← Tehiru
⇗ open this live, in the app →
idea
⚠⚠ The number is fixed. The list is not.
correspondences
nature
613 is agreed. Which 613 is not.
⭐⭐ The number is fixed and The membership is not — and the disagreements are on principle, not on detail. What counts as one commandment rather than two? Do rabbinic ordinances count? Does a commandment that applies only in the Temple still count now? Does a general instruction like be holy count, or is it a heading over the others?
Rambam (Sefer HaMitzvot, and the index at the head of the Mishneh Torah) lays down fourteen governing rules and then enumerates. Ramban disputes him at length in the Hasagot — not "you miscounted", but "your rule three is wrong". The Halakhot Gedolot counts differently again and is older than both. The Sefer HaChinuch follows Rambam's order and adds reasons.
⚠ So this app does not itself enumerate the 613. It adopts one named enumeration — Rambam's — and says whose it is on every screen where the list appears. Rambam's own English base here is Hyamson, chosen because it is public domain.
⭐ The honest shape of the situation: the tradition transmits a count with total confidence and transmits the contents with an argument attached. Those are two different kinds of knowledge and the app tries not to blur them.
threads (4)
⇗ walk this live in Tehiru →