Sedra Stats

Mishpatim STATS

18th of 54 sedras; 6th of 11 in Sh’mot
Written on 185 lines in a Sefer Torah, ranks 31st
33 parshiyot; 6 open and 27 closed
3rd most in the Torah; 2nd most S’tumot
118 p’sukim - ranks 22nd (5th in Sh’mot)
1462 words - ranks 31st (7th in Sh’mot)
5313 letters - ranks 37th (8th in Sh’mot)

The noticeable drop in ranking from p’sukim to words indicates short p’sukim; in fact, Mishpatim’s p’sukim are among the shortest in the Torah.

72 p’sukim in Yitro?

Here’s an email we received from jben

Phil, To answer your question of how we get 72 psukim in Yitro. (1) It IS with the Taam Ha’elyon. (2) It is NOT as printed in most of our chumashim, with the 1st and 2nd dibrot as one pasuk; rather, each of the ten gets its own pasuk. This goes according to a teshuva by Wolf Heidenheim. My Tikun HaM’fu’ar Simanim also has it this way, as does the Minchas Shai on the side gloss.

jben followed up with a scan of the page with the ANOCHI pasuk separate, as its own pasuk. This would, indeed, explain the traditional number of 72 for the p’sukim of Yitro. As jben pointed out, most Chumashim combine the first two dibrot (the ones we traditional say were from “PI HA- GEVURA”, from G-d’s mouth, so to speak - in contrast to the rest of the Torah, including the 611 other mitzvot, that we are taught from Moshe Rabeinu), in Taam HaElyon. And, as stated in last week’s TT, some Chumashim (relatively fewer), combine the two p’sukim (ANOCHA and LO YIHYEH) even in Taam Tachton.

CLARIFICATION: The Aseret Ha- Dibrot consists of 13 p’sukim:
ANOCHI = 1 pasuk, first command.
LO YIHYEH, LO TAASEH, LO TISH- TACHAVEH, V’OSEH CHESED = 4 p’sukim, 2nd command.
LO TISA = 1 pasuk, 3rd command.
ZACHOR, SHEISHET YAMIM, V’YOM HASH’VI’I, KI SHEISHET YAMIM = 4 p’sukim, 4th command.
KABEID = 1 pasuk, 5th command.
LO TIRTZACH, LO TIN-OF, LO TIGNOV, TO TAANEH = 1 pasuk, 4 commands (#6, #7, #8, #9).
LO TACHMOD = 1 pasuk, 10th command.
Add them up. 13 p’sukim, 10 commandment-p’sukim. (Only this option explains 75 vs. 72 p’sukim.)
Or, combine the first 2 commandments and get 9 p’sukim. Combine the first two p’sukim and you get 12 p’sukim in the Taamei Tachton.

MITZVOT
MISHPATIM has 53 mitzvot; 23 positive and 30 prohibitions. Only 3 sedras have more mitzvot - Ki Teitzei (74), Emor (63), and R’ei (55).

Kedoshim follows Mishpatim with 51 mitzvot. And let’s add Shoftim with 41, since the next in line is way down at 28.

Mishpatim has 8.65% of the Torah’s mitzvot (1.85% is average); 48% of the mitzvot in Sh’mot

These top 6 mitzva-sedras account for 337 of the 613 mitzvot - that’s 55% of the Torah’s mitzvot in 7 1/2 % of its sedras.

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