Hebrew numerals

	Email		Print
	Bookmark		Link

Hebrew numerals

The system of Hebrew numerals is a quasi-decimal alphabetic numeral system

Numeral system

A numeral system is a writing system for expressing numerals , and a mathematical notation for representing numbers of a given set, using graphemes or symbols in a consistent manner....
using the letters of the Hebrew alphabet

Hebrew alphabet

The Hebrew alphabet consists of 22 letters used for writing the Hebrew language. Five of these letters have a different form when appearing as the last letter in a word....
.

In this system, there is no notation for zero

0 (number)

0 is both a number and the numerical digit used to represent that number in numeral system. It plays a central role in mathematics as the additive identity of the integers, real numbers, and many other algebraic structures....
, and the numeric values for individual letters are added together. Each unit (1, 2, ..., 9) is assigned a separate letter, each tens (10, 20, ..., 90) a separate letter, and the first four hundreds (100, 200, 300, 400) a separate letter. The later hundreds (500, 600, 700, 800 and 900) are represented by the sum of two or three letters representing one of the first four hundreds.To represent numbers from 1,000 to 999,999 the same letters are reused to serve as thousands, tens of thousands, and hundreds of thousands.Gematria

Gematria

Gematria or gimatria is a system of assigning number to an alphabet. The word "gematria" is generally held to derive from Greek geometria, "geometry", which was used a translation of gema?riya....
(Jewish numerology) uses these transformations extensively.

In Israel

Israel

Israel officially the State of Israel , is a country in the Middle East located on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. It borders Lebanon in the north, Syria in the northeast, Jordan in the east, and Egypt on the southwest, and contains geographically diverse features within its relatively small area....
today, the decimal system (ex.

Discussion

Ask a question about 'Hebrew numerals'

Start a new discussion about 'Hebrew numerals'

Answer questions from other users

Full Discussion Forum

Encyclopedia

The system of Hebrew numerals is a quasi-decimal alphabetic numeral system

Numeral system

Hebrew alphabet

0 (number)

Gematria

Israel

Civil calendar

The civil calendar is any calendar in use in any country at any point in time which is used for civil, official or administrative purposes. All dates referred to by people in that country are expressed in relation to this calendar....
). The Hebrew numerals are used only in special cases, like when using the Hebrew calendar

Hebrew calendar

The Hebrew calendar or Jewish calendar is a lunisolar calendar used by Jews, now predominantly for religious purposes. It is used to reckon the Jewish New Year and dates for Jewish holidays, and also to determine appropriate Torah reading of Torah portions, Yahrzeits , and daily Psalm reading, among many ceremonial uses....
, or numbering a list (similar to a, b, c, d, etc...).

