12,014 related texts · Page 63 of 251
Specifically, we're diving into Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar 93, a section that delves into the profound meanings hidden within verses from Psalms and Isaiah. Prepare for some...
The mystical text Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a companion to the Zohar, delves into just that feeling, exploring how even Moses, the great lawgiver, experienced a disconnect...
Here, we get a peek into a truly mind-bending scene involving God, the Shekhinah, and some seriously impressive angelic creatures. The text speaks of the Blessed Holy One – that's ...
Jewish tradition has a name for that feeling: the beinonim, the "average ones." And let me tell you, their fate is a cliffhanger worthy of any thriller! The Tikkun (spiritual repai...
(Genesis 1:26). We hear that phrase all the time, but what's the deeper, more mystical understanding behind it? The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a central text of Kabbalah, o...
The Kabbalists certainly did. They saw the human face as a microcosm, a reflection of the divine. And in the lines and contours, they found echoes of something truly profound. The ...
Jewish mysticism, particularly through the lens of the Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, offers a breathtakingly beautiful answer. The Tikkunei Zohar, a later expansion on the cor...
A wealthy burgher and a poor man lived in the same building—the burgher in the upper floors, the pauper in the lower. Neither had children. One night, the burgher dreamed that stra...
Chapter twenty-one of the Tanya makes a metaphysical claim about Torah study that goes beyond anything said before: when you study Torah, God wraps Himself around your mind. The lo...
Rabbi Schneur Zalman of Liadi, the founder of Chabad Chassidism, poses a devastating question in his masterwork the Tanya: if most people will never fully defeat their evil inclina...
The Shechinah (שכינה) is not a separate entity from God. It is the point where God's hidden infinity first becomes visible, the way sunlight becomes visible only after it leaves th...
"And these are the names of the children of Israel" (Exodus 1:1). The Torah lists the twelve tribes again, even though they were already named in Genesis. Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Be...
"And God spoke to Moses" (Exodus 6:2). The Hebrew word for "spoke" (vayedaber) implies harshness, while "said" (vayomer) implies gentleness. Rebbe Elimelech of Lizhensk uses this g...
Buried in the middle of Sefer Raziel HaMalakh is a detailed astronomical and calendrical section that reads more like a scientific manual than a mystical text. It catalogs the move...
The sixth heaven of Sefer HaRazim is a realm of crystalline purity where the angels exist in a state of perpetual holiness. After the escalating intensity of the lower heavens—from...
Throughout the Middle Ages, Jews bore a reputation as the most powerful sorcerers in Europe. As scholar Joshua Trachtenberg documented in his 1939 study, this belief was so widespr...
Medieval Jewish folk belief wove a dense web of connections between the natural world and the supernatural. Certain plants healed. Certain foods enhanced memory or destroyed it. Th...
"This month": Nissan. You say it is Nissan. But perhaps it was some other month of the year? It is written (Exodus 23:16) "And the festival of the ingathering (Succoth) at the end ...
Rabbi Yishmael confronted a puzzle in (Deuteronomy 16:2), which says: "And you shall slaughter the Passover to your God — sheep and cattle." But the Passover offering is supposed t...
Rabbi Yishmael cuts through the debate about burning Passover leftovers with a characteristically logical argument. The other sages needed the repeated phrase "until morning" to es...
Rabbi Yossi HaGlili confronts the timing question head-on: when exactly must a person eliminate chametz from their home before Passover? His answer hinges on a single Hebrew word t...
Would you say that? There is a difference (between neveilah, [from which benefit may be derived] and chametz, [from which benefit may not be derived,], so that the resultant equati...
The Mekhilta continues its relentless cross-examination of Rabbi Yehudah's position that chametz must be destroyed specifically by burning. A new argument emerges — and a new count...
Rabbi Yehudah ben Betheira flips the entire debate on its head with a single devastating observation. The other rabbis have been arguing that chametz must be burned — and only burn...
