309 passages in Rabbinic Midrash
Individual passages from Pesikta de-Rav Kahana, shown in source order. Page 2 of 7.
Why does the Torah say the LORD separated Israel from the peoples rather than separating the peoples from Israel? The sages noticed the careful wording and drew a striking picture ...
This tension, this very human struggle, lies at the heart of a beautiful passage in the Pesikta DeRav Kahana, a collection of Midrashic (rabbinic interpretive commentary) teachings...
When Moses came to Israel in Egypt and announced that this very month would be the month of their freedom, the people did not cheer. They argued back, and the sages preserved three...
Rabbi Yitzhak watched a gazelle and saw God in its motion. The animal does not walk a steady path; it springs from tree to tree, from fence to fence, appearing here and then vanish...
"My beloved answered and said to me, arise, my love, my fair one, and come away" (Song of Songs 2:10). The sages heard in these tender names the whole lineage of Israel. "My love" ...
Rabbi Yonah began from a strange verse in Hosea, where the prophet buys back his wife "for fifteen pieces of silver and a homer of barley" (Hosea 3:2). On its surface it is a trans...
"This month shall be for you" (Exodus 12:2). On these words the sages heard God say something staggering to Israel: never before had He pulled a whole nation out from the inside of...
Rabbi Berekhiah turned the command to mark the new month into a mirror for Israel's own history. "This month shall be for you" (Exodus 12:2) is not only a rule about the calendar; ...
"This month shall be for you" (Exodus 12:2). The sages heard in the small word "for you" an act of trust: God handed the calendar over to Israel the way a father hands over his mos...
When the LORD told Israel that the new moon would mark their calendar, the sages heard a quiet promise tucked inside a command. The nations measure their time by the sun, blazing a...
The sages knew the science of the sky. A new moon born too late in the day cannot be seen that evening, for the eye has no power to catch so faint a sliver before it sinks. And the...
Three sages debated a single hopeful idea, and their disagreement was small. The Holy One, blessed be He, told Israel that a fresh redemption awaits them in the days to come. One s...
God commanded Israel to set aside the Passover lamb on the tenth of the month, four full days before it would be slaughtered. Rabbi Yochanan asked the obvious question. A lamb is b...
Rabbi Yitzchak read the word for "month" as a summons: renew your deeds. The same Hebrew letters that name the new moon can be heard as "make yourselves new." And there was reason ...
The Torah forbids eating the Passover lamb raw or boiled, insisting that it be roasted whole over fire, head, legs, and innards together. The sages first heard a lesson in patience...
Scripture calls the daily offering "My bread," and the rabbis hurried to correct any impression that God could be hungry. The psalm answers plainly: if I were hungry I would not te...
"The righteous eats to satisfy his soul, but the belly of the wicked shall want" (Proverbs 13:25). The sages found the whole human difference between need and greed in that single ...
After the Temple fell, an ache settled into Israel. People remembered when the wilderness camp moved at God's word and the morning and evening offerings rose without fail. Now the ...
Scripture commands two lambs each day for the continual offering, and the sages could not let the word for "lambs" pass without listening to it. The House of Shammai heard kovshim,...
We rush toward it on New Year's Eve, celebrate Cinderella's transformation, and tell spooky stories about what lurks in the darkness. But in Jewish tradition, midnight holds a uniq...
Pesikta DeRav Kahana turns to God Passes Judgment. A fascinating passage in the Pesikta de-Rav Kahana (7:2) gives us a peek behind the curtain – or perhaps, into the heavenly court...
A collection of rabbinic teachings, there's so much more to it than meets the eye. Rabbi Acha explores the verse from Isaiah (42:8): "I am YHWH, that is My name; and My glory will ...
A verse from Isaiah (44:26): "[God] confirmeth the word of His servant, and performeth the counsel of His messengers; that saith of Jerusalem: 'She shall be inhabited'; and of the ...
The familiar picture has opulent feasts, lavish parties, maybe strategizing with advisors late into the night. But what about King David, the sweet singer of Israel? What filled hi...
