For those studying the Daf-Yomi, one-page-a-day-cycle, tomorrow is an important day. A very important day. The present cycle of study began 1,355 days ago, on January 5th, 2020. And in another 1,355 days, on Monday June 7, 2027, the cycle will be completed. And so Kiddushin 39 marks the halfway point, page 1,356. There are 1,355 pages completed, and another 1,355 to go. If you have been studying the last 1355 pages, (or even if you joined at some later time), now is a good opportunity to congratulate yourself, or your favorite daf-yomi teacher.
Are we there Yet?
If you drove from New York to Los Angeles, it would take you about forty hours of driving to cover the 2,789 miles. If you took Interstate 80, the halfway point on that journey would be at mile 1,395 which means a pit stop at the Wood River West State Wildlife Management Area in Nebraska.
Travelling from Eilat to Kiryat Shmonah (via Route 90 up the Jordan Valley), your halfway stop would be just south of the Ein Gedi nature reserve (but before you cross the bridge over Nahal Arugot), 146 miles from your start and 146 more miles to go.
According to the Talmud (קידושין ל,א) that we happened to study a week ago, the middle letter of the Torah is the Vav of the word Gichon, (גחון) found in פרשת שמיני – Leviticus 11:42. We noted that this traditional halfway point is way off. The actual middle letter of the Torah is letter # 152,403, the first letter of ויקרא פרק ח פסוק כט, which is 4,833 letters sooner than the traditional one.
| Where is the Middle of the Torah? | ||
|---|---|---|
| According to the Talmud | According to the Facts | |
| Middle Letter of the Torah | וא"ו דגחון ויקרא 11:42 |
וא"ו דויקח ויקרא 8:29 |
| Middle Words of the Torah | דרש דרש ויקרא 10:16 |
יצק אל ויקרא 8:18 |
Pagination in the Talmud
Are we making too much of this halfway page, this daf at the center of the Talmud Bavli? Perhaps. If you were to read the Vatican's 1381 manuscript of Kiddushin (shown below) you would see a completely different pagination, and today's daf would not be the halfway point.
Manuscript of Talmud Bavli, Kiddushin, from the Vatican Apostolic Library (Vat.ebr.111/0222). The beginning of page 39a of the standard talmud in use today is show in red. This is one of three manuscripts in the Vatican Library together comprising all of Seder Nashim. It was copied by Yehoshaya b. Abraham b. Berechiah
b. Abraham b. Joseph of the Joseph Ha-Meoni family for Berechiah b. Mattathias and was completed on 11 Shevat 5141, or January 7th, 1381. Here is the entire colophon:
אני יהושעיה בן הרב ר' אברהם בן הרב ר' ברכיה בר' אברהם בר' יוסף ממשפחת יוסף המעוני כתבתי סדר נשים זה לר' ברכיה בר' מתתיה וסיימתיו בי"א יום לחדש שבט קמ"א לפרט המקום יזכינו
.להגות בו בניו ובני בניו עד סוף כל הדורות. אמן אמן. ברוך הנותן ליעף כח ולאין אונים עצמה ירבה
And below is our page, this time from a hand-written Talmud belonging to the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York. It dates from 1700; clearly the scribe undertook a labor of love in writing this when printed texts were widely available. And in this unique Talmud, Kiddushin 39 is not the middle page.
Talmud Kiddushin,1700. Page 39a (לט) is marked. From the Library of The Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, Record # 000009185.
So yes, this page is perhaps nothing more than an interesting by-product of the winning format in which the Talmud is now reproduced. But we celebrate marathons and half-marathons, even though their length is totally arbitrary, (based on the length of the Marathon in the 1908 London Olympics - 26 miles, 385 yards; 26 miles because, well, who knows, and 385 yards being added so that the race would finish in front of the Royal Box). Running a half-marathon is a remarkable achievement, and so too is studying half of all the pages in the Babylonian Talmud. Congratulations to all who have achieved this milestone. But this is not an opportunity to relax: Don’t you have a sukkah to build?
According to The New York Times (April 6, 2016, p3.) there are 5,422 pages in the Talmud. Which is sort of correct. And sort of not. In our standard pagination of the Talmud, one page is made up of the verso and recto (a and b sides) sides. So Daf Yomi according to The Times would take twice as long as it does currently. Another way to look at it is that The New York Times prefers Amud Yomi to Daf Yomi.
