Dating back to the eighth century B.C., gemantria is a family of numerological systems for interpreting the Hebrew Bible.
Horowitz and Gambell used the reduced value system to convert text into numbers.
To find the reduced value of a letter, add the digits of the ordinal value of the letter, if the ordinal value has more than one digit.
| letter | ordinal value | reduced value | letter | ordinal value | reduced value |
| alef | 1 | 1 | lamed | 12 | 3 |
| beit | 2 | 2 | mem | 13 | 4 |
| gimmel | 3 | 3 | nun | 14 | 5 |
| dalet | 4 | 4 | samech | 15 | 6 |
| hei | 5 | 5 | ayin | 16 | 7 |
| vav | 6 | 6 | pei | 17 | 8 |
| zayin | 7 | 7 | tzadik | 18 | 9 |
| chet | 8 | 8 | kuf | 19 | 1 |
| tet | 9 | 9 | reish | 20 | 2 |
| yud | 10 | 1 | shin | 21 | 3 |
| kaf | 11 | 2 | tav | 22 | 4 |
For the first nine letters, just use the ordinal value. The numerical value of the word is the sum of the reduced values of its letters.
For example, the word chet samech dalet ("lovingkindness") has reduced value sum 8 + 6 + 4 = 18.
Return to IFS and the authorship of Genesis.