Tanach · Rishonim on Tanach · Ibn Ezra · Torah
Ibn Ezra on Genesis 23:1/אבן עזרא על בראשית כ״ג:א׳
אחיי. לשון רבים ולא יתפרדו ומנהג הלשון להקדים המספר הרב על המעט והפך הדבר כמו שני יעקב:
1THE LIFE OF. The word life (chayyim) is always encountered in the plural. We never find it in the singular. [A HUNDRED AND SEVEN AND TWENTY YEARS.] Hebrew usually first lists the larger numbers and then the smaller ones.1. But we also find the opposite, an example being Scripture’s enumeration of Jacob’s years2. Here Scripture lists the smaller numbers first. (Gen. 47:28).