1,517 passages in Rabbinic Midrash
Individual passages from Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael, shown in source order. Page 9 of 32.
"from the heavens": from the goodly treasure trove of the heavens, viz. (Devarim 28:12) "The L–rd will open for you His goodly treasure trove, the heavens, etc." R. Shimon b. Gamli...
The sages of the Mekhilta turn to Rachav, the woman of Jericho who sheltered Joshua's two spies, and they reconstruct her whole life as a study in repentance. They said: Rachav the...
When Moses stood before Israel at Sinai and "took the book of the covenant and read it in the ears of the people" (Exodus 24:7), a question immediately arises: what exactly did he ...
The Torah states: "And if a man sells his daughter" (Exodus 21:7). The Mekhilta immediately draws attention to a legal distinction embedded in this verse that might otherwise go un...
The verse commands: "You shall not incline the judgment of your needy one in his quarrel." And the Mekhilta explains that "needy" here does not mean poor in money. It means "needy ...
"Speak to the whole congregation of Israel." The Mekhilta works out the calendar of the first Passover in Egypt by carefully fixing each command to its proper day. The speaking, th...
The Mekhilta offers a second interpretation of the phrase "and Pharaoh pressed ahead," this time focusing on the terrifying speed of the Egyptian pursuit. Pharaoh did not merely ch...
King David makes a remarkable claim in the Mekhilta: every nation on earth praises God in its own way, but David's songs are more pleasing to God than all of theirs combined. This ...
"each day's ration in its day": for the day and the morrow, e.g., on Friday, for Friday and Sabbath. R. Eliezer Hamodai says: So that one not gather for the day and the morrow, e.g...
Yithro, the father-in-law of Moses, had seven names. And the Mekhilta explains that each name encoded a different aspect of his extraordinary character. Yether, because he "added" ...
The Torah states that a father may sell his daughter into servitude (Exodus 21:7). The Mekhilta asks the next logical question: if a father can sell his daughter, can a daughter se...
Rabbi Acha bar Rabbi Oshiyah laid out the precise timeline of the first Passover. God spoke to Moses on the first of the month (Rosh Chodesh). The Israelites selected their lambs o...
The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael preserves a stunning image of dialogue between Israel and the Holy Spirit, a call and response that echoes through the ages. When Israel declares the ...
A seemingly technical legal teaching in the Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael reveals a deep argument about what made the manna special. The verse in (Exodus 16:5) states that on the sixth...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael preserves a fascinating tradition about the name of Jethro, Moses's father-in-law. His name was not always Jethro. In the beginning, the Torah calls h...
R. Yishmael says: What is written at the beginning, viz. (Leviticus 25:1-3) "And the L–rd spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying … then the land shall rest a Sabbath to the L–rd. Si...
The Mekhilta continues its rigorous legal analysis of who can be sold into servitude. Having established that a daughter cannot sell herself, a new question arises. Should a daught...
Rabbi Yossi Haglili agreed with the established timeline of the first Passover: God spoke on the first of the month, the lamb was selected on the tenth, and the slaughtering occurr...
As Israel stood at the edge of the sea, they looked back and saw something terrifying. "And, behold, Egypt coming after them" (Exodus 14:10). The Mekhilta notices a grammatical det...
The manna that fell in the wilderness was unlike any bread the Israelites had ever known. The Torah calls it "bread that is meshunneh", bread that is "different" (Exodus 16:4). But...
God commanded the Israelites to "wash their garments" in preparation for receiving the Torah at Sinai (Exodus 19:10). The Mekhilta asks a follow-up question that the Torah itself d...
The Mekhilta on damages takes up the laws of the Hebrew bondservant and tests an inference about the female servant. The case concerns "boring," the rite in which a male Hebrew ser...
This teaching from the Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael studies the command to set aside the Passover lamb: "on the tenth of this month they shall take to themselves, each man, a lamb for...
When the Israelites saw the Egyptian army bearing down on them and the Red Sea blocking their escape, the Torah says they "were exceedingly afraid." But what did they do with that ...
