9,687 related texts · Page 182 of 202
Rabbi said: which is the straight path that a man should choose for himself? One which is an honor to the person adopting it, and [on account of which] honor [accrues] to him from ...
When God appeared to Abram and commanded him to circumcise himself, the patriarch was already ninety-nine years old. According to the Yalkut Shimoni on Torah 80, God's words carrie...
"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...
Another explanation: And you will quickly perish (Deuteronomy 11:17)—exile after exile. And thus do you find with the ten tribes, exile after exile. And thus do you find with the t...
The Talmud claims you are never alone. According to Berakhot 6a, the sage Abba Binyamin taught that if the human eye were granted permission to see demons, no living creature could...
The Talmud in Berakhot 57a catalogues an entire symbolic vocabulary of dreams—a dictionary of the unconscious, organized by category, where every image carries a fixed meaning. Ani...
When Moses ascended to heaven to receive the Torah, the angels were furious. According to Shabbat 88b, they confronted God directly: "What is a human being doing among us?" God tol...
The Sages once captured the yetzer hara (יצר הרע)—the evil inclination itself. According to Yoma 69b, they prayed for three days, and it was delivered into their hands. A fiery lio...
The Talmud in Sanhedrin 97b presents a grand timeline for human history—and then admits no one truly knows when it ends. The Sages taught: the world is destined to exist for six th...
Jacob's deathbed blessings (Genesis 49) are among the most obscure passages in the Torah. Targum Onkelos does not merely translate them—he decodes them, turning cryptic poetry into...
The Hebrew Bible says Moses died "by the mouth of God" (Deuteronomy 34:5). Ancient tradition interprets this as death by a divine kiss—the gentlest possible departure from life. Ta...
And Devorah, was a prophetess. What was she like, that she prophesied about Israel and judged them? Wasn't Pinchas ben Eleazar alive then? I bring Heaven and Earth to bear witness ...
3 The Staff of Your Strength G-d shall send forth from Zion. Which staff is this? This is the staff of Jacob about which it is said: "Because with my staff I crossed this Jordan." ...
It is written (Jeremiah 50:33) "Thus said the LORD of Hosts: The people of Israel are oppressed, And so too the people of Judah etc." and it is written (ibid 34) "Their Redeemer is...
Seventy Names of Metatron: The book "Seventy Names of Metatron", which Rabbi Yishmael revealed, 23 of which he received when he ascended on high. The book was brought to print by R...
Story of Eldad the Danite, Narrative B In the name of the LORD God of Israel, blessed be His name, of our God the King, King of kings, Who chose Israel from among all nations and g...
"Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) Vayisu": It is based on the verse "They journeyed, and the terror of God was upon the cities that were around them, and they did not pur...
"Zohar Chadash": It consists of some esoteric Torah teachings (letters), verses, and Mishnaic teachings with a concealed Midrash on the Torah and the Song of Songs, as well as some...
"It happened with King Jehoiachin, of whom it is written: 'Thus says the Lord, Write this man childless.' When he fell into the hands of the wicked Nebuchadnezzar, he was imprisone...
"Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) Ezra": Mentioned in the introduction of Rabbi Tam ben Yehiya to the Book of Josippon, and he states there: "Indeed, Joseph [ben Gurion] ...
“And of Benjamin he said, The Lord's beloved…” (Devarim 33:12) One verse says “As for the Jebusites the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the children of Judah could not drive them out…” (...
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...
(2) (Fol. 3b) R. Abahu said: "Cyrus was a worthy king, and therefore were his royal years counted in accordance with those of the kings of Israel [beginning with Nissan]." R. Josep...
(7) (Fol. 16) MISHNAH (the earliest code of rabbinic law): At four periods in each year the world is judged; on Passover, in respect to the growth of grain; on Pentecost, in respec...
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...
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 ...
A child learned part of the book of Genesis, is captured and put into prison. The Emperor asked for a book from the library and it happened to be the Jewish Bible. No one could rea...
Simeon b. Kamhith, a high priest, walked about with a heathen king and got his clothes defiled and was incapacitated from acting on the day of atonement. His place was taken by his...
Rabbi Akiva sat in a Roman prison, and his captors gave him a choice: abandon the Torah, or rot in chains. He chose the chains. The Roman authorities pressed him repeatedly. They o...
Rabbi Akiva was locked in a Roman prison, cut off from his students and colleagues. But the study of Torah does not stop for prison walls. Rabbi Johanan ben Nuri had an urgent ques...
It was the custom to present newly married people with a hen and a cock and once the Roman soldiers passing by caught the birds and ate them; the Jews then attacked them. This was ...
Short note of the destruction of Bet-Tur through the axle of the waggon. They used to plant trees on the birth of a child and afterwards used them at its wedding. These were once c...
During a terrible famine, King Monobaz opened the royal treasury and distributed everything inside it to the poor. Every coin, every jewel, every stored reserve of wealth that his ...
Rabbi Shimon ben Antipatros had a reputation that troubled the sages of Israel. Travelers who stayed at his house reported something alarming: their host beat his guests. Not robbe...
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...
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...
R. Gamliel was proud and harsh and forced R. Joshua to stand up in the college during his lecture. Those present, greatly irritated, forced R. Gamliel to resign. R. Elazar b. Azary...
Rabbi Judah HaNasi needed to send a teacher to the town of Simonia. The community there required a sage who could teach Torah, render legal decisions, and guide the people. He chos...
Ben Dama came to Rabbi Ishmael in a state of great distress. He had experienced a dream so vivid and so disturbing that he could not shake it from his mind. In the dream, he had wa...
A heretic — the Talmud calls him a "Min" — came to Rabbi Ishmael with a series of strange dreams, seeking interpretation. The dreams were vivid, unsettling, full of bizarre imagery...
Rabbi Yohanan was the most beautiful man in Israel. The Talmud describes his appearance in terms usually reserved for angels — radiant skin, luminous eyes, a face that literally se...
R. Johanan was one of the last beautiful men of Jerusalem. Rish Lakish, a robber, surprised him in the bath thinking him to be a woman. He was converted to study on the promise of ...
Rabbi Akiba laughed when everyone else wept — and his laughter changed the course of Jewish faith. The first time was in Rome. Rabbi Akiba and his colleagues walked through the str...
The death of Rabbi Akiba in a Roman prison was one of the most sacred and terrible events in all of Jewish history. The greatest sage of his generation, the man who had laughed on ...
III. 2. A rich man on his death bed, ordered his son never to take an oath. Swindlers came and robbed him of all his property, claiming debts from his father, he refusing to swear....
V. 1. A man on his deathbed commanded his son to cast bread upon the waters. He did it daily and one fish caught it regularly and grew very big and persecuted the other fishes. The...
V. A man fed his father daily with two doves. When asked where he got them, he replied, “Evil—eyed dog, *) From shorter recension B. ed. Jellinek. vide p. 7, § 19. - 147 “ eat and ...
VII. 2. R. Meir on his pilgrimage to Jerusalem used to lodge with Judah the butcher, whose wife looked after him. She died and Judah married a second time and entreated by him Meir...
