Categories Of Gematria

Ideal Form: chelek hamishkhal¹

numerical equivalence between two words where each word also has the same number of letters; subcategories include chelek hachibur and chelek haperud where some letters may be combined or separated to form other letters

9 principle ways¹ for calculating word values:

1. mispar hame'ugal (the round number, mispar katan, cheshbon za'ir deChanoch²)

all tens and hundreds are reduced to single digits 1-9;
ק = י = א = 1

2. mispar hakadmi (cumulative value, mispar kidmi)

each letter is the sum of the values of all the letters from alef to that letter, inclusive; א = 1, ב = 3, ג = 6, etc.

3. mispar hechrachi (normative value)

simple sum total of the normative values of the letters, אחד = 13

4. mispar musaphi

same as mispar hechrachi except for also adding to the sum-total of the word the number of the amount of letters in the word אחד = 16, or adding the kolel (1 for the word as a whole) אחד = 14

5. mispar hameruba haklali

squaring of the mispar hechrachi, אחד = 13² = 169

6. mispar hameruba haperati

squaring of the individual numbers, אחד = 1²+8²+4² = 81

7. mispar shemi (miluy)

numbers of the names of the letters, filling in the letters where aleph (א) is the number (111) of its name, אלף; such that אחד = 953

8. mispar hamispari

sum of the numbers spelled out as words; echad,one (13) + shemonah,eight (395) + arba'ah,four (278) = 686 = אחד

9. mispar hamispari hagadol

combination of #7 and #8; each letter is spelled out fully (miluy) and that equivalent number is spelled out which in turn has a numerical equivalent;

y 10 י + yod 20 יוד + esrim 620 עשרים
so, in this system י = 650

Additional methods^1,3,4 of calculation:

10. mispar gadol³ (the great number)

five final letters have values 500 (kaf), 600 (mem), 700 (nun), 800 (pey), 900 (tzadi)

11. mispar kaful

multiplying letter-units instead of summing them

12. mispar temuri

taking the gematria of a permutation⁴ of the original word

footnotes:

¹ Spice Of Torah - Gematria, Gutman G. Locks; Pardess Rimonim 30:8, R. Moshe Cordovero
² Zohar III:251a; Tikunei Zohar 10:26a
³ Aruch, s.v. at-bach; Rashi on Sukah 52b, s.v. at-bach; Chochmat Shlemoh, Maharshal on Sukah 52b
⁴ via alphabetic transformations (Chilufei Otiyot), for example

additional references:

Sefer Abudraham, R. David ben Yossef
Gematria, The Mathematics Of Torah
Types of Gematria Table

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