769 related texts · 24 related myths · Page 14 of 17
The Pesikta DeRav Kahana, a collection of Midrashic (rabbinic interpretive commentary) teachings, offers a glimpse into this radical transformation. It all starts with a verse from...
(Psalm 25:8) tells us, "Good and upright is Ad-nai; therefore He shows sinners the way." But what is that way? The Pesikta DeRav Kahana, a collection of homiletic teachings, explor...
Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer turns to The Chilling Moment Abraham Raised the Knife. One of the most striking accounts comes from Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating text that expands u...
You need to hear the story of Ezekiel and the dry bones. The tale comes to us from Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, specifically chapter 33. Rabbi Phineas tells us that after twenty long ye...
Jacob saw a ladder at Bethel, but Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer hears the end of history hidden in that night vision. "Better is the end of a thing than the beginning thereof," Ecclesiast...
The familiar story is this: Jacob, preparing to face his estranged brother Esau, finds himself confronting a mysterious figure in the dead of night. The Torah tells us "a man" wres...
Rabbi Phineas paints a breathtaking picture. He suggests that everyone who heard that voice, the entire generation at Sinai, were elevated, transformed, made worthy of being like t...
Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating work of aggadic literature, gives us a glimpse, a chilling, visceral snapshot of their suffering. Rabbi Akiva, a towering figure in Jewish tra...
Wouldn't that be a blessing? That image is at the heart of a beautiful teaching found in the Yalkut Shimoni on Nach (617). Rabbi Yose uses this powerful metaphor to explain the ver...
Prayer is often remembered as a one-way street, us reaching out to the Divine. But what if the Divine is also reaching out, also… praying? The Yalkut Shimoni, a compilation of Midr...
It's absolutely fundamental. In fact, Rabbi Yehoshua of Sikhnin, quoting Rabbi Levi, makes a powerful statement: "Great is peace, for all blessings are sealed with peace." This isn...
What seems like a simple act is actually steeped in tradition, detail, and a whole lot of meaning. The Book of Numbers, Bamidbar in Hebrew, gives us the source for the Priestly Ble...
It’s fascinating to see how ancient texts like Sifrei Bamidbar, a legal midrash on the Book of Numbers, attempt to define and describe where we might find that light. It all starts...
The Israelites, after a period of wandering, find themselves at war with Midian. Bamidbar 31:7 tells us, "And they warred against Midian." The text goes on to say they surrounded i...
Our source for today is Sifrei Devarim, a fascinating collection of early rabbinic legal interpretations on the Book of Deuteronomy. It teaches us that the way the land receives wa...
What would it look like? What would it represent? Our sages pondered this very question, and the answers they gave are both beautiful and a little bit chilling. In Sifrei Devarim, ...
Sifrei Devarim turns to The Sacred Timing of the Early and Late Rains. The passage focuses on two specific rains: the yoreh and the malkosh. The yoreh, we learn, falls in Marcheshv...
Sifrei Devarim reads the blessing of abundance as a promise so rich it threatens to overflow every ordinary measure. The verse But it's not just about a good harvest. It's about so...
Rabbi Simai begins with a seemingly simple observation: "My taking shall drip as the rain." It’s a phrase ripe with symbolism, and Rabbi Simai uses it to explore the relationship b...
It's in those moments, when things feel darkest, that Jewish tradition offers a powerful, almost defiant, message of hope. Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal midrashim (rabbinic...
The Jewish tradition grapples with these questions in powerful, sometimes terrifying, imagery. to one such image: the cup of retribution. It all starts with a verse from Psalms (75...
The Sifrei Devarim, a collection of early rabbinic legal interpretations on the Book of Deuteronomy, points out this fascinating characteristic of the prophets. "And this is the bl...
The Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal midrash on the book of Deuteronomy, poses a fascinating question about a seemingly simple phrase: "before his death." It appears in the co...
A blessing: "Blessed is He that broadens Gad." What does it mean? Simply put, the passage teaches us that the territory allotted to the tribe of Gad expanded eastward. But the stor...