"Draw forth and take for yourselves": "Draw forth"—he who possesses his own; "and take" (i.e., acquire)—he who does not possess his own. R. Yossi Haglili says (The meaning is:) "Dr...
The Mekhilta, the halakhic midrash on Exodus from the tannaitic period, continues its investigation of a recurring biblical formula: when Scripture says God "has spoken," where exa...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus compiled in the 2nd century CE, traces another instance of the Bible's "as He spoke" formula — a device the rabbis use to link later p...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus, probes the geographic scope of the tenth plague with meticulous care. The verse states: "And the Lord smote every firstborn in the la...
(Ibid. 34) "And the people took their dough before it leavened": We are hereby apprised that they kneaded the dough, which had not risen to (become) chametz before they were redeem...
R. Eliezer says: The (non-) circumcision of one's servants does not prevent him from eating the Pesach (Passover). And what is the intent of "and you shall circumcise him, etc."? I...
The Torah commands regarding the Passover sacrifice: "you shall not take out of the house." But take what out of the house? The Mekhilta clarifies that Scripture is speaking specif...
The Mekhilta preserves a remarkable legal case involving a woman named Beluria, a proselytess — a non-Jewish woman who converted to Judaism. Beluria owned several maid-servants, an...
The Torah commands: "And the priest shall burn wood upon it every morning" (Leviticus 6:5), referring to the daily kindling of fire on the altar. The Mekhilta immediately asks: why...
The Mekhilta presents a teaching that reaches back before the creation of the world itself. The names of the righteous — and their deeds — are known to God before they are ever bor...
(Exodus 13:8) includes the phrase "because of this" — ba'avur zeh. The Mekhilta asks: what is the purpose of this phrase? The answer involves one of the most famous figures in the ...
(Exodus 13:9) speaks of the account of the Exodus serving "as a sign upon your hand." The Mekhilta derives from this verse a specific ruling about the construction of tefillin — th...
The Torah instructs placing tefillin (leather phylacteries worn during prayer) "between your eyes." Taken literally, this would mean on the bridge of the nose or the forehead direc...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael addresses a practical legal question arising from (Exodus 13:13): "Every human first-born among your sons shall you redeem." The commandment to redeem...
When the Torah says "tomorrow," does it mean the next day or some distant point in the future? The Mekhilta demonstrates that the word carries both meanings, depending on context. ...
There are four sons: a wise son, a wicked son, a simple son, and one who does not know how to ask. What does the wise son say? "What are the testimonies and the statutes and the ju...
"and I will be honored through Pharaoh": Scripture here apprises us that when the L–rd exacts punishment of the nations, His name is aggrandized in the world, as it is written (Isa...
Rabbi Shimon ben Gamliel drew a startling comparison between two empires — Egypt after the Exodus and Rome in its prime — to illustrate how completely the departure of Israel had g...
R. Acha says: The Holy One Blessed be He said: If not for your outcry, I would have destroyed them for the idolatry in their midst, viz. (Zechariah 10:11) "And tzarah crossed the s...
God uses the east wind as an instrument of judgment, and the pattern repeats across the Hebrew Bible with striking consistency. In Egypt, it was the east wind that brought the plag...
R. Pappus expounded (Psalms 106:20) "And they exchanged their glory for the image of an ox that feeds on grass": I might think, for the "ox" on high (i.e., Taurus); it is, therefor...
Rebbi — Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi, the compiler of the Mishnah (the earliest code of rabbinic law) — offers an alternative reading that slightly adjusts the ages of the miraculous singe...
The generation of the Flood was destroyed by the very thing they worshipped. The Mekhilta draws a chilling connection between their sin and their punishment through a play on Hebre...
The Mekhilta continues its detailed mapping of the Egyptian punishments at the Red Sea, this time connecting the drowning to the specific suffering of slave labor. The Egyptians ha...
