1,629 related texts · Page 31 of 34
"So the Egyptians enslaved the children of Israel with back breaking labor [b'farech]" (Ex. 1:13). R. Elazar says, "B'pe rach—with a soft mouth." R. Shmuel says, "B'frichah—With ri...
Rabbi Akiva was caught teaching Torah in public after the Roman Empire banned its study following the Bar Kokhba rebellion. When Pappus ben Yehuda warned him of the danger, Akiva a...
"I am God, your Lord, Who brought you out of the land of Egypt" (Exodus 20:2). Targum Onkelos translates the Ten Commandments with almost no deviation from the Hebrew—a remarkable ...
The Hebrew Bible says God "passed before" Moses and proclaimed the Thirteen Attributes of Mercy (Exodus 34:6). Targum Onkelos renders this as God "made His Shechinah pass" before M...
The Book of Gehinnom (the place of spiritual purification after death) [Reishit Chochmah: Gate of Fear: Chapter 12; Beit haMidrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary): Section 1] It...
..."Let not the rich person glorify themselves with their wealth (Yirm 9:22)." This [refers to] Korach the Levite, who had three hundred mules just to carry the load of the keys to...
"Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) Chazit": It is also called "Aggadat Chazit", and it is a comprehensive midrash on the Song of Songs and Ecclesiastes. These midrashim be...
Masechet Kallah is one of the minor tractates in the Talmud, in the Order of Damages. It consists of external beraitot and mishnayot that were compiled at the end of the Talmud by ...
The Book of the Wellspring of Wisdom When Moses ascended on high, a cloud came up against him, and Moses our teacher did not know if one rides it or holds it. Immediately, the clou...
The Aggadah (non-legal rabbinic narrative) of Shimon Kefa preserves a remarkable tradition about how the early Jewish sages worked to establish a clear separation between the Jewis...
Alexander the Great tied two eagles together with meat in front of them, so they fly upwards with him until his eyelids dropped from the cold. He then descends in a glass box to th...
Adrianus asks R. Joshua why God’s name is not mentioned in the five last commandments, which appears to apply to all nations. Joshua takes him over the town and shows him his statu...
A Matrona asked Rabbi Joshua what God has been doing since Creation. The reply was: “He pairs people.” The Ma- trona then ordered a number of male slaves to marry female slaves, th...
The Jews being prevented by decree from studying, Pappos met R. Akiba who had defied that decree. Rebuked by Pappos Akiba replied: “A fox on the shore of the sea saw some fish hidi...
An heathen heard of the honour paid to the high priest and he wished to become a Jew. Shammai refused him saying that it was ridiculous for him to pretend to become high priest. Hi...
Rabbi Zadok, captive in Rome, refused to be tempted to sin by the slave girl sent by the Matrona, as he declared that he was a descendant of the noblest family of high priests and ...
The story of Kamsa and bar Kam§a and the fall of Jerusalem. A man had company and had invited Bar Kamsa who was his enemy, by mistake. He afterwards turned him out in spite of his ...
R. Johanan b. Zakai was asked by R. Eleazar b. Arach permission to expound some of the mysteries of the creation (Ma’ase Merkaba). R. Johanan dismounted from his ass, as angels mig...
The judgment of poor, rich, and young after death when they neglect study. The poor man who pleads want of 75 - means is compared to Hillel who was wont to work all day for a very ...
King Solomon wished to build a temple with unhewn stone, as he was not allowed to use iron, that being forbidden by law. So he tried to obtain Shamir which he was told was in the p...
The throne of Solomon was entirely made of gold, having 33 steps upon which were various animals. 12 golden lions, and 2 golden bears stood on each step and over the throne was a k...
Story of the son of R. Reuben the Libellarius to whom the angel of death appeared in the form of an old man at the wedding festivities. He was treated with great respect on the adv...
Rabbi Ishmael's mother loved him with a love so fierce that it made her do extraordinary things. The Talmud records that when her son — the great sage, the High Priest's descendant...
