12,014 related texts · Page 26 of 251
Of wanting to hold onto something important, even when the world around us changes. And sometimes, it’s about acknowledging the darkness we've overcome. Take Purim, for example, th...
Take the ancient Egyptians and the Israelites, for example. Their story is filled with power struggles, cultural clashes, and some serious finger-pointing. Josephus, in his work Ag...
Sometimes, digging into the past brings up unexpected things... and uncomfortable questions. Today, we're wading into one of those uncomfortable corners, a place where ancient bias...
Two years. That is how long Joseph sat in an Egyptian prison after correctly predicting the fate of Pharaoh's cupbearer—who had promised to remember him and then promptly forgot. T...
God declared His secret name to Moses at the burning bush—and then Josephus, the first-century Jewish historian, refused to write it down. "It is not lawful for me to say any more,...
The Ark of the Covenant—the holiest object in Israel—fell into enemy hands. And the man responsible for guarding it died the moment he heard the news. The Philistines launched a ma...
Two Torah scholars convinced their students to tear a golden eagle off the Temple gate in broad daylight. Herod burned them alive for it. According to Josephus in Antiquities XVII,...
We're diving into a fascinating, and frankly a little unnerving, corner of Jewish lore today, exploring a passage from Heikhalot (the heavenly palaces) Rabbati. What is Heikhalot R...
That’s the image conjured in the ancient mystical text, Heikhalot (the heavenly palaces) Rabbati. Heikhalot Rabbati, meaning "The Greater Palaces," is a key work in the Heikhalot l...
You're not alone. Our ancestors wrestled with this too, and some of their most beautiful attempts to capture the unimaginable can be found in texts like Heikhalot (the heavenly pal...
It sounds like a strange question, I know. But in the mystical world of Kabbalah, even the most abstract concepts are given form, even… clothing.Here, we’re given a glimpse into ho...
It’s a question that's occupied Jewish mystics for centuries. The Partzuf (a divine configuration)im (פַּרְצוּפִים), if you're not familiar, are divine personas or configurations w...
The Sefer Yetzirah, or "Book of Formation," is a foundational text of Jewish mysticism, attributed to the patriarch Abraham himself by some traditions! We’re going to be looking at...
The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a profound and expansive section of the Zohar – the foundational text of Jewish mysticism – explores exactly that. It delves into the hidden ...
"In every generation and every day," the Tanya teaches, "a person must regard himself as if he had that day come out of Egypt." Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi reads the Exodus not a...
Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev opens his commentary on Parshat Va'era with a question about the nature of prophecy. God tells Moses, "I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jac...
"Yitro, the priest of Midian, heard all that God had done for Moses and His people Israel" (Exodus 18:1). What exactly did Yitro hear? Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev says he hea...
The night of the tenth plague was unlike anything Egypt had ever witnessed. Every firstborn in the land — from the heir of Pharaoh sitting on his throne to the firstborn of the cap...
On the night of the Exodus, God did not just strike the firstborn of Egypt. He also executed judgment on the gods of Egypt. And according to the Mekhilta, those judgments were not ...
"and they emptied out Egypt": We are hereby apprised that their idols melted and returned to their former state, (so that they were now permitted to take them.) And whence is it de...
Variantly (Psalms 68:7) "G–d settles the solitary in their homes. He takes out the bound bakosharoth. But rebels dwelling in dryness, etc.": They were rebels, in spite of which He ...
When the Israelites left Egypt and marched into the wilderness, they did not travel unprotected. God surrounded them with clouds of glory—miraculous pillars that shielded, guided, ...
As Israel stood at the edge of the sea, they looked back and saw something terrifying. "And, behold, Egypt coming after them" (Exodus 14:10). The Mekhilta notices a grammatical det...
The Mekhilta brings the prophet Jeremiah into its sustained argument about the power of prayer, citing one of the sharpest contrasts in all of Scripture: "Cursed is the man who tru...
Three times they returned and three times they fell. The first, in the days of Sancheriv, viz. (Isaiah 31:1) "Woe unto those who go down to Egypt for help!" The second, in the days...
Rabbi Shimon HaTemani declared that God split the Red Sea in the merit of a single commandment: circumcision. The covenant of Abraham, inscribed in the flesh of every Jewish male, ...
The Egyptians' greatest military asset became the instrument of their destruction. The Mekhilta points to a devastating symmetry in the Exodus narrative that reveals God's measure-...
The Mekhilta asks another of its characteristically sharp questions about the Red Sea crossing. The verse says the Egyptians "descended into the metzulot" — the whirlpools or churn...
The Mekhilta offers a second reading of the phrase "as a stone" from the Song at the Sea. The Egyptians sank like stone because their hearts were hard as stone — unyielding, unmova...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael draws attention to a single word in the Song at the Sea that transforms the entire verse from a description of the past into a prophecy of the future....
The Mekhilta identifies another future-tense verb in the Song at the Sea. It is not written "You have sent forth Your wrath" — as if God's anger were already spent — but "You will ...
Re those who said: Let us kill them and take their money—"My hand shall impoverish them." With five things (i.e., utterances) did Pharaoh stand and blaspheme in the midst of the la...
The Mekhilta takes the worldwide rejection of idolatry at the Red Sea and projects it forward into the future. What happened momentarily at the sea — when all nations opened their ...
(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...
The phrase "they turned to the desert" in (Exodus 16:10) seems like a simple geographic note. The Israelites looked toward the wilderness, and there they saw the glory of God. But ...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael preserves a precise legal discussion about the boundaries of Shabbat (the Sabbath) observance, rooted in the verse "Let each man sit in his place" (Ex...
When Moses stood on Mount Nebo and looked out over the Promised Land, God pointed to each region and revealed not just the terrain but the history that would unfold upon it. The Me...
R. Yishmael says: What is written at the beginning, viz. (Leviticus 25:1-3) "And the L–rd spoke to Moses on Mount Sinai, saying … then the land shall rest a Sabbath to the L–rd. Si...
The Mekhilta offers a poetic interpretation of the Song of Songs, reading its romantic language as a dialogue between God and Israel — and locating that dialogue in specific moment...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael pauses on a single phrase from the Ten Commandments to ask a question about dignity. When God declared "who took you out from the land of Egypt," what...
The Mekhilta unpacks a subtle but powerful argument that God makes to Israel. The verse reads: "As the deeds of the land of Egypt in which you dwelt you shall not do" (Leviticus 18...
Because of (the following) four things R. Mattia b. Charash went to R. Elazar b. Hakappar in Ludia. He said to him: My master, did you hear of the four divisions of atonement expou...
"Honor your father and your mother" (Exodus 20:12). The fifth of the Ten Commandments seems straightforward enough, but the Mekhilta immediately asks: what does "honor" actually re...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael raises a question about who is obligated to honor parents. The commandment says "Honor your father and your mother," but a related verse in (Leviticus...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael invites the reader to examine the rewards promised for three different commandments and to see a striking pattern. Each act of honor directed at the p...
The fifth commandment — "Honor your father and your mother" — comes with a promise attached: "so that your days be prolonged upon the earth" (Exodus 20:12). Most commandments in th...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael reveals a hidden connection between two of the Ten Commandments by examining their physical placement on the tablets. The commandment "You shall not t...
"And there be refreshed the son of your maid-servant" — this verse about Sabbath rest mentions a "maid-servant's son." The Mekhilta identifies this as an uncircumcised Canaanite se...
