The Bible consists of 24 books: the 5 books of Moses, the 8 books of the Prophets, and the 11 books of the Writings. The sages teach us that the secret of the number 24 is related to Isaiah chapter 3, verses 18 to 24. In these 7 verses Isaiah enumerates 24 different ornaments or adornments given to the bride on her wedding day. In ancient Israel, before the destruction of the Holy Temple in Jerusalem, the bride would be adorned with these 24 articles of jewelry and clothing before entering the wedding canopy where she would be legally wed to her husband. This is a very beautiful notion that we will try to understand better.
Even though we cannot usually rely on English translations of the Bible, we will have to do our best in this case, because the names of these 24 ornaments are very rare in the Bible.
THE 24 BRIDAL ORNAMENTS
Though Isaiah’s prophecy describes the joy and beauty of a wedding, it is actually a chastisement. He is enumerating these 24 ornaments to let the people know that because of their behavior, God is going to divest the people, who are likened to a bride on her wedding day, of these ornaments. The verses read:
On that day, the Lord will remove the splendor of the (1) shoe-bells, the (2) head scarves, the (3) moon-shaped ornaments, The (4) necklaces, and the (5) bracelets, and the (6) veils, The (7) bonnets, and the (8) leg bands, and the (9) hair ties, (10) and the brooches, and the (11) earrings, The (12) rings and the (13) nose rings, The (14) robes, and the (15) shawls, and the (16) kerchiefs, and the (17) pouches, The (18) mirrors, and the (19) linens, and the (20) turbans, and the (21) clasps, And it shall be that in the place of fragrance there will be rot, and in the place of the (22) belt, abrasion; and in the place of (23) coiffure, baldness; and in the place of the (24) ornamental belt, a belt of sackcloth; in the place of beauty.
The division of the ornaments is such that only the third of the verses mentions 5 ornaments. These we will correspond with the Five Books of Moses, the Pentateuch. The first, second, and fourth verses mention 8 ornaments, which we will thus correspond with the eight books of the Prophets. The remaining verses enumerate 11 bridal ornaments, so we will correspond these with the eleven books of the Writings.
SCHOLARLY BEAUTY
What is the meaning of this parable in which the 24 books of the Bible are described as 24 ornaments or adornments of the bride?
The sages teach us that every Torah scholar and sage, in order to appear as a beautiful bride before God, the Giver of the Torah, must be fluent in all 24 books of the Bible. Each book of the Bible for the scholar is like an ornament, an adornment that beautifies his soul before God. Rashi, the literal commentary to the Bible that is most relied upon, brings this saying from the sages in the book of Exodus. When God concluded speaking to Moses, teaching him the Torah at Mt. Sinai, He gave him the two Tablets. The Torah uses a word for “concluded” (כִּלָה) that is cognate with the word for “bride” (כַּלָה). And Rashi explains: The word “concluded” (כִּלָה) is written defectively [without a vav after the lamed].... just as a bride (כַּלָה) bedecks herself with 24 ornaments—those mentioned in the Book of Isaiah—so a scholar ought to be thoroughly versed in the contents of the 24 books [of Scripture].
In the Torah’s inner dimension, Kabbalah and Chasidut, the bride is a symbol for the sefirah, the channel of Divine energy or emanation, called kingdom (malchut, in Hebrew). Kingdom is the tenth of the ten sefirot. A thorough explanation of the sefirot is beyond our scope here, but we need to stress that though God is one, absolutely one, He acts and reveals Himself to us through ten “garments,” or “vessels” known as the sefirot, each demonstrating a different way in which the Divine manifests and reveals itself in reality.
Each of the sefirot corresponds to one of God’s Names. Similar to the sefirot, the Names of God represent God’s actions in reality, as the sages say, “I am known [i.e., my Name is] after my actions.” The Divine Name that corresponds to kingdom is the four-letter Name Adni (א-דני).
This is also the Name used to read the Tetragrammaton, God’s essential Name, Havayah (י-הוה), which we are not allowed to pronounce, as mentioned in our previous teachings. The Name Adni is usually translated into English correctly as “Lord.” This is perhaps the most well-known Name of God in English, but as noted, it is not God’s only Name. In fact, since it is the Name that corresponds to the sefirah of malchut, the tenth and lowest of the Ten Sefirot, it is also considered the lowest of God’s ten Names. Despite being the lowest Name, Adni/Lord, reflects or enclothes within itself the highest and most essential Name, the Tetragrammaton.
