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Concept
613 commandments
Summary
According to Jewish tradition, the Torah contains 613 commandments (taryag mitzvot). This tradition is first recorded in the 3rd century CE, when Rabbi Simlai mentioned it in a sermon that is recorded in Talmud Makkot 23b. Other classical sages who hold this view include Rabbi Simeon ben Azzai and Rabbi Eleazar ben Yose the Galilean. It is quoted in Midrash Exodus Rabbah 33:7, Numbers Rabbah 13:15–16; 18:21 and Talmud Yevamot 47b. The 613 commandments include "positive commandments", to perform an act (mitzvot aseh), and "negative commandments", to abstain from an act (mitzvot lo taaseh). The negative commandments number 365, which coincides with the number of days in the solar year, and the positive commandments number 248, a number ascribed to the number of bones and main organs in the human body.
Although the number 613 is mentioned in the Talmud, its real significance increased in later medieval rabbinic literature, including many works listing or arranged by the mitzvot. The most famous of these was an enumeration of the 613 commandments by Maimonides. While the total number of commandments is 613, no individual can perform all of them. Many can only be observed at the Temple in Jerusalem, which no longer stands. According to one standard reckoning, there are 77 positive and 194 negative commandments that can be observed today, of which there are 26 commands that apply only within the Land of Israel. In addition, some commandments only apply to certain categories of Jews: some are only observed by kohanim, and others only by men or by women.
Rav Hamnuna sourced the count of 613 in the verse ("Moses commanded us the Torah..."). The Talmud notes that the Hebrew numerical value (gematria) of the word Torah is 611. Combining 611 commandments which Moses taught the people, with the first two of the Ten Commandments which were the only ones directly heard from God, a total of 613 is reached.
Other sources connect the tzitzit (ritual fringes of a garment) to the 613 commandments by gematria: the word tzitzit (Hebrew: ציצת (Biblical), ציצית, in its Mishnaic spelling) has the value 600.
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