Torah tidbits
PARSHA-PIX Parshat Ki Tavo

Click on image for enlargement

Parsha Pix
Upper-right is the Bikurim story. Basket of first fruits placed at the side of the Mizbei’ach. The bringer is smiling the ultimate smile, as the Torah commands us to rejoice in all that G-d has given us. And smilie is reciting (speech bubble) about going down to Egypt and about being brought out of Egypt and taken to Eretz Yisrael.
Upper-left is HASHKIFA... G-d, look down upon us from on high...
One of the blessings mentioned in the sedra is that if we keep the Torah, then we will be “heads” not “tails". See the two shekel coin images.
Lower-left are the 12 stones upon which were engraved the Torah (or parts of it).
Lower-right is the opened treasure, as we ask of G-d. That treasure is in the form of beneficial and timely rains, and the bumper crops that result from good and plentiful rain.
The skate is for the word HASKEIT. It is a unique word in Torah and Na"Ch. Words that appear only once are often difficult to translate, since they provide only one context with nothing to compare it with. HASKEIT is rendered as "pay attention" or "be silent" or "form groups". It is followed by USHMA, and listen, hence the different possibilities for HASKEIT.
The successful basketball shot is for BARUCH TAN- ACHA, blessed is your basket (i.e. fruit, Rashi).
Thumbs up pointing to a city scape and a field is BARUCH ATA BA'IR UVARUCH ATA BASADEH.
That leaves 5 (that's a lot) unexplained items, a.k.a. visual TTriddles or ParshaPixPuzzles.

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 (KI TEITZEI) TTriddles:

[1] grass, meat, grapes; but she?
[2] his A or B; his B or C - whose? what? what not?
[3] All boys, in Tanach, only OVEID and ?
[4] The mother bird and whose water?
[5] Samuel Irving - 1895-1979
[6] As a word, it appears only twice; as 5/7 of an acronym, it completely pervades all scrolls
[7] Key man from a misspelled mourner
[8] NUN Ki Teitzei, CHET R'ei
[9] Mitzva fringe benefit for army exemptee

And the envelope, please...

[1] V'ACHALTA, and you will eat, appears 15 times in Tanach, all in Chumash, 13 of the 15 times are in D'varim. A few of those times, the object of the eating is a specific food, as presented in the wording of the TTriddle: the grass of the field (G-d's words to Adam after his eating from the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil), grapes (Ki Teitzei), meat (R'ei). One additional time, a word spelled the same way, but in feminine form occurs. It is in Megilat Ruth and it is she who is told V'ACHALAT, and you will eat... what? Bread dipped in vinegar.
[2] HIs (your brother's) donkey (A) or ox (B) fallen, his (brother's) ox (B) or sheep (C) lost -- that's the whose and what so far. The what not is to ignore the situation. (See D'varim 22:1,4)
[3] All boys at their BRIT are given a name, referred to as SH'MO B'YISRA'EL, his name in Israel. In Tanach, the phrase appears only twice. Once in the book of Ruth, when she gives birth to OVEID, David HaMelech's grandfather. The other reference is not to a name of a boy, but to the Chalitza process (D'varim 25:10): BEIT CHALUTZ HANA'AL.
[4] Many TTriddles originate from an unusual word that catches attention. In the portion of SHILU'ACH HAKEN, the term used for the mother bird's sitting on her eggs or chicks is ROVETZET. The feminine form of ROVEITZ, it appears only thrice in Tanach. Besides with the mother bird, it refers to deep waters, in the bracha of Yaakov to Naftai and the bracha of Moshe to Shevet(s) Yosef. (ROVEITZ appears four times in Chumash.)
[5] Samuel Irving Newhouse... Just a play on the family name, as in BAYIT CHADASH (22:8).
[6] SHAATNEZ. Again, unusual word leading to a TTriddle. As the mixture of wool and linen, the word appears only twice (K'doshim and Ki Teitzei). But add a GIMEL and a TZADI and you have the acronym SHAATNEZ GATZ, for the 7 letters (plus the second form each of the NUN and TZADI) upon whose square heads are placed the triple-Tagim in STAMM (Sefer Torah, T'filin, Mezuza, Megila).
[7] The word KI (key), the word ISH (man), and the word MEI-AVEL (from a misspelled mourner, because this AVEL is spelled with an AYIN, rather than an ALEF) - all follow the phrase LO YIKACH, he shall not take. Those are the only three times LO YIKACH appears in Tanach. (LO TIKACH is more common, with 10 occurrences.)
[8] An old TTriddle rephrased. The haftara of Ki Teitzei is RANI AKARA... (Yeshayahu 54:1-10). The haftara of R'ei is ANIYA SO'ARA... (54:11-55:1). The combined portions (54:1-55:1) is the haftara of Parshat No'ach. So Ki Teitzei is marked with the NUN of No'ach, and R'ei is marked with the CHET.
[9] One of the people who is exempted from army service (except for a "mitzva-battle") is a groom in his first year of marriage. The accompanying mitzva is his requirement to rejoice with his wife.
[Ace solver YYW (this week's prizes-winner) puns that the fringe benefit is Talit, worn from the time one marries, according to some (but not all) customs. This is not just TTriddle stuff; the source of the custom to put Talit on from marriage, rather than Bar Mitzva (and before), as with many other mitzvot, is the juxtaposition of the repeat command to put tzitzit on the four corners of a garment (D'varim 22:12) to the words: When a man takes a woman...]

This week's TTriddles:

[1] who'd we tell it to before the kohen?
[2] HaShem (3), Torah (7), Shira, and who?
[3] Ark, Place, Kohein/Kohanim, King
[4] Shiur: One over basket
[5] obverse, not reverse
[6] It has alchemits drooling
[7] your fathers, my family, the Land, where, where, and whom
[8] plus 5 elements from the ParshaPix


[The Parshat Ki Tavo Homepage]
[The TORAH tidbits Homepage] [How to use TORAH tidbits]
[About The OU/NCSY Israel Center] [About TORAH tidbits]
 [www.ou.org]
 
The Torah Tidbit Archive