Timeless Torah

My wife and I have been blessed with healthy, normal children...ten times. With each addition, neighbors and acquaintances raise their eyebrows and wonder, “How do they manage?” The simple answer is, every time we have another baby, the one that used to be the youngest is promoted to “Assistant”. So presently, we actually have only one baby and nine assistants. Personally, I think we have a dynamite ratio

But the size of our family is nothing when compared to those of our ancestors. In this week’s reading, one census identifies 605,550 men, between the ages 20 thru 60 eligible for the draft, while a separate count of Levites reveals 23,300 males older than one month.

It has long been noted that the average of each of the 12 tribes (50,295) is more than double the number of Levites. In truth, this incongruity is even more marked when we take into account that other tribes only reckoned adult men, whereas by the Levites, even infants were included.

A more accurate analysis of the two censuses requires us to compare apples to apples. If there are 600,000 soldiers aged 20 thru 60, it follows that there are 150,000 individuals between 20 to 30, a similar number between the ages of 30 to 40, and so on. Assuming that the life expectancy at that time could easily reach 80 (Moses was already 81, Aaron 84), then one should add 150,000 more Israelites from one month old to age 10, 150,000 till 20, and another 300,000 more between the ages of 60 to 80.

This calculation now puts both groups on the same field: the number of Israelite men is 1.2 million and the individual tribal average is 100,590. In comparison, the Levites only muster 22,300. Thus the average of each tribe is four and one half times greater than the Levites. This anomaly between the Levites and their fellow Jews is explained by the Ramban (circa 1200’s). The initial family of Jacob & Sons arrived in Egypt with a mere 70 souls. In spite of enslavement and infanticide, they grew into a mighty throng of several million.

This was nothing short of miraculous. Indeed, G-d assured His people that the more they were persecuted, the more numerous they would become. This Divine blessing however only worked for the tribes who felt the lash of the whip and the mire of the mud pits. The Levites, however, who had historically escaped the harshest elements of bondage, were not privy to this potent gift of fertility.

All of the above-mentioned is common knowledge for any youngster attending a competent Jewish day school. But we are going to take this one step further. It is recorded in the Parsha that of the 22,300 Levites mentioned previously, 300 were first born. This compares to 22,273 first born Israelites. Now comes the interesting part. Take out your calculator and discover the amazing size of the ancient Hebrew mishpocha. Figuring that every Israelite family had one first born gives you 1.2 million divided by 22,273 for an average of 53 youngsters in each family. Obviously G-d’s blessing was working at full capacity.

One would expect to see considerably smaller families amongst the Levites who, as we said, did not enjoy such heavenly powers of reproduction. But if one divides the Levitical group of 22,300 by 300 first born, the average mishpocha for Mr. & Mrs. Levy is 74 children!

If you think I left out any pertinent information that would affect the numbers, you are right. Until now we only considered the boys. But even if you add an equal amount of girls (first born and others) the ratio and family sizes won’t change.

If your head is not spinning with the logistics of catering to these kinds of families, and a caterer is what you would need, then we must ask: How did the Levite families end up being so much larger than their tribal counterparts? One explanation perhaps can be inferred from the Midrash which records that 80% of Israelites did not want to leave Egypt. Unfortunately for them, their wish was granted and they perished in the ninth plague of darkness. There is good reason to assume that the Levites, who forever remained loyal to the promise of redemption, were not part of this tragedy. Hence the original tribal family was not 53 kinderlech, but five times larger, which adds up to...drum roll please, a grand total of 265 children per Israelite family!

In our contemporary culture, these statistics make no sense. But irrespective of the actual figure, one thing is clear: our forefathers considered children the greatest blessing. My wife and I concur.