563 related texts · 17 related myths · Page 4 of 12
Why Satiety Leads to Rebellion Against God is the question behind this passage from Sifrei Devarim. It’s a fascinating idea, isn’t it? It suggests that it’s not hardship that neces...
It wasn't just about grand gestures; it was also about the consistent, regular offerings. to a small but fascinating passage from Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal interpretati...
Sometimes, seemingly simple words unlock entire worlds of understanding. Take the word "abomination," for example. What does it really mean in the context of our relationship with ...
Sifrei Devarim turns to Tithes and Ritual Purity - What Counts as Unclean. One phrase in particular catches our attention: "and I did not consume of it in uncleanliness (tumah)." T...
Sifrei Devarim turns to Reuben Claims the Birthright but Levi Wins the Priesthood. Sifrei Devarim tells us that Asher steps in and "reconciled his brothers." Because of this act, t...
The Hebrew Bible promises: "A prophet from your midst, of your brethren, like me, will God establish for you" (Deuteronomy 18:15). Targum Onkelos translates this verse without alte...
Rabbi Yehoshua ben Levi says, “There are three matters that the earthly court did and the heavenly court agreed with them, and these are they: Reading the Scroll [of Esther on Puri...
The rabbis taught a stark warning: reduce your tithes, and God will reduce your harvests. The Talmud and Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) preserve the story of a family t...
A prosperous farmer in the land of Israel had fields that yielded abundantly, orchting, and vineyard heavy with fruit. Year after year, God blessed his harvests. But the farmer gre...
In the Temple of Jerusalem, the most fragrant service of the day was the burning of the ketoret, the compound incense of eleven spices that rose in a thin column from the golden al...
The verse in (Genesis 12:19) is Pharaoh's outburst, and Targum Pseudo-Jonathan sharpens its center. Why saidst thou, She is my sister? When I would take her to me to wife, plagues ...
The Hebrew of (Genesis 15:14) promises judgment on the nation whom they shall serve. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan gives the judgment a number that has startled readers for centuries. Two...
When Isaac draws Jacob close and breathes him in, the Targum Pseudo-Jonathan tells us what the patriarch actually smells. It is not the field. It is not the goats. It is the incens...
Reuben was supposed to inherit everything. As the firstborn of Jacob, three crowns rested on his head by right, bechorah (the birthright), kehunah (the priesthood), and malchut (th...
The Torah says God made the midwives "houses." The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Exodus (1:21) tells us exactly what those houses were. "And forasmuch as the midwives feared before the...
The astrologers finally crack. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 8:15) records their confession: This is not by the power or strength of Mosheh and Aharon; but this is a plague sen...
The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 9:14) preserves a warning that cuts through every illusion Pharaoh ever held. "At this time I will send upon thee a plague from the heavens," ...
The plagues are not only punishment. They are curriculum. The Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 10:2) records the Holy One's own reason: "In the hearing of thy sons and of thy chil...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 15:26) translates the covenant at Marah with a surgeon's precision. The Word of the Lord says: If you will truly hearken to the Word of the Lord y...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on Exodus (Exodus 23:25) gives a promise that ties worship to health: you shall do service before the Lord our God and He will bless the provision of thy foo...
The golden incense altar stood just outside the veil, not inside the Holy of Holies, but as close to it as any vessel of daily service could come. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan places the...
If the anointing oil was for people and vessels, the incense was for the air itself. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan preserves the command to Moses: take spices, balsam, onycha, galbanum. A...
The incense was not simply mixed. It was beaten. Targum Pseudo-Jonathan records the instruction: after the spices were compounded, Moses was to beat them small, ground fine. And so...
Targum Pseudo-Jonathan on (Exodus 40:5) refuses to let a single detail of the sanctuary pass without meaning. The golden altar of incense is to be placed before the ark of the test...
When the Tabernacle stood finished in the wilderness and every board was raised into place, the Holy One turned Moses's attention from the walls to the men who would serve inside t...
