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Where do dreams come from? The Talmud in Berakhot 55a offers a surprisingly psychological answer: from the dreamer's own mind. Rabbi Shmuel bar Nahmani taught in the name of Rabbi ...
At the end of days, the prophet Malachi says, you will be able to tell the righteous from the wicked at a glance: "You shall return and discern between the righteous and the wicked...
We all know Moses. The guy who led the Israelites out of Egypt, received the Torah on Mount Sinai… a pretty big deal. But even Moses, seasoned leader and prophet, felt a tremor of ...
The ancient Moabites knew that feeling all too well. See, a little backstory is needed. Remember Sihon and Og? Those formidable Amorite kings? Well, they were expansionists. They'd...
The Jewish people were redeemed from Egypt because of the righteous women. According to Sotah 11b, Rav Avira taught that while the men had given up hope under Pharaoh's slavery, th...
Rachel had watched her sister enter the wedding canopy and had not envied her — not then. But when the children came, one after another from Leah's womb, Rachel's patience broke. "...
Jacob sent messengers ahead to his brother Esau (Genesis 32:4). The Hebrew word is malachim — messengers, angels. The midrash says this literally: Jacob sent actual angels. He had ...
“How does the greatly crowded city sit alone? She has become like a widow. Great among the nations, a princess among the states: She has become a vassal” (Lamentations 1:1).“How [e...
There was an incident involving Miriam daughter of the baker, who was taken captive with her seven sons. The emperor took them and placed them behind seven partitions. He brought t...
“He severed in his enflamed wrath all the horn of Israel; He retracted His right hand from before the enemy. He burned in Jacob like flaming fire, consuming all around” (Lamentatio...
The Hebrew Bible says Moses died "by the mouth of God" (Deuteronomy 34:5). Ancient tradition interprets this as death by a divine kiss—the gentlest possible departure from life. Ta...
That’s the raw, human core of this passage from Sifrei Devarim, a collection of early rabbinic legal commentaries on the Book of Deuteronomy. It centers around Moses, and his despe...
It’s a question that’s plagued humanity for millennia, and it’s a question that even Moses himself wrestled with. Imagine being Moses, the man who led the Israelites out of slavery...
A man who had mastered Scripture, studied the Mishnah, and served many scholars dropped dead in the middle of his life. His widow seized his tefillin (leather phylacteries worn dur...
The opening verse of Deuteronomy lists a string of place names — "in the wilderness, in the Arabah, over against Suph, between Paran and Tophel, and Laban, and Hazeroth, and Di-zah...
Bar Haddaya, the dream interpreter who gave favorable readings to paying clients and devastating ones to non-payers, eventually paid for his corruption with his life. Berakhot 56b ...
After Vespasian became emperor, his son Titus completed the destruction of Jerusalem. According to Gittin 56b, Rabban Yohanan ben Zakkai's famous encounter with Vespasian included ...
The parable of the blind man and the lame man in the orchard, told by Antoninus to Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi in Sanhedrin 91b, establishes one of the Talmud's most important doctrines: b...
Rabbi Simlai made one of the most ambitious claims in the entire Talmud. He said: 613 commandments were given to Moses at Sinai—365 prohibitions corresponding to the days of the so...
The Hebrew Bible calls Moses "the man of God" (Deuteronomy 33:1). Targum Onkelos adds one word: "the prophet of God." Moses is not merely a man who belongs to God. He is a prophet—...
The Hebrew Bible makes one of its most radical claims in (Deuteronomy 30:12-14): "It is not in heaven... nor is it overseas... for the matter is extremely close to you, in your mou...
It is written (Jeremiah 50:33) "Thus said the LORD of Hosts: The people of Israel are oppressed, And so too the people of Judah etc." and it is written (ibid 34) "Their Redeemer is...
Twenty generations passed between Adam and Abraham without old age being mentioned once. Not because people didn't age — but because no one had earned the particular beauty of visi...
“All its people are sighing, seeking bread; they have given their delights for food to restore life. See, Lord, and look, for I have become abject” (Lamentations 1:11).“All its peo...
