936 related texts · Page 13 of 20
The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a major work of Kabbalah, tackles that feeling head-on. In its 120th section, it speaks of a future where everything clicks into place. A fut...
You cannot receive complete divine providence until you shatter your desire for money. Rabbi Nachman of Breslov taught this as a direct spiritual mechanism, not a moral platitude. ...
Sefer Raziel HaMalakh contains something truly unusual for a mystical text—an alternative alphabet. Several of them, in fact. These are not the standard 22 Hebrew letters but speci...
Strip away the medieval slander and a real tradition of Jewish magic emerges—one that Joshua Trachtenberg traced from the Bible through the Talmud and into the folk practices of me...
The most widely practiced form of Jewish magic required no special training, no secret names, no angelic invocations. It required only a Bible. As Joshua Trachtenberg documented, m...
The Hebrew word mazal (מזל) originally meant "constellation" or "star." Only gradually did it shift to mean "luck"—and the journey of that word tells the story of Jewish astrology ...
And thus do you find with Baruch the soon of Neriah, who complained before the L–rd, (Ibid. 45:3) "You (Baruch) say: Woe unto me, the L–rd has added grief to my pain!" (You say:) W...
The Mekhilta makes a striking claim about the moral character of the Israelites in Egypt: they were not guilty of sexual immorality. The proof comes from an unexpected source — a v...
Rabbi Yoshiyah offered a creative reading of the Hebrew word "ufasachti" — "and I will pass over you" — from the Passover narrative. He said: do not read it as "ufasachti" but as "...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic commentary on Exodus, arrives at one of the most dramatic prophetic verses in all of Scripture: "The glory of the Lord shall appear, and all flesh will ...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus, examines a soaring promise from the prophet Isaiah: "Then you will rejoice in the Lord, and I will 'ride' you on the heights of the e...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic commentary on Exodus, addresses a verse with massive implications for the Exodus narrative. Moses tells Israel in Deuteronomy: "And the Lord said to you...
"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...
(Exodus 12:3)7) "six hundred thousand men": sixty ten thousands, as in (Song of Songs 3:7) "Behold, the couch of Shlomoh, (acronymically, 'He who spoke and brought the world into b...
Rabbi Nathan offered a striking interpretation of the word bakosharoth from (Psalms 68:7), "He takes out the bound bakosharoth." Rather than reading it as a single word, he split i...
Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah, one of the most prominent Tannaitic sages, made a bold claim about why God chose to liberate Israel from Egypt. It was not because of anything the enslave...
The Torah says to place tefillin (leather phylacteries worn during prayer) "upon your hand" — but which hand? The Mekhilta ruled that "hand," when used without further qualificatio...
(Ibid.) "And chamushim did the children of Israel go up from the land of Egypt": "chamushim" indicates "armed," as in (Joshua 1:14) "Then you shall cross over chamushim" (in contex...
Joseph made his brothers swear a solemn oath, and the Mekhilta records the exact logic behind his request. He said to them: "My father went down to Egypt of his own free will, and ...
Rabbi Yossi HaGlili told a parable to explain one of the most staggering miscalculations in the history of Egypt. A man inherited a beth kor of land — a sizable property — and sold...
"and the children of Israel went out with a high hand": Scripture hereby apprises us that when the Egyptians were pursuing Israel, they vilified and execrated and cursed, while Isr...
With the Egyptian army bearing down and the Red Sea blocking their path, the Israelites succumbed to terror. It was Moses who stepped forward and spoke the words that steadied an e...
(Exodus, Ibid.) "Stand ready (hithyatzvu) to see the salvation of the L–rd": Moses said to them: Today the Shechinah will repose the Holy Spirit upon you; for "yetzivah" in all pla...
R. Meir says: "the L–rd will war for you": He will perform for you miracles and (acts of) strength, and you will stand still. Israel asked Moses our teacher: "What can we do?" He a...
R. Yossi Haglili says: When Israel entered the sea, Mount Moriah was uprooted from its place, with the altar of Israel built upon it, and its woodpile upon it, and Isaac bound upon...
