One can hear distinct similarities with contemporaneous Akkadian clothing vocabulary: sisiktu ('thread', 'edge', 'loom') or tsitstsatu (a floral ornamentation).

[3] This hypothesis is supported by the fact that the custom of making fringes from extending the threads of embroidery was common in the ancient Near East as the means of strengthening the fabric.

The further analyses of the antique iconography suggest that apart from this pragmatic purpose the tassels could also decorate the cloth and as such be a marker of the social status: the more elaborate and elegant the fringes, the higher the position of the owner.

[4] This data has led the scholars to assume that the practice itself is of very ancient origins and evolved into Jewish ritual clothing where it was invested with religious meaning.

I am Hashem your God.You shall make tassels on the four corners of the garment with which you cover yourself.Since the Hebrew word kanaph can mean 'corner' or 'border', the specific place of the attachment of the fringes is unclear.

Lastly, the passage lacks any instructions on the binding of the fringes, save for the obligation to include "a cord of blue" (Heb.

The lack of detail on these points suggests that the tying of tzitzit was to a great extent Oral Torah until the third to first century BCE with the codifying of the Talmud.

The primary mnemonic purposes of this mitzvah are expressed clearly: wearing tzitzit reminds a daily practitioner to bring God's love into action by practicing all other mitzvot.

The blue thread mentioned in the Torah, tekhelet, is omitted by most Rabbinic Jews due to controversy over the dye-making process.

The medieval rabbis debated the source of the tzitzit obligation for garments made from different types of fabric.

[5] In practice, the rabbinic sages permitted using wool and linen strings in tandem only when what they hold to be genuine tekhelet is available.

The Talmud explains that the Bible requires an upper knot (kesher elyon) and one wrapping of three winds (hulya).

The tying method which gained the widest acceptance can be described as follows:[21] The four strands of the tzitzit are passed through a hole near the garment's corner.

Others, especially Sephardi Jews, use 10-5-6-5 as the number of windings, a combination that represents directly the spelling of the Tetragrammaton (whose numerical value is 26).

Rashi, a prominent Jewish commentator, bases the number of knots on a gematria: the word tzitzit (in its Mishnaic spelling, ציצית‎) has the value 600.

(Nachmanides knots are worn by the majority of Sephardic Jews and Teimani Jews) Modern Biblical scholar Jacob Milgrom notes than in ancient Middle Eastern societies, the corner of the garment was often elaborately decorated to "ma[k]e an important social statement", functioning as a "symbolic extension of the owner himself".

[29] He also notes that the Torah requires tekhelet, normally a royal and priestly color, to be used by all Jews: The tzitzit are the epitome of the democratic thrust within Judaism, which equalizes not by leveling but by elevating.

In recent times, with the (debated) re-discovery of the Ḥillazon in the Murex trunculus mollusk,[33] some have noted that one cannot fulfill the mitzvah of tzitzit without the tekhelet strand.

Therefore, many Rishonim permitted women to wear tzitzit (including Isaac ibn Ghiyyat, Rashi, Rabbeinu Tam, Baal HaMaor, Rambam, Raaviyah, Rashba, and Ra'ah).

The Rema states that while women are technically allowed to don a tallit, doing so would appear to be an act of arrogance (yuhara).

[42] The vast majority of contemporary Orthodox authorities forbid the donning of a tallit by women,[46] although Moshe Feinstein,[47] Joseph Soloveitchik, and Eliezer Melamed approve women wearing tzitzit in private, if their motivation is "for God's sake" rather than motivated by external movements such as feminism.

[48] Women in Conservative Judaism have revived the wearing of the tallit since the 1970s, usually using colors and fabrics distinct from the traditional garment worn by men.

[50] It has become common in Reform and other non-Orthodox streams for girls to receive a tallit at their bat mitzvah,[51][52] although some do not subsequently wear it on a regular basis.

Another version of Samaritan tzitzit is the simple fringes on the sides of the very large white tallit worn by the priests when carrying a Torah scroll.

The reason for this lexical change is open to speculation, yet, the scholars are inclined to assume that in the times when Deuteronomy was composed, the meaning of the tzitzit of Numbers 15:37 had been lost and the gedîlîm is a dynamic translation of an unusual term.