1,962 related texts · Page 157 of 218
Imagine the scene: Balaam, the non-Jewish prophet-for-hire, is up to no good. He's been hired by Balak, king of Moab, to curse the Israelites (Numbers 22-24). He's built seven alta...
The Torah portion V'Zot HaBerachah, "This is the blessing," gives us a glimpse into that raw, fervent side of prayer as Moses, in his final act, intercedes for the tribes of Israel...
The text tells us that “the sound of their grief pierced to the very heavens.” It paints a vivid picture of despair. And where is Moses, their leader, during all this? He’s gone to...
Jewish tradition certainly knows that feeling, and it gives us some incredible stories about how our ancestors faced it. Imagine this: the prophet Elijah, a figure practically syno...
It’s a story of sin, substitution, and…redemption. Originally, get this, the b’chorim—the firstborn sons—held a special spiritual role. They were designated to perform sacred servi...
The book of Bamidbar Rabbah, a treasure trove of rabbinic commentary on the Book of Numbers, delves into this very idea. It all starts with the command to count the firstborn males...
The story begins with Akilas, a convert to Judaism – a ger tzedek, as we say in Hebrew. He approaches Rabbi Eliezer with a question, a concern, really. Akilas points to the verse i...
The Rabbis, masters of drash (interpretive storytelling), loved to find echoes and allusions throughout the Torah. They saw connections where we might only see separate stories. An...
But it's also so much more. It’s a roadmap, a history book, a mystical text. And it's all wrapped up together, often needing a little… unpacking. That's where commentaries like Ber...
