PARSHA-PIX - Parshat Ki Tavo

Parsha Pix

Bikurim basket by the side of Mizbei'ach, happy bringer telling of going into Egypt and coming to E. Yisrael. G-d look down upon us...send us your treasures (rain), 12 stones with Torah engraved. Be a head not a tail.

TTRIDDLES...
are Torah Tidbits-style riddles on Parshat HaShavua (sometimes on the calendar events of the week). The best solution set submitted each week (there isn’t always a best) wins a double prize — a CD from...Noam Productions and/or a gift (game, puzzle, book, etc.) from...Big Deal A fun place to shop

Even if you can’t solve any, they are fun (and sometimes informative) to read about in the weekly TTriddles report (which is what you’re reading now)

Last week's (SHO’F’TIM) TTriddles:
[1] Is M’chuya’el of P’nu’el liked?
[2] How many tags on lana e lino?
[3] distal phananx to tragus

And the envelope please...
[1] M’chuya’el was the great-grandson of Kayin and the grandfather of Lemech (who killed Kayin). He is also referred to as M’chiya’el. (Sounds a lot like the pronunciations of Litvaks & Galitzianas respectively.) P’nu’el is a place first mentioned right after Yaakov’s encounter with the Guardian Angel of Eisav (or whomeverhe struggled with). It is actually first referred to as P’ni’el. Again, two spellings and pronunciations for the same word. A person. And a place. In Ki Teitzei, we find the word S’NU’A (hated - too strong - let’s say, less loved) in the portion about a man having two wives, etc. The word also appears as S’NI’A, again,a YUD instead of a VAV. The TTriddle could have been, what word in this week’s sedra has two variant forms, similar to the two forms of the name M’chuya’el and the place P’nu’el? But that’s not how TTriddles sound. So it became, Is M’chuya’el of P’nu’el (he probably wasn’t from that place) liked? And the answer is NO,because of the word-connection to S’NU’A. Some of you probably think the TTriddle (or the one who makes them) is warped. But several readers actually got the answer. So there!

[2] Here’s a good example of a TTriddle that was half-solved by several, but fully solved by none. LANA is wool in Spanish and Italian. LINO is linen in both languages. And “e” is “and” in both. Without knowing if it is in good form, LANA E LINO is wool & linen, which is SHAATNEZ (mentioned in Ki Teitzei). Half way there.How many tags? Some solvers who had the Shaatnez part just ignored the TAG part of the question. Others thought it referred to an identifying tag. Actually, it refers to the Hebrew word TAG, the marks make on top of certain letters in a Sefer Torah, T’filin, Mezuza, etc.

Scribal tradition is to put a crown of three tagimon the square head of seven different letters – ZAYIN, NUN (both forms), GIMMEL, AYIN, SHIN, TZADI (both forms), and TET. The mnemonic device to remember the letters with the triple crowns is SHAATNEZ GATZ. The word SHAATNEZ is unusual in that it has 15 TAGs on it.

[3] I’m sure this TTriddle sent many people to the dictionary to look up TRAGUS. (Impressive is the one who knew the word without looking it up.) The tragus is the projection of skin-covered cartilage in front of the meatus of the external ear. That means it’s what you would press with the tip of your finger to close yourear to prevent yourself from listening to LASHON HARA, gossip, vulgar language, and the like. A phalanx (among other definitions) is a finger or toe bone. The distal phalanx is the bone at the tip of the finger. Baal HaTurim has a play on words for and a YATED you shall have on EITZANECHA. It is a REMEZ, he says to closingthe ear.

This Week's TTriddles:
[1] Promise in the parsha;advice in the perek
[2] Page 9, Niccolo, 1782-1840 (Ed Norton) - not on the parsha
[3] MEM = 7. How so?
[4] The Pesach, Shavuot, Sukkot, Chanuka connection
[5] No more boxes on pages 1 & 2
[6] 2,3,4,9,11,12 • 1,5,6,7,8,10