Meaning
Five Hebrew letters change shape at the end of a word: kaf, mem, nun, pe and tsadi. In the standard count they are worth what their ordinary forms are worth. Mispar Gadol, the large count, gives them the hundreds that the alphabet otherwise lacks: after tav at 400 come final kaf 500, final mem 600, final nun 700, final pe 800 and final tsadi 900. The Hebrew alphabet thus reaches 900 just as the Greek does with sampi.
Agrippa printed exactly this in 1533, setting the finals as the last row of the Hebrew hundreds, and added that some writers instead write 500 to 900 with tav and another hundred. The Jewish Encyclopedia of 1906 lists the large count among the methods, and the Hebrew calculators carry it as one of the main ones.
How it is counted
שלום, shalom, "peace": ש 300 + ל 30 + ו 6 + ם 600 = 936; reduced to 18, then to 9.
נחש, nachash, "serpent": נ 50 + ח 8 + ש 300 = 358; reduced to 16, then to 7.
אמת, emet, "truth": א 1 + מ 40 + ת 400 = 441; reduced to 9.
Only a word that ends in one of the five forms changes; shalom, which ends in a final mem, rises from 376 to 936, while emet and nachash, which do not, are unchanged.
Which rule we follow
Our other Hebrew methods count a final as its base letter, and this page is the one place where they do not. The chart names the method beside every total, so a reader can see which rule produced it.
The other way to write 500 to 900
Agrippa notes that not everyone used the finals as numbers. Some wrote the hundreds above 400 by adding to tav: tav with qof for 500, tav with resh for 600, tav with shin for 700, two tavs for 800, and two tavs with qof for 900. Under that convention a final letter is only a final letter, and a word's large count and standard count are the same; Mispar Gadol is the method that gives the finals their own values. The difference can be large: king, מלך, is 90 by the standard count and 570 by the large.
Correspondences
Each item with how it stands: “sourced” is in the work cited, “our construction” is EsoTerrier’s own, and “disputed” means the sources disagree.
- Agrippa's Hebrew table (1533)
- The finals as 500 to 900, completing the hundreds sourced
- Jewish Encyclopedia (1906)
- Describes the finals counted 500 to 900 among the methods sourced
- Calculators
- TorahCalc and Kesher list it among the main methods sourced
How the schools read it
- Agrippa (1533)
- Gives the finals as the hundreds 500 to 900, and mentions the compound alternative.
- Reference works
- List it as the large count beside the standard.
- EsoTerrier
- A core Hebrew method; the only one in which finals are not their base letter.
Claims about it
-
The finals have always been worth 500 to 900.
falseWhat the record shows: Only in this method. In the standard count, and in our other Hebrew methods, a final letter counts as its ordinary form; some writers put 500 to 900 as compounds of tav instead.