While definitive answers might elude us, Jewish tradition offers tantalizing hints and comforting assurances. Our exploration begins in Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal and et...
The Blessing of Moses in (Deuteronomy 33) gets the full Targum treatment, every tribe's destiny expanded, every blessing loaded with specifics the Torah never mentions. It opens wi...
The death of Moses in (Deuteronomy 34) is eight verses in the Torah. Targum Jonathan turns it into one of the most elaborate death scenes in all of ancient Jewish literature. From ...
"This month shall be for you." It shall be turned over to you. R. Yehoshua b. Levi said, "It's like a king who had a horologue. When he looked at it, he would know what time of day...
Who wrote the Hebrew Bible? The Talmud in Bava Batra 14b provides a complete accounting, attributing every book to a specific author. Moses wrote his own book, the Torah. And also ...
Rabbi Elazar ben Shimon and the prophet Elijah once met on the road, and the Talmud preserves a strange and vivid account of what happened next. Elijah was traveling in disguise, a...
Bride & Angel of Death. Tobit. Tanh. Deut. Haazinu. Midr. Decalogue, No. VII, 3 b. Ben Atar, No. I, Eliah Cohen. Meil Se- daka 434, reprinted B. H. V, p. 152, 154. Farhi, O. P. I, ...
The prophet Elijah gave three gifts to a poor man. And the story of those gifts became a parable about the nature of divine assistance. The details of the gifts vary across differe...
Adam is the Hebrew and Biblical designation for humanity generally, and specifically for the progenitor of the human race. According to Genesis i, mankind was created on the sixth ...
"Blessed is the man who fears the Lord" (Psalm 112:1). The rabbis asked: what ultimately happens to him? And they landed on Ecclesiastes: "In the end, everything will be heard, fea...
Leah was hated. Or unloved, depending on the translation, but the Hebrew is harsh. And God saw it (Genesis 29:31). The psalm that frames it is equally clear: "The Lord upholds all ...
Rav Acha taught that before Adam was created, God turned to the ministering angels and consulted with them. "Shall we make man?" He asked. The angels answered honestly: "What good ...
A Roman legend told how the daughter of a certain emperor had so admired the beauty of Rabbi Ishmael's face that after his martyrdom his skin was removed, embalmed, and kept among ...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 5:29) preserves the folk etymology of Noah's name. Lamech calls his son "Noach," which the Targum glosses as "Consolation," saying: "This shall c...
Abraham had asked for Ishmael to be the heir of the promise (Genesis 17:18). Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 17:19) preserves the Lord's answer, and it is not what Abraham reque...
When the ram has been offered and the knife has been set down, the blessing arrives. In Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Genesis 22:17), the Aramaic preserves the double Hebrew intensifi...
The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan quietly drops a cosmic detail into the meal. When Isaac asks for wine, the Hebrew text does not explain where it comes from. The Targum does. "He had no ...
The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan sharpens the timing of the scene to a breath. "It was when Izhak had finished blessing Jakob, and Jakob had only gone out about two handbreadths from Izh...
Leah names the second son of her handmaid Zilpah Asher, from osher, "happiness" or "praise" (Genesis 30:13). The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan translates the name into a prophecy about th...
"Therefore the sons of Israel do not eat the sinew which shrank." Targum Pseudo-Jonathan (Genesis 32:33) preserves the origin of one of the oldest kosher laws, the prohibition agai...
The Targum gives the baker's dream two readings, the way it gave the butler's dream two readings. This is its interpretation. The three baskets are the three enslavements with whic...
A dying man does not waste his last gestures. When Jacob gathered the strength to bless his grandsons, he did something strange with his hands. Menasheh, the firstborn, stood on hi...
There is a line in Jacob's blessing so strange the ancient translators could not leave it alone. In the Hebrew, Jacob asks an angel to bless his grandsons. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan k...
When Joseph tried to move his father's hand, the old man answered with a phrase that has echoed for centuries. "I know, my son, I know" (Genesis 48:19). The doubling is not a stamm...