Main Table

Decimal	Hebrew	Glyph	Cardinal Cardinal number In mathematics, cardinal numbers, or cardinals for short, are a generalization of the natural numbers used to measure the cardinality of Set .... (ex. one, two, three)		Ordinal (ex. first, second, third)
Decimal	Hebrew	Glyph	Masculine	Feminine	Masculine	Feminine
0 0 (number) 0 is both a number and the numerical digit used to represent that number in numeral system. It plays a central role in mathematics as the additive identity of the integers, real numbers, and many other algebraic structures....	N/A		efes		N/A
1 1 (number) 1 is a number, number names, and the name of the glyph representing that number.It represents a single entity, the unit of counting or measurement....	Aleph Aleph * Aleph or Alef is the first letter of the Semitic abjads descended from Proto-Canaanite alphabet, Arabic alphabet, Phoenician alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, Syriac alphabet....	?	echad (?????)	achat (?????)	rishon (??????????)	rishonah (????????????)
2 2 (number) 2 is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the natural number following 1 and preceding 3 ....	Bet Bet (letter) Bet, Beth, or Vet is the second Letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shnayim (????????)	shtayim (?????????)	sheni (????????)	shniyah (??????????)
3 3 (number) ----3 is a number, Numeral system, and glyph. It is the natural number following 2 and preceding 4 ....	Gimel Gimel (letter) Gimel is the third Letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shlosha (??????????)	shalosh (????????)	shlishi (????????????)	shlishit (?????????????) or shlishiyah (??????????????)
4 4 (number) This article discusses the number Four. For the year 4 AD, see 4. For other uses of 4, see 4 4 is a number, numeral, and glyph....	Dalet Dalet Dalet is the fourth Letter of many Semitic languages alphabets, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	arba'a (?????????)	arbah (????????)	revi'i (??????????)	revi'it (???????????)
5 5 (number) 5 is a number, numeral, and glyph. It is the natural number following 4 and preceding 6 ....	Hei He (letter) He is the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician alphabet , Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	chamisha (????????)	chamesh (??????)	chamishi (???????????)	chamishit (????????????)
6 6 (number) 6 is the natural number following 5 and preceding 7 .The SI prefix for 10006 is exa , and for its reciprocal atto ....	Vav Waw (letter) Waw is the sixth letter of many Semitic alphabets, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, Syriac alphabet, and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shisha (???????)	shesh (?????)	shishi (??????????)	shishit (???????????)
7 7 (number) 7 is the natural number following 6 and preceding 8 . It is the smallest positive integer to be spoken with two syllables when pronounced in English....	Zayin Zayin Zayin is the seventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language , Aramaic language , Hebrew language , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet []....	?	shiv'a (???????)	sheva (??????)	shvi'i (???????????)	shvi'it (????????????)
8 8 (number) 8 is the natural number, following 7 and preceding 9 . The SI prefix for 10008 is yotta , and for its reciprocal yocto . It is the root of two other numbers: eighteen and eighty ....	Het Heth (letter) or is the reconstructed name of the eighth letter of the Proto-Canaanite alphabet, continued in descended Semitic alphabets as Phoenician alphabet , Syriac alphabet , Hebrew alphabet chet , Arabic alphabet , and Tifinagh ....	?	shmonah (?????????)	shmoneh (?????????)	shmini (???????????)	shminit (????????????)
9 9 (number) 9 is the natural number following 8 and preceding 10 . The ordinal adjective is ninth....	Tet Teth is the ninth letter of many Semitic abjads , including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet 'Tet' , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ; it is 9th in abjadi order and 16th in modern Arabic order....	?	tish'a (????????)	tayshah (???????)	tshi'i (????????????)	tshi'it (?????????????)
10 10 (number) 10 is an Even and odd numbers natural number following 9 and preceding 11 ....	Yud Yodh Yodh is the tenth letter of many Semitic History of the alphabet, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Yud , Syriac alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	assara (????????)	eser (??????)	asiri (???????????)	asirit (????????????)
20 20 (number) 20 is the natural number following 19 and preceding 21 . A group of twenty units may also be referred to as a score....	Kaf Kaph Kaph is the eleventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Kaf , Arabic alphabet , Persian alphabet ....	?	esrim (?????????)
30 30 (number) 30 is the natural number following 29 and preceding 31 ....	Lamed Lamedh Lamed or Lamedh is the twelfth letter in many Semitic languages abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet Lamed and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shloshim (???????????)
40 40 (number) 40 is the natural number following 39 and preceding 41 .Despite being related to the word "four" , 40 is spelled "forty", not "". This is because etymologically , the words have different vowels, "forty" containing a contraction in the same way that "fifty" contains a contraction of "five"....	Mem Mem Mem is the thirteenth letter of many Semitic languages abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?	arba'im (???????????)
50 50 (number) This article discusses the number fifty. For the year 50 CE, see 50. For other uses of 50, see 50 50 is the integer following 49 and preceding 51 ....	Nun Nun (letter) Nun is the fourteenth letter of many Semitic language abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language and Arabic alphabet ....	?	chamishim (??????????)
60 60 (number) 60 is the natural number following 59 and preceding 61 . Being three times twenty, 60 is called "three 20 " in some older literature....	Samech Samekh Samekh or Simketh is the fifteenth letter in many Semitic languages alphabets, including Phoenician alphabet, Hebrew alphabet, and Aramaic alphabet, representing ....	?	shishim (?????????)
