yeah I know you did not ask!
You should so be blessed – well cursed at times actually – with a mind such as mine, making all these weird connections between my rumored neurons. Just be thankful that I do not share all of my random thoughts.
All my experience with Jewish temple services are in Reformed synagogues as that is the branch of Judaism that Señora follows.
In the temple, on the back of each pew are copies of the prayer book and of the Torah. Many folks at these services speak or have a passing knowledge of Hebrew, but many do not. For that reason, these books are in Hebrew and English. Typically the Hebrew is in the right column and the English is in the left. Or the English translation is written just below the Hebrew.
As the principle language is Hebrew, a language read from right to left, as opposed to English which is read from left to right, they start at what English speakers would think of as the back of the book. Thus the page numbers increase in an order opposite of what we are used to.
We were at a Bat Mitzvah today, and as I followed along in the prayer book I thought, “they should number books in English like this. That way you would know how many pages you had left to read in the book.”
Or not.
Brilliant