Torah tidbits
PARSHA-PIX Parshat B'chukotai

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Parsha Pix
Top left is a graphic of rain falling from a cloudy sky, onto the ground, from which a plant is growing. (Very hard to see in the black and white hard copy ParshaPix, but clearly seen in the color email and website version.) To the right of that image is a watch. Together they represent G-d's promise of beneficial rain in its proper time and that the ground will yield its bounty.
Upper right is another part of the promise - that we will eat bread in abundance.
And below the oven and breads is another part of the promise, peace in the Land.
The non-mathematical statement that 5 is greater than 100 and that 100 is greater than 10,000, is yet another part of the promise for our following Torah and Mitzvot. Namely, that if our enemy were to attack us, five of us would repel 100 and 100 would chase away a myriad (10,000, that is).
Beneath that is a former TTriddle. Zodiac symbol for Taurus, the Bull, represents newborn calves, which are tithed separately from the other two kinds of kosher animals. The sign for Aries represents lambs and that of Capricorn is for goats. The newborns of goats and sheep can be combined for the purpose of MAASEIR B'HEIMA, because both kinds of animals are called by the collective term TZON.
Speaking of tithing one's newborn animals, along the right side of the ParshaPix is a lineup of ten lambs, counted from top to bottom. The 10th one to pass under the shepherd's crook is designated as holy, hence the star-burst around it.
In the lower left is a family, with each member marked with their ERECH (value) in original shekels. 50 for a male between 20-260, 30 for a female in the same age range. 20 for a boy between 5-20 and 10 for a girl that age. The baby is marked 5?3 because we cannot tell if it is a boy or a girl. Boys from one month to five years are valued at 5 shekels and girls that age are 3 shekels. Not shown are seniors with a value of 15 and 10, male and female respectively.
125% is the total amount one pays to redeem that which carries with it an addition of chomesh. (See Sedra Summary for further details.)
The fellow lifting the barbell with ease must be very strong, as in CHAZAK, CHAZAK...
One item remains unexplained as the visual TTriddle this week.
Speaking of TTriddles, since the TTriddles page was printed, we have received quite a number of solution sets. No one got them all, but all of them were gotten. MM/Bklyn snapped out of a slump with a prize-winning solution set. YYW did a fine job, as did RHM. Two TTriddlers guessed that HBS was Harvard Business School, which would have mixed feelings, perhaps, about some of the economic rules regarding Yovel and redemption of consecrated things. Good one, fellows.

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. 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

Last issue’s (EMOR) TTriddles:

[1] HBS would have mixed feelings about part of B'har
[2] Partial fulfillment of Va'eira's opener
[3] When the previous afternoon is NOT like the day itself
[4] The Shma-like pasuk makes G-d's intentions clear
[5] possibly implies not to read Torah Tidbits during davening
[6] Confused dispute-partner of Amora Rav Yosef
[7] Maybe it's the 13th year
[8] Besides Sh'mita, B'har's other Har Sinai connections
[9] plus one element from the ParshaPix

And the envelope, please...

[1] HBS is Harriet Beecher Stowe. She wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin (1852), the most famous piece of anti-slavery literature of the 19th century. She would probably have mixed feelings about the different details of EVED IVRI and EVED K'NAANI towards the end of B'har.
[2] In Va'eira's opening p'sukim, we find the promises from G-d to take us out of Egypt... and to bring us into Eretz Yisrael and give the Land to us. In Vayikra 25:38, G-d says that He took (past tense) us out of Egypt, in order to give (but not yet, at that time) you the Land...
[3 ] For most days on which Tachanun is not said, we also don't say it at Mincha of the previous afternoon. The exceptions to that rule are Erev Rosh HaShana, Erev Yom Kippur, and Pesach Sheni (this past Monday).
[4] Same answer as [2] above. Different from the last pasuk in Sh'ma, in which G-d tells us that He took us out of Egypt in order to be to us, G-d, in Vayikra 25:38, He "clarifies" His intention of carrying out His full 3-pronged Plan: To take us out of Egypt, to be our G-d and that we shall be His Nation (commitments made at Sinai), and to bring us into the Land and give it to us as a Heritage.
[5] In B'har's haftara, we find the pasuk (Yirmiyahu 32:16) that says, "And I prayed to G-d, after TT..."
[6] R Yosef's main BAR P'LUGTA was RABA (b. Nachmani), who served as Rosh Yeshiva in Pumbadita for 22 years, from age 18 to 40, when he passed away. (Some say he died at 60.) Confused means scramble the letters, of RABA and we get B'HAR.
[7] This refers to Sh'mita year, which of course is the 7th year, but on a TTriddle level, if you misunderstand the pasuk which says, Six years you shall plant your fields and six years you shall tend your vineyards... Six and six makes twelve, so Sh'mita must be the 13th year.
[8] There's a straight answer to this TTriddle, and then a little TTriddlier answer. At the end of the sedra, we find G-d's statement (again) that He took us out of Egypt (first commandment at Sinai), that we may not make idols or bow on an EVEN MASKIT (second commandment), and we must keep the Shabbat (fourth). These are all SINAI connections, besides Sh'mita. And here's the TTriddle answer. For Bnei Yisrael are to Me as AVADIM... (Vayikra 25:55), this is the pasuk quoted as the answer as to why an EVED IVRI (Jewish servant) who asks to remain in service "forever" (until Yovel) has his ear pierced. The ear that heard at Sinai, KI LI BNEI YISRAEL AVADIM... and went and acquired a human master... We are to be G-d's AVADIM and not AVADIM to AVADIM. This pasuk from B'har is referred to as the words we heard at Sinai.
[9] Which brings us to a new version of an old PPP (ParshaPixPuzzle). This was a straight (are any TTriddles ever truly straight?) pictogram (a.k.a. pictograph). The letter O, a picture3 of a dodo bird, and oven, and another dodo, smaller than the first. O DODO O VEN DODO... (Vayikra 25:49)
Also... the smaller dodo can be a male offspring of the larger one, which makes him a BEN-DODO.
Or if he is a cousin of the other dodo, then he would be BEN-DODO anyway.
As of this writing (very early - Erev Shabbat B'har, would you believe it?), no one has submitted answers, nor was anyone expected to yet submit them. If any good solution sets come in, we'll share that news with you some other place in this issue.

This week's TTriddles:

[1] In a TTriddle-way, it represents all of Mishna & Gemara
[2] This time, the deal is to all of us. For what individual was a similarly worded deal offered?
[3] CD LaZ TU FGF
[4] Newborns: 17 calves, 17 lambs, 17 baby goats • How many animals are MAASER
B'HEIMA?
[5] plus one element for the Parsha Pix


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