The Torah tells us about the 10th plague, the death of the firstborn in Egypt, and the Exodus that followed. But the details… they’re fascinating. Rabbi Shimon Ben Yochai, a toweri...
Pesikta DeRav Kahana turns to Shadows of Egypt of Egyptians. The Pesikta DeRav Kahana, a collection of rabbinic teachings, explores this. It's not just talking about the firstborn ...
Scripture says the LORD struck "the firstborn of Pharaoh," and the sages noticed something hidden in those words. If Pharaoh himself had a firstborn rank to lose, then he was a fir...
The warning of the tenth plague did not stop at palace and noble house. Scripture stretched it down to "the firstborn of the maidservant" turning the grindstones in the lowest corn...
The plague of the firstborn swept up the cattle along with the people, and the sages pressed the obvious question. If a human being sinned, what wrong had the cow or the lamb done ...
Rabbi Levi taught a principle that runs through Scripture like a steady pulse. The Master of Mercy does not touch lives first. Before judgment reaches a person, it gives warning af...
Rabbi Berechiah read the plagues not as scattered blows but as a campaign, the way a king lays siege to a rebel city. He came upon Egypt with the strategy of kings. First He dammed...
The prophet Isaiah painted a startling contrast: "darkness shall cover the earth, and thick darkness the peoples, but upon you the LORD will shine." The sages opened up the kinds o...
The Sages once wanted to bury the book of Ecclesiastes. Its lines seemed dangerous: if all human toil is empty wind under the sun, then why labor at all, even over Torah? But they ...
The Book of Job has a strange line about a harvest devoured by the hungry and a snare gaping for the rich man's wealth. The rabbis read it as the secret history of Israel's deliver...
When the priest lifted the new barley before God, he did not simply hold it still. He waved it back and forth, then raised it high and lowered it again, a gesture full of meaning. ...
Do not think the barley Omer a small thing, the rabbis warn. By its merit Abraham was promised the land, on condition that he keep God's covenant. By its merit God restores peace b...
A single verse holds a debate as old as the academy: "Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains, Your judgments are a great deep." Rabbi Ishmael reads it as two destinies, mo...
God asks a question that silences every boast: who ever gave to Me first, so that I would owe him in return? Everything under heaven is already Mine. Yet the Holy One does not leav...
Why does the Torah say "when an ox is born," when of course it is a calf that is born, not a full-grown ox? Rabbi Abbahu draws a thread through several teachings to answer, all gui...
Ecclesiastes says that what will be has already been, and the rabbis hear in it a quiet rule of history: every wonder God promises for the future, He has already rehearsed through ...
Three times, the rabbis teach, God came to argue His case with Israel, and three times the nations leaned in to watch the verdict. Surely now, they thought, the Creator will crush ...
The prophet's harsh words turn tender in the rabbis' hands. "You are from nothing," Isaiah says (Isaiah 41:24), and the sages hear it as a meditation on birth itself. A child arriv...
Why should the ox stand first in the order of sacrifices? The animal that recalls the golden calf seems an odd choice to lead the procession to the altar. Rabbi Levi answered with ...
The rabbis flinch at the plain reading of the golden calf and look for the loophole. Notice, they say, the wording: "These are your God, O Israel" (Exodus 32:4). "Your," not "our."...
The three animals fit for the altar are not chosen at random, the midrash teaches. Each carries the memory of one of the fathers. The ox recalls Abraham, who ran to the herd to fee...
A newborn animal cannot go straight to the altar. The Torah requires that it stay seven days beneath its mother before it can be offered (Leviticus 22:27). Rabbi Levi heard royal p...
"A righteous man knows the soul of his beast, but the mercies of the wicked are cruel" (Proverbs 12:10). Rabbi Levi read the whole arc of Jewish history in that single verse. The r...
The portion closes with a quiet promise about the one gift that outlasts time. "When you sacrifice a thanksgiving offering to the LORD, you shall sacrifice it so that you may be ac...
