says that the flood lasted for forty days because of the people of that generation "perverted the embryo that is formed in forty days." It is interesting to note that the Zohar gives a similar reason for the fact that the punishment was through the water. The division of the waters represents the original concept of sexuality in creation, with the "upper waters" as the male element, and the "lower waters" as the female. The generation of the flood perverted this basic concept of sexuality, and therefore, the "upper waters" and "lower waters" came together to punish them. In a book of Jewish Mystical philosophy titled Torah Ohr, it is explained that the Flood was not simply the punishment for a totally corrupt world. For, to destroy the world, HaShem could have chosen any number of different methods to this end. The Flood was also an act of purification, which is why the deluge lasted for forty days. The number forty corresponds to the forty seahs (a fluid measurement) in a mikveh (ritual bath). The waters of Noah cleansed the world by immersion in the same way one is purified by immersion in the waters of the mikveh. This separation and removal of all extraneous and undesirable elements have the ultimate purpose of bringing the world (and a person) to a higher level, hence forty:
The waters of Noah cleansed the world by immersion in the same way one is purified by immersion in the waters of the mikveh. This separation and removal of all extraneous and undesirable elements have the ultimate purpose of bringing the world (and a person) to a higher level, hence forty:
Genesis 7:11
The springs of the great deep were split open, and the windows of heaven were opened.
Genesis 7:17
For forty days the flood kept coming on the earth, and as the waters increased they lifted the ark high above the earth.
This same concept also applies to Mikveh, which can be made up of rain waters and spring waters. The same concept also applies to the giving of the Torah. This also involves the idea of birth. The Jewish people were born anew under the covenant of the Torah, and the Torah itself, in being transmitted to man, had to undergo a birth process. As in the case of man, this was to take forty days. The same reasoning also explains why the Israelites spent forty years in the desert. When Moses sent spies to explore the Promised Land, the Torah tells us that:
Numbers 13:25
"they returned from spying out the land at the end of forty days."
The spies knew that the Israelites would undergo a spiritual rebirth when they entered the Promised Land. In order to experience this rebirth themselves and report on it, the spies spent forty days in the land. They were not worthy of the land, however, and therefore, they brought back a bad report. As a result of this report, the Israelites rebelled against Moses, not trusting that HaShem would give them the land. It was then decreed that they should spend forty years in the desert, as the Torah says:
Number 14:34
"Following the number of days in which you spied out the land - forty days - for every day, you shall bear your sins for a year - forty years."
These forty years represent yet another kind of rebirth - the rebirth of an entire generation that would be worthy of eventually entering the Promised Land. We see that the number forty represents the process of birth. As we have said, it is related to the measure of a man. This also explains the forty Seah of water that the Mikveh must contain. The Mikveh also represents the womb, and therefore, these forty Seah parallel the forty days during which the embryo is formed.
In order to understand why birth and embryonic development always involve the number forty, we must introduce yet another concept.
Our Sages teach that the world was created through ten Divine utterances. Mystically, each of these ten utterances manifests itself on four different levels, hence a total of forty. On Shabbat, we refrain from 39 categories of forbidden labor. The Talmud refers to these 39 as "forty minus one" because each one parallels one of the forty levels of creation, except for the highest level of creation, creation of something from absolute nothingness, which has no parallel in our physical world.
Creation consists of four stages, alluded to in the verse:
Isaiah 43:7
"All that is called by My Name,
(1) for My glory,
(2) I have created it,
(3) I have formed it,
(4) and I have made it."
These four stages are represented by the four letters of the Tetragrammaton, God's Name Yud Hay Vav Hay. The first stage is "God's Glory," where things exist conceptually, but not in actuality. The next stage is creation," which represents creation, "something out of nothing." Then comes "formation" where the primeval substance attains the first semblance of form. Finally comes making," where the process is completed and yields a finished product. Our sages also teach us that the world was created with ten sayings.
By ten commands was the world created, and these are they:
In the beginning, God created
Genesis 1
1. And the spirit (ruah) of God hovered 2); And God said: Let there be light; And God said: Let there be a firmament; And God said: Let the waters be gathered together ; And God said: Let the earth put forth grass; And God said: Let there be lights And God said: Let the waters swarm; And God said: Let the earth bring forth; And God said: Let us make man. Menahem b. R. Jose excluded, ’And the spirit of God hovered over the face of the waters,’ and included, AND THE LORD GOD SAID: IT IS NOT GOOD THAT THE MAN SHOULD BE ALONE.
These "ten sayings" enter into each of the four stages of creation, the total number of elements of creation is forty. The number forty is therefore very intimately related to the concept of creation
One Lash Less
A Jew who transgresses a Torah prohibition is punished with lashes. How many lashes? The Torah mentions the number forty but the Sages interpreted this to mean the number preceding forty and therefore rule that the number of lashes is 39. How foolish are most people, exclaimed the Sage Rava, who stand up for a Sefer Torah but not for a Torah scholar. The Torah says forty lashes and the Sages limited it to 39. A similar proof of the power of the Sages could apparently have been brought from the fifty days of counting the Omer which the Sages interpret as 49. But only the example of the lashes is cited because the true greatness of the Sages to be appreciated by the masses is not in their ability to make the Omer count one day less but in their ability to remove one painful lash from a sinner.
HOW MANY LASHES ARE GIVEN? FORTY SAVE ONE?
If it were written, ‘forty in number,’ I should have said it means [actually] forty in number; but as [the order of] the wording is ‘by number forty’ [it means] a number coming up to the forty. Raba observed: How dull-witted are those other people who stand up [in deference] to the Scroll of the Torah but do not stand up [in deference] to a great personage, because, while in the Torah Scroll forty lashes are prescribed, the Rabbis come and [by interpretation] reduce them by one. Every time one finds the number forty in Torah, its inner meaning is the ascent from one level to the next higher one. Forty is the time when a Torah scholar becomes fit to judge and decide halachic questions. Even though the scholar may have previously studied much Torah, not until this power of binah reaches full maturity at age forty can he best analyze, infer, study precedents, and render legal decisions.
There is much more significance to the number 40 throughout the word of Yahweh. We as his Talmidim learn to count. As everything has its significance in the Torah. Shema, Selah--hear, listen and obey the words of Yahweh, take time to reflect and consider this lesson
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