70 70 (number) 70 is the natural number following 69 and preceding 71 ....	Ayin Ayin *' or* ' is the sixteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic language, Hebrew language and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shiv'im (?????????)
80 80 (number) 80 is the natural number following 79 and preceding 81 ....	Pei Pe (letter) Pe is the seventeenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Pei , Persian alphabet Pe and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shmonim (??????????)
90 90 (number) 90 is the natural number preceded by 89 and followed by 91 ....	Tsadi Tsade 'Tsade' is the eighteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language 'Tsadi' and Arabic alphabet ....	?	tish'im (??????????)
100 100 (number) 100 is the natural number following 99 and preceding 101 ....	Kuf	?	me'a (?????)
200 200 (number) 200 is the natural number following 199 and preceding 201 . Roman numerals: CCThe number appears in the Padovan sequence, preceded by 86, 114, 151 ....	Resh Resh Resh is the twentieth letter of many Semitic History of the alphabet, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language and Arabic alphabet ....	?	matayim (????????)
300 300 (number) 300 is the natural number following two hundred ninety-nine and preceding three hundred one....	Shin Shin (letter) Shin is the twenty-first letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language , and Arabic alphabet ....	?	shlosh meot (???????? ??????)
400 400 (number) 400 is the natural number following three hundred [and] ninety-nine and preceding four hundred [and] one....	Tav Taw (letter) Taw or Tav is the twenty-second and last letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Tav and Arabic alphabet ....	?	arba meot (???????? ??????)
500 500 (number) 500 is the natural number following 499 and preceding 501 ....	Tav Kuf or Chaf Sofit Kaph Kaph is the eleventh letter of many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Kaf , Arabic alphabet , Persian alphabet ....	?"? or ?	chamesh meot (?????? ??????)
600 600 (number) 600 is the natural number following five hundred ninety-nine and preceding six hundred one. It is a pronic number and a Harshad number....	Tav Resh or Mem Sofit Mem Mem is the thirteenth letter of many Semitic languages abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Aramaic alphabet, Hebrew alphabet and Arabic alphabet ....	?"? or ?	shesh meot (????? ??????)
700 700 (number) This article is about the numbers 700 through 799; for each individual number, see its section below.700 is the natural number following 699 and preceding 701....	Tav Shin or Nun Sofit Nun (letter) Nun is the fourteenth letter of many Semitic language abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language and Arabic alphabet ....	?"? or ?	shva meot (?????? ??????)
800 800 (number) 800 is the natural number following 799 and preceding 801.It is the sum of four consecutive primes . It is a Harshad number.Eight hundred is also:...	Tav Tav or Pei Sofit Pe (letter) Pe is the seventeenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language Pei , Persian alphabet Pe and Arabic alphabet ....	?"? or ?	shmone meot (????????? ??????)
900 900 (number) 900 is the natural number following eight hundred ninety-nine and preceding nine hundred one. It is the square of 30 and the sum of Euler's totient function for the first 54 integers....	Tav Tav Kuf or Tsadi Sofit Tsade 'Tsade' is the eighteenth letter in many Semitic abjads, including Phoenician language, Aramaic language, Hebrew language 'Tsadi' and Arabic alphabet ....	??"? or ?	tsha meot (??????? ??????)
11 11 (number) 11 is the natural number following 10 and preceding 12 . It is the first number which cannot be represented by a human counting his or her eight fingers and two thumbs additively .... : achad asar/achat esre, 12 12 (number) 12 is the natural number following 11 and preceding 13 .The word "twelve" is a native English language word that presumably arises from the Germanic languages compound twa-lif "two-leave", meaning that two is... : shneim asar/shteim esre, 13 13 (number) 13 is the natural number after 12 and before 14 . It is the smallest integer with eight letters in its spelled out name in English. It is also the age at which children become teenagers.... : shlosha asar/shlosh esre, 14 14 (number) 14 is the natural number following 13 and preceding 15 .... : arba'a asar/arba esre, 15 15 (number) 15 is the natural number following 14 and preceding 16 . In English, it is the smallest natural number with seven letters in its spelled name.... : chamisha asar/chamesh esre, 16 16 (number) Sixteen is a composite number, and a square number, being 4 2 = 4 × 4. It is the smallest number with exactly five divisors, its proper divisors being , , and .... : shisha asar/shesh esre, 17 17 (number) 17 is the natural number following 16 and preceding 18 .... : shiv'a asar/shva esre, 18 18 (number) 18 is the natural number following 17 and preceding 19 . It equals ten and eight, twice nine, nine times two or three times six.... : shmona asar/shmone esre, 19 19 (number) 19 is the natural number following 18 and preceding 20 . It is a prime number.... : tish'a asar/tsha esre
1000 1000 (number) 1000 is the natural number following 999 and preceding 1001 .... : elef, 2000 2000 (number) 2000 is the natural number following 1999 and preceding 2001.See also: millennium, year 2000 AD, Y2K, 2000 .Two thousand is the highest number expressible using only two unmodified characters in roman numerals .... : alpaim, 10 000 10000 (number) 10000 is the natural number following 9999 and preceding 10001.... : aseret alafim, 100 000 100000 (number) One hundred thousand is the natural number following 99999 and preceding 100001.In South Asia, one hundred thousand is called a lakh. In Thai language, Lao language and Vietnamese language there is a separate word for this number, ???, ??? [saen] and ?c [uc].... : mea elef, 1 000 000: miliyon, 1 000 000 000 1000000000 (number) 1,000,000,000 is the natural number following 999,999,999 and preceding 1,000,000,001.In scientific notation, it is written as 109.... : miliyard