The verse says: "Twelve golden ladles, full of incense, ten each ladle, in the sacred shekel; all the gold of the ladles was one hundred and twenty." Okay, twelve golden ladles. Go...
The verse sets the scene: “They ascended and scouted the land from the wilderness of Tzin to Rehov, at the approach to Hamat” (Numbers 13:21). But, Bamidbar Rabbah asks, how exactl...
Bamidbar Rabbah turns to Moses's Transgression of Kora. The story starts with the rebellion of Koraḥ against Moses, a challenge to Moses’s leadership and Aaron’s priesthood. Rememb...
The Torah portion of Terumah introduces us to Betzalel, the artisan chosen to construct the Mishkan, the Tabernacle. But where did he get all that skill? Shemot Rabbah, a classical...
It turns out, the ancient rabbis thought about this a lot, especially when it came to the relationship between humanity and God.” In Shir HaShirim Rabbah 6, a midrashic (rabbinic i...
And he went out on the second day, and behold, two men of the Hebrews were striving together (Exod. 2:13). Who were these men? They were Dathan and Abiram, who later said: Let us m...
And thou shalt make an altar to burn incense upon (Exod. 30:1). Scripture states elsewhere in allusion to this verse: Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart (Prov. 27:9). This vers...
(Lev. 8:3:) “And assemble the whole congregation.” The Holy One, blessed be He, said to Moses, “Pay him honor in front of all Israel, in order that they may see him today when he e...
Midrash Tanchuma reads the eighth day of the Tabernacle service through Aaron, the righteous one who flourishes like a palm. The verse says, "The righteous one shall flourish like ...
(Lev. 13:2), “When anyone has on the skin of his flesh.” Why do the plagues come?50Cf. Lev. R. 17:3. Because of harlotry. And so you find in Jerusalem, that because they were absor...
(Numb. 16:23–24:) “And the Lord spoke […], ‘Speak unto the congregation, saying, “Get away from about [the dwellings of Korah, Dathan and Abiram].”’” Although Moses heard it from t...
Specifically, the story turns to the first book, 1 Maccabees 3. While not included in the Tanakh, this book is preserved in the Septuagint and is a crucial historical source for un...
The ancient Jewish sages certainly thought so. Take the story of Korah, a name synonymous with rebellion. His very name, they believed, was a clue to his tragic fate. The Torah tel...
The real power behind the Jewish throne in the first century BCE was not a Jew at all. Antipater, an Idumean whose family had converted to Judaism only a generation or two earlier,...
The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael invokes a pair of verses from Psalms to reveal something startling about how God responds to the nations that rage against Israel: He laughs. The firs...
The Israelites certainly did, wandering in the wilderness after the incredible Exodus from Egypt. And their doubts, as we'll see, had serious consequences. Rabbi Jochanan, son of N...
Shabbat is a map of history. Tanna DeBei Eliyahu Rabbah 2:1 imagines the world as six thousand years of labor followed by a seventh millennium of rest. Two thousand years of emptin...
A passage from Sifrei Bamidbar, specifically focusing on (Numbers 18:30-32), which deals with the Levites and their portion of the tithes. The verse states, "And you shall say to t...
They saw layers of connection, echoes of stories past, and whispers of divine intent in every word. Take, for instance, a passage from Sifrei Devarim, a legal midrash on the Book o...
The grain offering described in Leviticus 2 seems straightforward, flour, oil, frankincense, baked into cakes or wafers. But the Targum Jonathan adds a theological bombshell hidden...
Leviticus 26 contains the blessings and curses, God's promise of abundance for obedience and a cascading nightmare for rebellion. The Targum Jonathan adds a breathtaking historical...
"Many peoples have afflicted me from my youth" (Psalm 129:1). The Assembly of Israel, the collective voice of the nation, says this as a Song of Ascents, sung while ascending to th...
When Alexander of Macedon marched east, the Samaritans, called in the Talmud the Kutim, saw a political opening. They sent word to Alexander asking him to destroy the Temple in Jer...
