Apropos to our last post about the dissemination of the light and the Jewish souls from 1-3-70-600,000 as presented repeatedly in the Torah, a recent comment on the DailyZohar regarding Chayeh Sarah made a wonderful connection between the 600,000 Jewish souls and Abraham’s purchase of the cave at Machpelah.
“As per Leviticus 27:16, the size of a beit-kur, which is the equivalent of 75,000 square cubits, represents a value of 50 silver shekels. Thus, the size of the field which Abraham purchased for 400 silver shekels was eight kur, or 600,000 square cubits. (Paaneach Raza)
A square cubit is the size of the roof hole at the top of Noah’s Ark and the size of the two tablets that the 10 Commandments were engraved in. It’s also enough space for a man to stand comfortably in, meaning Abraham purchased a plot of land that provides an individual “space” for each of the 600,000 souls of Israel. When using the Holy Cubit that the Future Holy Temple is designed with, it works out to a plot of land exactly .37 square miles.
Now, it’s said by the sages that every Jew has a letter in the Torah and that there are 600,000 letters in the Torah. We’ve previously shown that there are exactly 600,000 – 408 component letters in the Torah, when each letter is broken down into the component letters that comprise it. Interestingly, there are a total of 50 component letters, as in the value of one field, with 50 always being a connection to the upper sefira of Binah.
And since the Torah is a hologram of G-d Name, his Unity, the entire Torah is included in every letter of it, we see by the Torah references to a cubit square that if all the hope of humanity (the opening in the ark) and the entire Torah (10 Commandments) can fit in that 1 square cubit space, and that we have a place reserved for ourselves in Israel thanks to Abraham, we each have the hope of the generation and entire Torah within us. And waiting for us.
The question always arises as to why 408, and we can’t know for certain. We do know, as the Zohar explains that it has to do with the coded Hebrew word “Zot” of numerical value 408, which refers to the time of the final redemption. We also know that if the missing letters were all Vavs of numerical value 6, then the 408 letters would equal 2448, as in the year the Torah was received at Sinai.
Nevertheless, Abraham purchased the cave/field from the sons of Chet (Hittites), whose numerical value is 408. And he purchased the field of 8 kur for 400 shekels for our 8 illustrious forefathers who would be buried there: Adam, Eve, Abraham, Sarah, Isaac, Rivka, Jacob and Leah. Either way, kabbalistically we can construe that as 400+8 = 408.
Abraham was securing a place for us, where we could all one day join together again as one, and he made sure he’d be waiting there for us.
Let’s make sure the Cave of Machpelah and the surrounding 600,000 square cubits (27.5″ x 27.5″) stay in Israel. It’s our patrimony and our future.