Note: For ordinal numbers greater than 10, cardinal numbers are used instead.

Speaking and writing

Hebrew has masculine and feminine ways of saying the words. For just counting, feminine is used (except echad). Otherwise, the gender is used (ex. two boys, two girls). Also, objects are either male or female (ex. a book (sefer) is male).The number is written first, then the noun (ex. shlosha yeladim), except for number one where it is reversed (ex. yelad echad). The number two is special, shnayim (m.) and shtayim (f.) becomes shney (m.), and shtey (f.) when describing the number of some noun. Also, mixed groups are always addressed as male, which is the case with all Hebrew. For ordinal number

Ordinal number

In set theory, an ordinal number, or just ordinal, is the order type of a well-order. They are usually identified with hereditarily transitive sets....
s (number indicating position), for greater than 10 the cardinal is used.

Calculations

The Hebrew numeric system operates on the additive principle in which the numeric values of the letters are added together to form the total. For example, 177 is represented as ??? which corresponds to 100 + 70 + 7 = 177.

Mathematically, this type of system requires 27 letters (1-9, 10-90, 100-900). In practice the last letter, tav (which has the value 400) is used in combination with itself and/or other letters from kof (100) onwards, to generate numbers from 500 and above. Alternatively, the 22-letter Hebrew numeral set is sometimes extended to 27 by using 5 sofeet (final) forms of the Hebrew letters.

Key exceptions

By convention, the numbers 15 and 16 are represented as ????? ?(9 + 6) and ????? ?(9 + 7), respectively. This is done in order to refrain from using the two-letter combinations ?–? ?(10 + 5)? and ?–? ?(10 + 6)? (which are alternate written forms for the Name of God

Tetragrammaton

Tetragrammaton The letters, properly read from right to left , are:|-! Hebrew !! Letter name !! Pronunciation|-valign=top| ?'...
) in everyday writing. In the calendar, this manifests every full moon, since all Hebrew months start on a new moon.

Combinations which would spell out words with negative connotations are sometimes avoided by switching the order of the letters. For instance, ??????? (meaning "you/it will be destroyed") might instead be written as ???????.

Gershayim

Gershayim is a punctuation mark used in the Hebrew language. It has two distinct meanings.# The original meaning of "Gershayim" is to denote a note of cantillation in the reading of the Torah, taking the form of a doubled curved stroke printed above the accented letter....
(U+05F4 in Unicode

Unicode

Unicode is a computing industry standard allowing computers to consistently represent and manipulate Character expressed in most of the world's writing systems....
, and resembling a double quote mark) (sometimes erroneously referred to as merkha'ot (Hebrew for double quote)) are inserted before (to the right of) the last (leftmost) letter to indicate that the sequence of letters represents a number rather than a word. This is used in the case where a number is represented by two or more Hebrew numerals (e.g., 18 ? ?????).

