29 or 30? Both.

Rabbeinu Bachye offers an interesting insight into the birth of Zerach and Peretz in this week's parsha. (See Rabbeinu Bachye Bereishis 38:30) Rabbeinu Bachye maintains that the two were named after the recognition that they symbolised the sun and moon. Zerach means to shine which is certainly what the sun does, and Peretz means to be broken which is what happens to the moon every month as it wanes. Just as the sun and moon were created on the fourth day of Creation, so too, the establishment of Zerach and Peretz comes from the fourth of the Shevatim, Yehuda.

The Davidic Monarchy arose from Peretz's lineage and we know that David HaMelech is often compared to the moon (such as the fact that he is mentioned in Kiddush Levana). Rabbeinu Bachye then mentions that, in his opinion, there were 29 generations from Peretz to Tzidkiyahu. This mimicks the fact that the moon goes through its monthly cycle in 29 days and then sets. So too, the kingdom was established by Peretz and 29 generations later, under the leadership of Tzidkiyahu, Nevuchadnezar destroyed the Beis HaMikdash and exiled the Davidic Monarchy. Since that point in time it has not, as of yet, been reestablished.

Rabbeinu Bachye concedes that the Midrash offers a similar, but somewhat different, approach to recognizing these connections. The Midrash counts the generations in a different fashion and sees the parallel of the Davidic Monarchy to the moon as reflecting the generations from Avraham Avinu until Tzidkiyahu instead of Peretz to Tzidkiyahu. According to this approach there were thirty days which also seems to reflect the monthly cycle of the moon. The fourteenth generation is David and his name in Gematria equals fourteen. The fifteenth is Shlomo and his name connotes completion as the moon is full on the fifteenth day of its cycle.

Perhaps, the reason why both numbers, 29 and 30, have a way of working out is because the average lunation is not an even 29 or 30 days. As we are taught, the average lunation is 29 days 12 hours and 793 Chalakim (or 29 days 12 hours 44 minutes and 3 1/3 seconds). Perhaps encoded in the whole numbers that surround this fraction is this mystical hint to the Davidic Monarchy. May we merit to its reestablishment speedily and within our own time.

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