10,602 related texts · Page 31 of 221
The text Kalach Pitchei Chokhmah, a profound Kabbalistic work, offers a fascinating glimpse into this process. It talks about how the divine influence is channeled, almost like wat...
And the answer, or at least a glimpse of it, lies in understanding a few key concepts from the Kabbalah, the Jewish mystical tradition. We're going to dive into something called Ka...
Kabbalah, the ancient Jewish mystical tradition, offers some breathtaking answers. It's not a simple story, mind you, but it's a deeply compelling one. Today, we're diving into a c...
It's more than just letters, you know. It's a doorway into understanding the very fabric of creation. to the Sefer HaBahir, one of the earliest and most influential texts of Kabbal...
This very question is tackled in Sefer HaBahir, one of the earliest and most important texts of Kabbalah, Jewish mysticism. The Bahir, meaning "brightness" or "illumination," delve...
The Sefer Yetzirah, the "Book of Formation," is a short but incredibly dense mystical text that attempts to explain just that. It lays out a system where the 22 letters of the Hebr...
That feeling, that tantalizing sense of the unknowable, is at the heart of the Idra Zuta, a truly mind-bending section of the Zohar. We're diving deep into the mystical heart of Ka...
Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai, the sage traditionally credited with authoring the Zohar, makes a powerful statement. He declares that everything he has revealed about Atika Kadisha – the...
Take the opening words of the Torah, Bereshit (בראשית) – "In the beginning." Simple enough. But what if those words were a doorway, a key to unlocking profound secrets about creati...
Jewish mysticism has a powerful image for that feeling, and it all starts with… your navel. Sounds a little strange. But stick with me. The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a cor...
The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a central text of Kabbalah, certainly sees it that way. In Tikkunei Zohar 124, we find this very image: the Torah as a garden, specifically a...
Two verses in the Torah appear to contradict each other on a basic question: how many days must one eat matzah during Passover? One verse says six days. Another says seven. The Mek...
The Mekhilta addresses a gap in the Torah's instructions about eating matzah during Passover. The verse states, "Seven days shall you eat matzot" (Exodus 12:18). This clearly estab...
In Judaism, there's a pretty firm foundation: God created the world precisely when He chose to. But that leads to a whole host of other questions, doesn't it? What was before that ...
Jewish tradition offers a fascinating, almost dizzying glimpse into that unimaginable period. We know that on each of the first five days of Creation, God brought forth a multitude...
Turns out, even God had that problem. We all know the story: God creates Adam, the first man, and realizes he's a little lonely. So, naturally, God decides to create him a partner,...
According to one fascinating oral tradition, Adam's first wife wasn't quite the helpmate he expected. She was, shall we say, a little too clever, a little too strong for him. Can y...
Where was the Torah before it was given to Moses? Have you ever wondered about that? It's a question that dives right into the heart of Jewish mythology. Because if the Torah is so...
We often picture the shame, the hardship... but what about the stuff? Did he get to take anything with him? Well, according to one fascinating folktale recounted in Howard Schwartz...
And their grumbling had some pretty fiery consequences. We find ourselves in the book of Numbers (Bamidbar in Hebrew, meaning "in the wilderness") chapter 21. The Israelites are tr...
It’s one of those enduring mysteries that captures the imagination. They were carried away, prisoners in their own land, and exiled beyond the mysterious river Sambatyon. But what ...
And at the heart of it all lies the mystery of the Third Temple. The tradition tells us that in the End of Days, a great Ingathering of the Exiles will occur, and we'll hear the fo...
The ancient sages did. And in Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rabbinic interpretations of the Book of Psalms, they grapple with this very question, particularly in relation to th...
David, millennia later, giving voice to the unspoken gratitude of humanity's dawn. Rabbi Samuel, whose teaching is recorded in the Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary), ident...
Midrash Tehillim, a beautiful collection of interpretations on the Book of Psalms, offers a powerful contrast to this feeling. It tells us that while worldly gifts can be lost, the...
The ancient rabbis certainly understood that feeling. They saw it reflected in the words of King David, in the 18th Psalm, and explored it deeply in Midrash Tehillim, a collection ...
Even Adam, the first human, felt that way. Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Psalms, delves into this very feeling in Psalm 25. It opens with the ...
to a passage from Midrash Tehillim 36 that speaks directly to this feeling. The verse we're focusing on is a prayer: "Draw your kindness towards your devotees." Simple enough. But ...
Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rabbinic interpretations of the Book of Psalms, explores this idea in a truly fascinating way. Rabbi Abbahu offers a parable: Imagine a king conqu...
And as we find in Midrash Tehillim, a collection of interpretations on the Book of Psalms, the answer is a dazzling, multi-layered chorus. Psalm 148 begins with a resounding call: ...
We all know the basic tale: prophet disobeys God, gets swallowed by a sea creature, repents, and is spit back out. But what about the details? What was it like inside that fish? We...
God rested. But what does that mean? The book of Genesis tells us, "And on the seventh day God finished his work" (Gen. 2:2). But according to Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating...
Take, for example, the story of the oath to Noah after the flood. Why do our sages, according to Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, institute that we should mention the oath to Noah every sin...
Our tradition has some fascinating, and sometimes unsettling, answers. Let's talk about Nimrod. Rabbi Akiba, a giant of the Talmudic era, pulls no punches when he describes Nimrod'...
Abraham knew that feeling. The story of the Tower of Babel – you know, that ambitious, maybe even arrogant, attempt to build a tower that would reach the heavens – it's more than j...
Sometimes, the clues are hidden in plain sight, tucked away in unexpected places. Let's take a peek into the Yalkut Shimoni, a vast collection of rabbinic commentary on the Bible, ...
The Yalkut Shimoni, a fascinating collection of rabbinic commentary on the entire Hebrew Bible, touches on this very moment in section 685 on Nach (the books of Prophets and Writin...
(Genesis 2:7) says God formed man from "the dust of the ground." The Targum Jonathan says something far more specific. God took dust from the place of the Beit HaMikdash (בית המקדש...
The Hebrew Bible says God "came down" to see the Tower of Babel and confused humanity's language (Genesis 11:7). But the ancient Aramaic translators of Targum Jonathan told a radic...
Jewish tradition has something fascinating to say about that very idea. It's a notion that the very foundations, the shoresh – the roots – of absolutely everything were established...
to one. Before Adam was even a twinkle in God's eye, the Big G was contemplating a cosmic dilemma. As we learn from Tree of Souls, there were already two kinds of beings populating...
Maybe, just maybe, you're missing the Shabbat (the Sabbath). You know, the Sabbath. That sacred pause in the week, that island of stillness in our often-frantic lives. But did you ...
The creation story, as we know it, tells of God fashioning the world, setting it firmly on its foundations (Tree of Souls, Ifa 7838). Then came Adam, the first human. God brought h...
Specifically, Bamidbar Rabbah – a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Numbers – gives us a vibrant picture. It tells us that each of the twelve tribes had its own uniqu...
Sometimes, a seemingly simple verse can unlock a whole world of understanding about God's relationship with us. to one such passage from Numbers, specifically 3:11-13. It starts pl...
We know, according to tradition, that God created the world in six days. But what about since then? The Talmudic sages pondered this very question. In Bamidbar Rabbah, a collection...
But Jewish tradition offers a powerful counter-narrative, one of enduring hope and unwavering protection, even when we stumble. Our Rabbis explored this idea in Bamidbar Rabbah, sp...
Specifically, we're looking at the offerings of Elyasaf son of Deuel, the prince of the tribe of Gad. "On the sixth day, prince of the children of Gad, Elyasaf son of Deuel" (Numbe...