The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael continues its portrait of the extraordinary dialogue between Israel and the Holy Spirit with another matched pair of verses. When Israel proclaims (De...
Moses and Aaron stood before the entire assembly of Israel in the wilderness and made a promise that must have sounded almost too good to believe: "In the evening you will know tha...
God told Moses to have the people ready "for the third day" (Exodus 19:11), and the Mekhilta identifies this as the sixth day of the month of Sivan, the day on which the Torah was ...
"And if a man sells": We are hereby apprised that he may sell her (as a maid-servant). And whence is it derived that he is permitted to betroth her?, If he can remove her from (the...
The Torah commands regarding the Passover lamb: "On the tenth day of this month, they shall take" (Exodus 12:3). The Mekhilta zeroes in on one seemingly minor word in this verse, t...
The Mekhilta continues tracing the lineage of prayer through the patriarchs, turning to Isaac. The Torah says that "Isaac went out lasuach in the field" (Genesis 24:63). And the Me...
The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael presents yet another exchange in the ongoing dialogue between Israel and the Holy Spirit. When Israel declares (Psalms 89:18), "For You are the glory ...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael draws a sweeping conclusion from the verse "and you will know that the L-rd took you out of the land of Egypt" (Exodus 16:6). The teaching here is not...
The Torah states: "And if a man sells his daughter as a maid-servant" (Exodus 21:7). The Mekhilta draws a striking inference from this phrasing. A father may sell his daughter as a...
(Exodus 23:7) says: "And a clean one and a righteous one you shall not kill." The Mekhilta applies this to a specific judicial scenario involving imprecise testimony. Suppose one w...
The Mekhilta completes its tracing of prayer through the three patriarchs by turning to Jacob. The Torah says that Jacob "vayifga in the place and he spent the night there, for the...
When the Israelites grumbled in the wilderness about food, Moses and Aaron told them (Exodus 16:7): "And in the morning you will see the glory of the Lord." The Mekhilta de-Rabbi I...
The Mekhilta teaches that there are people in the Torah whose very names were diminished, literally shrunk, because of their actions. The prime example is Efron the Hittite, the ma...
The Torah describes the revelation at Sinai as occurring "before the eyes of all the people" (Exodus 19:11). The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael takes this phrase and draws from it one o...
The Torah rules concerning a Hebrew maidservant that "she shall not go out as the bondsmen go out" (Exodus 21:7). The Mekhilta works to pin down exactly what this denial of release...
The Mekhilta presses one of the hardest problems in capital law: what proof does a court need before it may put a murderer to death? It constructs the most extreme case imaginable....
The Mekhilta adds a further proof that the Hebrew root "pegiyah" means prayer, citing the prophet Jeremiah: "Let them now pray (yifgu na) to the Lord of hosts, that the vessels whi...
"This is my G-d and I will extol Him." Commenting on the Song at the Sea, R. Eliezer makes a striking claim through this verse in the Mekhilta: a lowly maid-servant standing at the...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael drew a sharp distinction between two foods God gave the Israelites in the wilderness, and the difference had everything to do with how they were reque...
The Mekhilta offers another example of a name diminished by moral failure: Yonadav, originally called Yehonadav. The difference is a single element, the divine syllable "Yeho," der...
The Torah states that God descended onto Mount Sinai "before the eyes of all the people" (Exodus 19:11), and the Mekhilta draws a startling conclusion from those words: if even a s...
The Mekhilta examines how the Torah's laws governing Hebrew servants apply equally to men and women. The verse states "the Hebrew man or the Hebrew woman" (Deuteronomy 15:12), and ...
Shimon ben Shetach once had a single scheming witness, a zomem, one proven to have conspired to give false testimony, executed. Yehudah ben Tabbai was horrified. He said to Shimon:...
How many lambs were needed for the first Passover? The Mekhilta tackles this question with characteristic precision. One might initially think that a single lamb would suffice for ...