The "morning" of Jacob—(Ibid. 28:18) "and Jacob rose early in the morning, etc." The "morning" of Moses—Exodus 34:4) "and Moses rose early in the morning, etc." The "morning" of Jo...
Great is the faith wherein Israel believed in Him who spoke and brought the world into being; for in reward for Israel's belief in the L–rd, the Shechinah reposed upon them and the...
Rabbi Nechemiah teaches a principle of extraordinary generosity. If a person takes upon himself even a single mitzvah in true faith, that person is worthy of having the Holy Spirit...
(Exodus 15:1) "Az yashir Mosheh": Az ("then") sometimes signals the past and sometimes signals the future. The past: (Genesis 4:26) "Az men began", (Exodus 4:26) "Az she said", (Ex...
The Song at the Sea begins with a grammatical mystery. The Hebrew text of (Exodus 15:1) reads az yashir Mosheh—literally, "then Moses will sing," using the future tense. If the Tor...
The Mekhilta interprets the phrase "For He is high on high" (Exodus 15:1) as describing a relationship of mutual exaltation between God and Israel. The doubling in the Hebrew — ga'...
The Mekhilta takes a single Hebrew word from the Song of the Sea — "ve'anvehu" — and shows how three different rabbis derive three entirely different meanings from it, each reveali...
The Mekhilta offers a pointed reading of the phrase "The chariots of Pharaoh" from the Song of the Sea, connecting Pharaoh's destruction at the Red Sea directly to his earlier crim...
The Song at the Sea praises God not only for His power but for His patience. The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael highlights a detail that the Israelites themselves recognized as they san...
When the (other) kingdoms are symbolized, they are symbolized as cedars, viz. (Ezekiel 31:3) "Behold, Ashur, a cedar in the Levanon," and (Amos 2:9) "And I destroyed the Emori from...
(Ibid.) "They stood up like a flask": Just as a bound flask neither emits nor admits, so, the spirits of the Egyptians were bound up within them, neither emitting nor admitting—whi...
The Mekhilta draws a remarkable distinction between what the Red Sea was for Egypt and what it was for Israel. For the Egyptians, the sea was a sealed tomb. For the Israelites, it ...
The Egyptian army was not unified in its cruelty. According to the Mekhilta, the Egyptians at the Red Sea divided into three factions, each with a different plan for what to do wit...
The Mekhilta pinpoints the exact moment when Israel first declared (Exodus 15:11): "Who is like You among the mighty, O Lord?" It was not during the plagues. It was not at the mome...
The Song at the Sea declares, "Who is like You, nedar in holiness" (Exodus 15:11), and the Mekhilta finds a hidden layer of meaning compressed inside a single Hebrew word. The word...
The Mekhilta once again turns to verb tense to extract prophecy from the Song at the Sea. The verse does not say "worked wonders" — past tense, as though God's miracles were finish...
(Exodus, Ibid.) "this people whom You have redeemed": For all the world is Yours, and You have no people but Israel, viz. (Isaiah 43:21) "This people have I created for Myself, etc...
(Exodus 15:18) "You will bring them and You will plant them": The fathers prophesied without knowing what (they were prophesying). It is not written "You will bring us and You will...
At the climax of the Song of the Sea, Israel proclaimed: "The Lord will reign for ever and ever" (Exodus 15:18). It is one of the most sweeping theological declarations in the enti...
(Ibid. 20) "Then Miriam the prophetess took": Where do we find that Miriam was a prophetess? She said to her father (Amram): In the end, you will beget a son who will be the savior...
The Mekhilta asks a practical question that most readers skip right over. The verse says Miriam took "the timbrel in her hand" and led the women in song after the crossing of the R...
The Mekhilta highlights a detail about Miriam's song that establishes a fundamental principle about women's participation in Israelite worship. The verse says "And Miriam answered ...
Moses and Aaron stood before the entire assembly of Israel in the wilderness and made a promise that must have sounded almost too good to believe: "In the evening you will know tha...
