religion · Shared topic · Revision 0

What Is Gematria?

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The current answer

Reading Hebrew words by the numbers their letters carry: what the practice legitimately does, and the reason it can be made to prove almost anything.

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Gematria (גימטריא) is the practice of reading a Hebrew word by the sum of the numerical values its letters carry, so that words or phrases with the same total are taken to illuminate one another.

Imported citation, not independently checked: G. Scholem, Kabbalah (1974)

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Chai (חי, "life") is 18, which is why charitable gifts are so often multiples of eighteen.

Imported citation, not independently checked: G. Scholem, Kabbalah (1974)

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Greek letters carry numerical values on the same principle, and the Greek practice is called isopsephy.

Imported citation, not independently checked: David E. Aune, Revelation (1998)

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The reading that commands the widest scholarly support is Nero Caesar written in Hebrew letters (נרון קסר), which totals 666.

Imported citation, not independently checked: David E. Aune, Revelation (1998), on 13:18

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