“Remember, Lord, what befell us; look, and see our disgrace” (Lamentations 5:1).“Remember, Lord, what befell us.” Rabbi Yitzḥak began: “The greyhound, or the goat” (Proverbs 30:31)...
It's not just about the win itself, but about the obstacles overcome. Take the story of Og, King of Bashan. We find him mentioned in the book of Devarim (Deuteronomy). Now, Og wasn...
But instead of rejoicing, a wave of despair washed over them. "And you murmured in your tents..." That simple phrase from Sifrei Devarim (Deuteronomy) opens a window into a moment ...
The ancient sages grappled with a similar idea when considering the Torah. Could the very words of wisdom, the sacred teachings, ever become… detrimental? Sifrei Devarim, a legal m...
The Book of Devarim, Deuteronomy, dives right into this question. It's in chapter 13, verse 2, where it says, "If there arise in your midst a prophet..." But it doesn’t just stop t...
The Targum Jonathan on (Deuteronomy 3) contains two stunning additions to the biblical narrative. The first involves a giant king. The second involves the most desperate prayer Mos...
Deuteronomy, or Devarim in Hebrew, is full of Moses' final words, his reflections on a lifetime of leadership. And within the rabbinic compilation called Devarim Rabbah, a midrash ...
In Jewish tradition, the battles against Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, loom incredibly large. The sages even equated these triumphs to the monumental victory over Pharao...
Remember him? He was Abraham's nephew. His daughters famously conceived children by him after the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah (Genesis 19:30-38), leading to the birth of the ...
Two words haunted ancient Israel: shedim (demons) and se'irim. The Israelites were forbidden from sacrificing to either. They sacrificed anyway. The se'irim were the hairy ones, sa...
It's not just about freedom from slavery; it's about the cosmic battle between belief and denial, played out through plagues and miracles. to the second plague, the plague of the f...
We're not just talking spiritually big, but physically… colossal. Let's talk about Og, King of Bashan. Og. The name alone conjures images of a giant striding across the ancient lan...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic commentary on Exodus, addresses a verse with massive implications for the Exodus narrative. Moses tells Israel in Deuteronomy: "And the Lord said to you...
(Exodus, Ibid.) "All the inhabitants of Canaan melted ('namogu')": When the inhabitants of Canaan heard that the Holy One Blessed be He had said to Moses (Devarim 20:16-17) "But fr...
After being rejected by the sons of Esau, God turned to the sons of Ammon and Moab and made the same offer: "Will you accept the Torah?" The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael records their...
The ancient sages did. They saw words as potent forces, capable of building worlds or tearing them down. Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rabbinic interpretations on the Book of P...
We find a fascinating, almost exasperated, glimpse of this in the book of Devarim – Deuteronomy. Specifically, (Deuteronomy 1:12). "How can I bear alone your contentiousness?" Mose...
We often picture him as this towering, almost superhuman figure, but behind the miracles and the commandments, there was a real person grappling with a monumental task. And sometim...
Moments where the choices seem equally appealing, or equally daunting. This week, in Sifrei Devarim 53, we find a powerful exploration of just that – the choices we face and the il...
It all comes down to how we interpret the texts, how we tease out the deeper meanings hidden within the words. Let's take a little journey into Sifrei Devarim, a portion of the Deu...
It might surprise you. to a seemingly obscure passage and see what we uncover about purity, impurity, and who gets a seat at the table – or, in this case, at the plate. Our journey...
It might seem a bit arcane to us now, but these details were crucial to maintaining the sacred order. to a fascinating passage from Sifrei Devarim, specifically section 73 (referen...
Jewish tradition grapples with that very human conundrum in the laws surrounding the Hebrew slave, or eved Ivri. Specifically, we're looking at a fascinating little corner of the b...
Like you've finally built that dream house, and then… boom! Duty calls. Well, Jewish tradition has something to say about that feeling, and it all starts with a verse in Devarim, t...