Similarly, a single Geresh

Geresh

Geresh is a sign in Hebrew writing. It has two meanings.1. An apostrophe-like sign placed after a letter. It is used:Usage...
(U+05F3 in Unicode, and resembling a single quote mark) is appended after (to the left of) a single letter to indicate that the letter represents a number rather than a (one-letter) word. This is used in the case where a number is represented by a single Hebrew numeral (e.g., 100 ? ????).

Decimals

In print, Hindu-Arabic numerals

Hindu-Arabic numeral system

The Hindu-Arabic numeral system is a positional decimal numeral system first documented in ancient India no later than the ninth century, and later spread to the western world through Mathematics in medieval Islam....
are employed in Modern Hebrew for most purposes. Hebrew numerals are used nowadays primarily for writing the days and years of the Hebrew calendar

Hebrew calendar

The Hebrew calendar or Jewish calendar is a lunisolar calendar used by Jews, now predominantly for religious purposes. It is used to reckon the Jewish New Year and dates for Jewish holidays, and also to determine appropriate Torah reading of Torah portions, Yahrzeits , and daily Psalm reading, among many ceremonial uses....
; for references to traditional Jewish texts (particularly for Biblical chapter and verse and for Talmudic folios); for bulleted or numbered lists (similar to A, B, C, etc., in English); and in numerology (gematria

Gematria

Thousands and date formats

Thousands are counted separately, and the thousands count precedes the rest of the number (to the right, since Hebrew is read from right to left). There are no special marks to signify that the “count” is starting over with thousands, which can theoretically lead to ambiguity, although a single quote mark is sometimes used after the letter. When specifying years of the Hebrew calendar in the present millennium, writers usually omit the thousands (which is presently 5 [???]), but if they don't, this is accepted to mean 5 * 1000, with no ambiguity. The current Israeli coinage includes the thousands.

Date examples

“Monday, 15 Adar 5764” (where 5764 = 5(×1000) + 400 + 300 + 60 + 4, and 15 = 9 + 6):

In full (with thousands): “Monday, 15(th) of Adar, 5764”

‫??? ??? ?״? ???? ?׳???״?‬

Common usage (omitting thousands): “Monday, 15(th) of Adar, (5)764”

‫??? ??? ?״? ???? ???״?‬

“Thursday, 3 Nisan 5767” (where 5767 = 5(×1000) + 400 + 300 + 60 + 7):

In full (with thousands): “Thursday, 3(rd) of Nisan, 5767”

‫??? ????? ?׳ ????? ?׳???״?‬

Common usage (omitting thousands): “Thursday, 3(rd) of Nisan, (5)767”

‫??? ????? ?׳ ????? ???״?‬

To see how today's date in the Hebrew calendar

Hebrew calendar

The Hebrew calendar or Jewish calendar is a lunisolar calendar used by Jews, now predominantly for religious purposes. It is used to reckon the Jewish New Year and dates for Jewish holidays, and also to determine appropriate Torah reading of Torah portions, Yahrzeits , and daily Psalm reading, among many ceremonial uses....
is written, see, for example, the dateline at the top of the home page.

Recent years

5768 (2007–08) = ???????

5767 (2006–07) = ????????

5766 (2005–06) = ????????

5765 (2004–05) = ????????

Similar systems

The Abjad numerals

Abjad numerals

The Abjad numerals are a decimal numeral system in which the 28 letters of the Arabic alphabet are assigned numerical values. They have been used in the Arabic language-speaking world since before the 8th century Arabic numerals....
are equivalent to the Hebrew numerals up to 400. The Greek numerals

Greek numerals

Greek numerals are a numeral system using letters of the Greek alphabet. They are also known by the names Milesian numerals, Alexandrian numerals, or alphabetic numerals....
differ from the Hebrew ones from 90 upwards because in the Greek alphabet

Greek alphabet

The Greek alphabet is a set of twenty-four letters that has been used to write the Greek language since the late 9th century BC or early 8th century BCE....
there is no equivalent for Tsadi.

Hebrew numerals

Main Table

Speaking and writing

Calculations

Key exceptions

Gershayim

Decimals

Thousands and date formats

Date examples

Recent years

Similar systems

External links