563 related texts · 17 related myths · Page 3 of 12
Shir HaShirim Rabbah turns to The Secret Incense Recipe of the House of Avtinas. Specifically, the incense prepared by the House of Avtinas. In Shir HaShirim Rabbah, this priestly ...
Consider the instructions for bringing a minchah, a meal offering, found in Leviticus. It might seem like a simple act, but the Rabbis find layers of meaning and insight within it....
And thou shalt make an altar to burn incense (Exod. 30:1). What do the letters in the word ketoret (“incense”) stand for? The kuf stands for kedushah (“sanctification”), tet for ta...
Midrash Tehillim turns to What Happened to Korah's Sons After They Repented. It all begins with a verse from Proverbs (15:24): "The path of life leads upward for the wise." What do...
The Targum Jonathan on (Deuteronomy 11) turns the promise of rain into a precisely timed agricultural calendar. The Hebrew says God will give "the early rain and the late rain." Th...
Rabbi Nachman of Breslov taught that in the future, all suffering will be revealed as good. Not philosophically. Experientially. You will bless God for your pain the same way you b...
"The entire world was created only for my sake" (Sanhedrin 37a). Rabbi Nachman of Breslov takes this teaching at face value: if the world exists for you, then you are responsible f...
The Torah mentions redeeming "the first-born of the unclean beast" in (Numbers 18:15), which could suggest that every unclean animal's firstborn must be redeemed. Camels, horses, d...
If only a donkey's firstborn is redeemed, what does the Torah mean when it says in (Numbers 18:15), "but redeem shall you redeem the first-born of the unclean beast"? The Mekhilta ...
"among your sons shall you redeem": What is the intent of this? It is written (Numbers 18:16) "And redemption from one month", general. "according to the monetary valuation, five s...
The generation of the Flood earned their destruction through arrogance. According to Sanhedrin 108a, God gave them 120 years of warning. They spent those years mocking Noah. The Sa...
At the gate of Gehinnom, two walls of angels do not whisper. They cry, "Give! Give!" Otzar Midrashim's Book of Gehinnom opens with Rabbi Zeira reading the leech's daughters in (Pro...
“Haman said: ‘Indeed, Queen Esther gave a feast and besides the king she did not bring anyone but me. And tomorrow too I am invited by her along with the king” (Esther 5:12).“Haman...
Ben Sira, in his wisdom, reminds us of something fundamental: "If they were not, you would not have come to the world." Your parents, your ancestors... they paved the way. And what...
Jacob certainly did. You've just wrestled with an angel (or at least, a really tough guy who might as well have been an angel!), you're about to face your estranged brother who mig...
Book of Jubilees turns to Ancient Agricultural Tithes Ordained in Jubilees. The Book of Jubilees isn’t part of the canonical Hebrew Bible that most people know. It’s an ancient Jew...
The familiar story is this: the plagues, the parting of the Red Sea, the Israelites' triumphant escape from Egypt. But what about the behind-the-scenes cosmic drama? The Book of Ju...
While God was still speaking, Abraham suddenly found himself back upon the earth. "O Eternal, Mighty One," he said, "I am no longer in the glory in which I was while on high, and w...
Levi, third son of Jacob and Leah, called his sons together when he knew his death was near. It had been revealed to him that he would die. When they gathered, he told them everyth...
It wasn't just a simple "Okay, God, I'll go." According to the Legends of the Jews, as retold by Ginzberg, Moses' agreement came with conditions. He wanted assurances that his requ...
Him is often remembered as this revered figure, almost from birth. But what about his younger days? Did he always believe? to a fascinating, and somewhat irreverent, story about hi...
Legends of the Jews turns to Jacob Tithed His Sons and Consecrated Levi for Priesthood. Tithing, in this context, wasn't just about giving a tenth of your income. It was a consecra...
The familiar story centers on the ten plagues. God unleashing a series of devastating blows against Egypt to convince Pharaoh to let the Israelites go. But there's often more than ...