Simeon ben Rabbi forgot to invite Bar Kappara to dinner. The latter wrote on the door: ‘‘After joy death.” Invited afterwards to another dinner, he kept the guests so amused by his...
Story of R.b. Nahman, who was accused of keeping people away from work for two months, and of detaining them in the village. He fled and was overtaken by the Angel of Death whilst ...
When God gave the Torah at Mount Sinai, the scene was unlike anything the universe had ever witnessed. The entire nation of Israel stood at the base of the mountain, and when the v...
2. A merchant whilst travelling, is asked by an innkeeper to be allowed to go with him. Near a town they meet a blind man. The merchant gives him something; the other refuses sayin...
A wealthy merchant was traveling far from home when he fell gravely ill. He knew he was dying. His only son was back in his homeland, too far away to reach in time. But the merchan...
When the Romans made it a capital offense to study Torah, Rabbi Akiba continued to teach openly, gathering great assemblies of students in public. Pappos ben Yehuda found him and w...
The patience of Hillel was not merely a personal virtue — it was a teaching method that transformed lives. The Talmud (Shabbat 31a) records three separate occasions when difficult,...
A heretic once challenged the sages with what he thought was a devastating logical trap. "Your God is a thief," the man declared. "The Torah says that God caused a deep sleep to fa...
The Romans were not fools. They knew that the Jewish sages wielded enormous influence over their people — more than any general or governor could match. So when the empire wanted t...
The Talmud in tractate Kallah (5:1) tells the story of a man who inherited a large sum of money and faced a decision that would define the rest of his life. He could invest the mon...
Rabbi Shimon ben Halafta was known as a man who tested everything through experience rather than theory alone. When a question arose about the nature of children, he did not consul...
The philosophers of Alexandria were famous throughout the ancient world for their cleverness, their logical traps, and their determination to humiliate any thinker who could not ma...
A man hid his gold in a set of clay jars — the ancient equivalent of a safe deposit box — and the story of what happened to those jars became a parable about the fragility of earth...
A psalm of David, written after Doeg the Edomite betrayed him — that's where Aggadat Bereshit anchors the story of Jacob's ladder. Strange placement. But the rabbis had a method. D...
Before the world was created, God hid the Torah. Not in a vault, not in a distant heaven — hidden in the fabric of things, waiting for the right person to find it. And then Abraham...
"The Lord says to my Lord: 'Sit at my right hand'" (Psalm 110:1). This verse launches one of the most complex readings in Aggadat Bereshit — about how the Holy One loves and exalts...
When the righteous multiply in the world, good things multiply with them. This is Aggadat Bereshit's reading of "When the righteous are many, the people rejoice" (Proverbs 29:2). N...
Hannah vowed at Shiloh — if God gives her a son, she will give him back (1 Samuel 1:11). Rabbi Berachiah used this verse to address four theological objections that people raise ag...
Zechariah saw a horseman in a vision of the night (Zechariah 1:8). The rabbis identified this figure as the prince of Edom — the heavenly guardian angel of the nation that had rule...
It’s a question that's haunted philosophers and theologians for millennia, and Jewish tradition definitely has some answers. At the very heart of it all, there is ONE God. Absolute...
Before the sun, the moon, the stars... before anything? Jewish tradition has some pretty mind-bending answers, and one of the most fascinating involves the Torah. Not just the one ...
The story of the Akeidah, the binding of Isaac, is one of the most powerful and disturbing in the Hebrew Bible. We usually focus on Abraham's faith, Isaac's (near) sacrifice, and G...
That’s the kind of dream Jacob, later known as Israel, had as he fled from his brother Esau. It wasn't just a random jumble of images, but a direct encounter with the divine. The T...
The great Moses himself had such an experience. As we read in (Exodus 4:24), on the road one night, Adonai—God—encountered Moses and sought to kill him. Talk about a plot twist! Wh...
The ancient rabbis grappled with these questions constantly, searching for meaning in misfortune. One particularly fascinating exploration revolves around the affliction of leprosy...
