If There Are 600,000 Letters in the Torah, Where Are the Leviim?

What’s said in this shiur

The opening of this shiur, in Rabbi Dovid Orlofsky’s own words — taken from the captions, so names and Hebrew terms may be approximate.

Hi, this is David Eliavsky with our question and answer series. In Bamidbar, it says there are 600,000 Jews without counting the tribe of Levi. Hazal say there are 600,000 letters in the Torah. Where do Leviim fit in? This is such an interesting question. Because when we say there are 600,000 Jews, that's for sure not true. There were 600,000 There were 600,000 men between the ages of 20 and 60. It doesn't count children. It doesn't count women. It doesn't count anybody over 60. The number 600,000 did not include Moshe and Aaron. It didn't It didn't include Jews who are older than that. They They weren't not counted at all. And there are not 600,000 letters in the Torah. There are 304,700 and I forgot. >> [laughter] >> So there aren't 600,000 letters. So they say, "Well, you could take compound letters and if you look at a ches as two vavs or a vav and a zayin, depending how you write it, you know, you could look at a taf as a reish and a nun, you know, if you start taking them apart, you can you can do it like that." But conceptually, and this is what Rabbi Shmuel spoke about this once, it's coming to teach me a lesson, not that these two facts are not correct.

Jump to a moment

1. 0:00Hi, this is David Eliavsky with our question and answer series. In Bamidbar, it says there…
2. 0:31There were 600,000 men between the ages of 20 and 60. It doesn't count children. It…
3. 1:01and I forgot. >> [laughter] >> So there aren't 600,000 letters. So they say, "Well, you…
4. 1:32that these two facts are not correct. There were not 600,000 Jews in the desert, there…
5. 2:04Torah is not kosher to read from. Yeah? And uh it doesn't matter whether it's the…
6. 2:35people who say, "I don't feel like it makes a difference to God if I live…
7. 3:07Why doesn't every man look like the most handsome man, and every woman look like the…
8. 3:38So, im yirtzah Hashem, everyone should know that you are a letter in the safer Torah.…

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