Now, returning to the 24 ornaments of the bride, the bride is one of the symbols associated with the sefirah of kingdom and thus with the Name Adni/Lord. When you refer to God as Lord, you are actually referring to Divinity as it is revealed (among other things) in a the sefirah of kingdom, symbolized by the bride.
24 PERMUTATIONS OF GOD’S NAME ADNI
Whenever we seek to deepen our understanding of a topic related to a number (in this case 24), we search for parallel instances of that number as it appears in Torah.
So now let us look at what else corresponds to 24 apart from these 24 ornaments and the 24 books of the Bible. The first thing that should come to mind is that there are 24 hours in a day. This is not just a universal convention, it is also the way the sages divide the day according to halachah (Torah law).
24 is also the number of permutations that can be made from a word with four (different) letters. Mathematically, calculating the number of permutations possible for n objects is n! which is read as “n factorial.” It is the product of the integers from 1 to n. In the case of 4 letters, the number of permutations is 4! (4 factorial) or 1 times 2 times 3 times 4, which is indeed 24. But, if m of the objects are the same, then the number of different permutations possible is n!/m (n factorial divided by m).
Since God’s Name Adni has four different letters they can be permuted in 24 different ways. But because the Tetrgrammaton has 2 identical letters, its total number of different permutations is 24/2 or 12.
Now, since the Name Adni corresponds to the sefirah of kingdom and to its symbol the bride, it follows that the 24 different permutations of this Name correspond to the 24 ornaments or adornments of the bride.
There is one particular night that we traditionally read an abridged version of the entire Bible—all 24 books. This is the night of Shavu’ot (the Feast of Weeks), which also commemorates the day the Torah was given at Mt. Sinai. In honor of this special occasion, we read the beginnings and endings of all 24 books of the Bible. As it were, we are adorning ourselves before God with the ornaments of a bride—the 24 books of the Bible—because the Giving of the Torah is likened to the wedding between God and the Jewish people. The arrangement of the Bible as read on this night is known as Tikkun Leil Shavu’ot, which literally means “the Rectification of the Night of Shavu’ot,” the festival commemorating the Giving of the Torah. In this text, following each of the 24 books of the Bible that we say in short, there appears one of the 24 permutations of the Name Adni, thus creating a correspondence between the 24 books of the Bible and the 24 permutations.
Another point to add to our list of things that correspond to the 24 books of the Bible is the 24 hours of every day. The 24 permutations of Adni correspond to the 24 hours of the day: 12 hours of day and 12 hours of night. According to Torah, the day usually follows the night, meaning that every 24-hour period begins with 12 hours of darkness with the 12 hours of light following. This for example is the order at the beginning of Genesis, where the account of each day ends with the words, “there was evening and there was morning.” In other cases, in the Torah, especially regarding the service practiced in the Tabernacle or the Holy Temple, it is the night that follows the day.
The average day (or every day at the equator) is from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m. So, in the Tabernacle, the first hour of the day is from 6 to 7 a.m. The 13th hour is from 6 to 7 p.m., and so on. The first hour would correspond to the first permutation of Adni and the thirteenth hour to the thirteenth permutation. There were very special individuals throughout history who would contemplate the particular permutation of Adni (and of Havayah) every hour of the day. Some would even go so far as to divide every hour into four quarter hours, with each 15 minutes corresponding to the four letters of the permutation of Havayah (or Adni) corresponding to that hour, in order. This was especially prevalent in the study halls of the Chasidic movement where many would learn Torah while keeping their consciousness connected to God using this meditation.
What we are now adding is that a perfect soul that is connected to God through Torah could also connect directly by concentrating on each of the 24 books of the Bible in succession for each of the day’s 24 hours. The first hour would be dedicated to Genesis, the second to Exodus, and so on until every 24 hours, one would go through the entire Bible.
For us this may seem like an unachievable goal, because of the state of our consciousness now. But there were people alive recently who could go through the entire Talmud in their mind (2711 folio pages of text) in several hours. Even though we cannot conceive of what this might mean, the ideal state of being connected to the Bible and through the Bible, being connected to God would include a review of each of the 24 book of the Bible, each of the 24 permutations of Adni, and each of the 24 ornaments adorning the bride, while recalling that it is we who are God’s bride.
Notes:
1. In passing, let us mention that in the original Hebrew, these verses contain exactly 48 words. Apart from being twice the value of 24, in our next installment of the daily teaching, we will see deeper significance for this number in this context.
2. It is customary not to pronounce this Name when it is not part of a verse, which is why we transliterate it into English in a manner that is somewhat differently from how it would be pronounced.
3. For the archetypal value of numbers, see in length in our volume, The Hebrew Letters.
