The name Gwendolen in Hebrew letters is גוונדולן. Below: how its number adds up, which page of the Torah it falls on and what verse stands there. Everything is computed, nothing is guessed.
גוונדולן
In short
Your name in Hebrew letters is גוונדולן. Gwendolen is a name of Welsh origin. It probably comes from the words “gwen” and “dolen”, which mean “white” and “ring”. The name is used in Wales and England. In Hebrew it is written by sound. Adding up the numbers of its letters gives 155 — the same as the Torah word קנה, “stalk, reed”. That number points to Torah page 155 of 354 — in the portion Vayakhel. What that portion is about: The Sabbath comes before the work on the Sanctuary; the people bring more than enough; Bezalel and the craftsmen build the Tabernacle. The verse that begins with the first letter of your name and ends with the last is Deuteronomy 28:50. Each of these steps is laid out below with its sources. Every figure can be checked by hand.
You wrote “Gwendolen” — this exact spelling is what was calculated: גוונדולן. A name from the Tanakh — its Tanakh spelling is used. If your name is spelled differently, correct the Hebrew spelling and the report is recomputed.
Adding up the letters of the name גוונדולן gives 155.
155
The number 155 is the Torah word קנה — «stalk, reed» (Genesis 41:5).
Them hath He filled with wisdom of heart, to work all manner of workmanship, of the craftsman, and of the skilful workman, and of the weaver in colours, in blue, and in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen, and of the weaver, even of them that do any workmanship, and of those that devise skilful works.
This is from the portion Vayakhel. What it is about: The Sabbath comes before the work on the Sanctuary; the people bring more than enough; Bezalel and the craftsmen build the Tabernacle.
Other ways of counting
The tradition counts the same name in several ways. The main one is above: each letter is its number. The other eight are old and checkable too; each gives its own number, and many of them have a Torah word with the same number.
Final letters as 500–900 (mispar gadol) — 805. A Torah word with the same number is שרשה — “chain” (Exodus 28:22).
Reduced, each letter to one digit (mispar katan) — 38. A Torah word with the same number is גלה — “to uncover” (Genesis 9:21).
Ordinal: alef 1, bet 2 … tav 22 (mispar siduri) — 65. A Torah word with the same number is אדני — “my Lord” (Genesis 15:2).
Cumulative: a letter plus all letters before it (mispar kidmi) — 574. A Torah word with the same number is ולקחתיך — “and I will fetch you” (Genesis 27:45).
Squares of the letter values (mispar perati) — 6033.
Building: the sum grows with each letter (mispar bone’eh) — 496. A Torah word with the same number is צרור — “bundle, pouch” (Genesis 42:35).
The letters that come out are רפפטקפכט — not a word that stands in the Pentateuch. Atbash: letters mirrored, alef for tav, bet for shin, and the number of the resulting word — 578. A Torah word with the same number is בעשור — “on the tenth” (Leviticus 16:29).
Filling: the names of the letters are counted — alef, bet, gimel… (milui) — 839.
The number 155 appears in the classical books 5 times across 4 works. The earliest mention is מדרש לפירושים (~1450?).
Every letter of the name explained, the words and namesakes with references, the Hebrew date, the letter and tribe of the month, day 861 of your life (±1), the psalm by age, the attestations from the classical books — a PDF sent to your email.
The number of the day, every morning
Every date has a number too. Once a year it will match the number of your name — 155. The channel posts one number a day, one verse and the Torah page it lands on. Nothing after it, no mailing list.
Hebrew is written from right to left. גוונדולן has 8 letters: ג Gimel, ו Vav, ו Vav, נ Nun, ד Dalet, ו Vav, ל Lamed, ן final Nun. The first letter is Gimel, the last is final Nun.
For an engraving, a sign or a tattoo, show the spelling to someone who reads Hebrew: transliterating a name is a choice, not the only option.
The name גוונדולן does not stand as a word in the Pentateuch — as with most names, including many Tanakh names from the later books.
The verse of your name
There is a custom: at the end of the prayer one says a Torah verse that begins with the first letter of one's name and ends with its last. For גוונדולן these are ג and נ. The Pentateuch has exactly one such verse — Deuteronomy 28:50:
גוי עז פנים אשר לא ישא פנים לזקן ונער לא יחן
This is from the portion Ki Tavo. What it is about: “When you enter”: the first fruits and the declaration; the stones on Mount Ebal; blessings and admonitions.
Any name written in Hebrew letters is a number: גוונדולן = 155. And every date has a number of its own. There is a day in the year when the two coincide.
«Them hath He filled with wisdom of heart, to work all manner of workmanship, of the craftsman, and of the skilful workman, and of the weaver in colours, in blue, and in purple, in scarlet, and in fine linen, and of the weaver, even of them that do any workmanship, and of those that devise skilful works.»
Each Hebrew letter has a number; a word's number is their sum (alef 1 … tav 400). The page is the remainder modulo 354: the Torah divided into 354 pages of 861 letters, as the lunar year has 354 days. Everything can be checked by hand.