Ancient Jewish texts confront that very question, often framing it as divine retribution – a cosmic balancing of the scales. And there's no better place to see this play out than i...
The stakes might be higher than we imagine. You’re wandering in the desert, sustained only by miraculous bread falling from the sky – manna. God gives very specific instructions ab...
The Talmud, in Tractate Chullin 60b, quotes God as saying, "Dead things come before Me and leave Me imbued with life." Powerful. But what does it really mean? The Sages, in their i...
It goes deeper than just a census. The tribe of Levi carried a weighty burden: atoning for the sin of the firstborn sons of Israel. Before the infamous Golden Calf incident, the fi...
Legends of the Jews turns to Israel Tries to Replace Moses and Return to Egypt. The people, as Ginzberg recounts, weren't just sad. They were furious. The dream of the Promised Lan...
The story of Korah is a chilling example. We find it in the Book of Numbers (Numbers 16), but the Rabbis and storytellers throughout the ages have embellished it, explored it, and ...
The destruction of Korah and his followers is often remembered as the end of a chapter, a moment of divine justice that should have brought peace. But according to Ginzberg's retel...
Moses, desperate, remembers a secret he learned during his time on Mount Sinai, when he ascended to receive the Torah. It's a pretty wild story, actually. Each angel he encountered...
It was a matter of utmost importance, a sacred duty meticulously observed. Josephus, in his work Against Apion, gives us a fascinating glimpse into this world. He explains that our...
David made one mistake that cost seventy thousand lives. He counted his people. The Torah had been explicit: if you number Israel, every person counted must pay a half-shekel to Go...
The familiar telling remembers the benevolent angels, the messengers, the healers. But what about the ones who fall from grace? In Jewish tradition, Dumah wasn't always the oversee...
The boundary between medicine and magic barely existed in medieval Jewish life. Physicians recited psalms over patients. Rabbis prescribed amulets alongside herbal remedies. And th...
When God told Moses to take the staff that had struck the Nile, the Mekhilta explains the reason: it was because of Israel's "murmurings." The people had been complaining, and now ...
(Exodus 22:28) "Your fullness and your dema (terumah) you shall not delay": "Your fullness", bikkurim (first-fruits, which are taken from fully ripened grain). "you shall not delay...
It is often remembered as a calm, orderly process, but some stories hint at a bit more… chaos. What if I told you the very waters that give life once rose up in rebellion against G...
The story goes that when God desired to create the world, He turned to Rahab, who was the angel or prince of the sea. God commanded Rahab to "Open your mouth and swallow all the wa...
There's a story in the Torah, a rather unsettling one, about two brothers, Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, and it's been echoing through Jewish tradition for millennia. We find...
The ancient rabbis certainly did. They saw it playing out in the story of the Israelites in the desert, a story brimming with lessons for us today. Our jumping-off point is Psalm 1...
King David knew that feeling, and he gave voice to it in the Psalms. Psalm 141, to be exact. It begins, "I call upon you, O Lord; make haste to me; give ear to my voice when I call...
Jewish tradition, in its beautiful complexity, actually has something to say about that feeling – about being an outcast, and even more surprisingly, about the possibility of retur...
The story picks up as Jacob, returning to the land of Canaan, sends gifts ahead to his brother Esau, whom he fears. But these aren't just any gifts. Jacob sends "all the tithe of h...
The tale centers around Phineas, a figure known for his zeal and righteousness. Rabbi Elazar of Modein tells us that Phineas took a dramatic step. He placed a ban – a serious prohi...
The Torah tells us that Moses, having fled Egypt after, well, that incident, was trying to settle into life in Midian. But trouble seemed to follow him. Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a f...
The Book of Bamidbar, or Numbers, dives right into that. Specifically, Bamidbar 5:9 lays out the rules for terumah, the portion of the harvest given to the Cohein, the priest. "And...
The verse Seems straightforward. But as with so much in Jewish tradition, the simplicity The first reading hides layers of meaning. The rabbis of old loved to unpack these layers, ...
