Torah tidbits
PARSHA-PIX - Chayei Sara

ParshaPix
Some elements from last year; some new things...
Upper-left is Rivka at the well, from the Davka Judaica collection of clipart. (Highly recommended, by the way.) 
But before that, we have the bag of 400 silver coins, the exorbitant price that Avraham paid for the cave, field, etc. The payment went to EFRON, whose name resembles the Hebrew word for PENCIL, hence the pencil. 
Avraham sent Eliezer, who took with him 10 camels (gamal-gimmel) laden with all sorts of goodies.
Under Rivka at the well is a gold ring that was among the items given to Rivka by Eliezer.
At Rivka's home, Eliezer was offered food. He refused to eat until his "business" was concluded. Top center is a place setting Xed out, indicating his refusal to eat.
This saved his life, as we are taught that Lavan attempted to poison Eliezer. B'tu'el fell victim to the poison and died.That's the poison bottle under the B"H.
B"H was Eliezer's reply to his apparent success, with G-d's help.
The couple under the CHUPA can represent Yitzchak and Rivka, as well as Avraham and Ketura.
The gift box is for the gifts that Avraham gave the children of the PILAGSHIM (Ketura). It can also be the gifts Eliezer gave Rivka and family.
The two dots are a SHVA, a sound-alike for one of Avraham's sons by Ketura.
The gemstone at the bottom should have been mentioned before. It is one of the opinions as to what the BAKOL blessing was. That opinion is that Avraham possessed a gemstone with curative powers and was sought out by many people from far and wide who were ailing.
That leaves the legth of chain inside the speech-bubble, the birthday cake, and the two items in the loer-right which go together. Let them all consitute a PPP. 

TTRIDDLES...

are Torah Tidbits-style riddles on Parshat HaShavua (sometimes on the calendar). They are found in the hard-copy of TT scattered throughout, usually at the bottom of different columns. In the electronic versions of TT, they are found all together at the end of the ParshaPix-TTriddles section. Some TTriddles are also presentedfor call-in solution on Torah Tidbits Audio (Arutz-7, Thursday night). The best solution set submitted each week (there isnt always a best) wins a double prize a CD from Noam Productions and/or a gift (game, puzzle, book, etc.) from Big Deal

Last week's (Vayeira) TTriddles:

[1] Get up & go! Who to whom, here & in come!
[2] His Aramaic logo can be :)
[3] Rotate it 180º, drop the dot, put it on top - and the trup will match the word
[4] Lot's bug was slow to move
[5] In Eilonei Mamrei. Where else and to whom else?

And the envelope please...

Many solid solvers this week too...
[1] Get up & go is KUMU U'TZ'U, which Lot said to "those who took his daughters" in trying to encourage them to flee S'dom, because it was to be destroyed. (They did not take him seriously.) The phrase KUMU U'TZ'U appears in one other place in the Chumash (in Tanach, for that matter) - in Parshat BO (come, as in here and in come!), when Par'o calls to Moshe and Aharon (after the smiting of the first borns) to leave Egypt with everyone and everything.
[2] Lot of people got this one. Targum (Aramaic) for TZ'CHOK, laughter, is CHIYUCH (in modern Hebrew), a SMILE. So the SMILEY (a colon followed by a close parentheses) can be the logo of YITZCHAK AVINU, whose name means laughter (of joy).
[3] This was harder, but a few got it too. The word GAREISH (GIMMEL-REISH-SHIN), as in 21:10 when Sara tells Avraham to expel Hagar and Yishmael, GAREISH ET HA'AMA HAZOT V'ET B'NAH... has the Torah note T'VIR, which is under the word and looks like a quarter-circle from 3:00-6:00 on a clock-face, with a dot in it. If you drop the dot and rotate the quarter-circle so that it now runs from from 9:00-12:00, and put it above the word, the note will be a GEIREISH (a.k.a. Azla-Geireish), which (almost) matches the word.
[4] I goofed with the presentation of this TTriddle. It should have said Lot's Beetle rather than Lot's Bug. Although BUG is also a nickname of Volkswagen's BEETLE. And that was what was being referred to in the TTriddle. Lot's beetle was his Volkswagen, whose emblem is a V and a W, which when written side by side look like vw, which if you rotate it 90° to the right (still following?) looks like a SHALSHELET, the trup over the word VAYITMAHMAH, and he (Lot) lingered, or was slow to move. You might want to reread this solution to fully get it, but that's what itwas supposed to be. I wonder if more people would have solved it if it used the word beetle rather than bug. Lot's VW was over the word that means SLOW TO MOVE. Something like that. As I've often admitted, TTriddles are easier to make than to solve (usually). But they are fun. Special thanks to the person (she knows who she is) who told me that she enjoys reading the solutions a week later, even though she solves one on her own. That's part of the game with TTriddles.
[5] This one seemed to have confused some solvers. The intention was that EILONEI MAMREI is where VAYEIRA EILAV HASHEM, G-d appeared to him. The TTriddle was where else and to whom else. (Yes, I know it said for whomelse, but to whom else is more accurate.) The solution is based on the full phrase VAYEIRA EILAV HASHEM, which appears in Tanach only three times — B'reishit 18:1, our sedra of the same name, 26:2 when G-d appears to Yitzchak in Gerar and forbids him from leaving Eretz Yisrael, and again in 26:24 when G-d appears to Yitzchak in Be'er Sheva to tell him not to worry, He is with him and will bless him, and multiply his descendants "for the sake of My servant Avraham". So the correct solution to this TTriddle is Yitzchak, twice, in Gerar and Be'er Sheva. (An anel of G-d appears to GID'ON in Sho'f'tim 6:12 with the words VAYEIRA EILAV MAL'ACH HASHEM, also to tell him that G-d is with him.)
Finally, we come to the hidden (in the printed version) and announced (in the electronic version) PPP, ParshaPixPuzzle. In the upper-left corner of the ParshaPix was an array of dots. Many people recognized the dots as Braille, and a few actually read the dots as "kill Lot", the Braille graffiti that one of the wicked citizens of S'dom no doubt wrote on Lot's door after the people were blinded by the angels and Lot's door was closed to them.
Good solutions sets from MM/Bklyn, RHM, Y&S/G, STH of Wynnewood, PA (PPP only). Near perfect solution came from ZviR, who wins the double prizes this week. A few solvers thought the trup TTriddle was the MAHPACH, related to the term for the upheaval of S'dom. Not quite, but something. So too, a few solvers that the SHALSHELET looked like a worm, and thought that was the bug referred to. Again, not quite, but something. The main thing is tohave fun.

This week's TTriddles:

[1] Rivka, Yaakov, Aharon, Mishkan
[2] You can use it for demi tasse
[3] Maybe he was born at 3:00 o'clock
[4] From 3 to approx. 15, one line would fit the sedra and another the haftara


[The Chayei Sara Homepage]
[The TORAH tidbits Homepage] [How to use TORAH tidbits]
[About The OU/NCSY Israel Center] [About TORAH tidbits]


The Torah Tidbit Archive