1,822 related texts · Page 32 of 38
Four hundred shekels of silver. That was the price Abraham paid for a patch of dirt in Hebron—just enough ground to bury his wife. Sarah had died at one hundred and twenty-seven ye...
The whole thing started with a bowl of soup. Esau came home from hunting one day—starving, exhausted, still a young man—and found his brother Jacob cooking lentil stew. It was brig...
A golden cup hidden in a sack of grain. That was Joseph's final test—not to punish his brothers, but to see whether they had changed. He planted his own drinking cup in Benjamin's ...
David made one mistake that cost seventy thousand lives. He counted his people. The Torah had been explicit: if you number Israel, every person counted must pay a half-shekel to Go...
It’s a question that’s haunted mystics and theologians for millennia. And the answer, as we find in Jewish tradition, is both breathtakingly beautiful and terrifyingly destructive....
A darkness, he called it. And it led him on a journey, one that would ultimately illuminate the most mystical and enigmatic of Jewish texts: the Zohar. But let's be honest, the Zoh...
You're not alone. Jewish tradition, especially Kabbalah, is deeply interested in the idea of inner and outer, of the pnim (internal) and chitzon (external) – and it applies this co...
The ancient mystical text, Heikhalot (the heavenly palaces) Rabbati, which translates roughly to "The Greater Palaces," gives us a peek behind the curtain, into the celestial realm...
In it, we find a powerful scene, a moment of intense advocacy before the very throne of God. Imagine this: A voice rising, filled with both awe and a desperate plea. "King fearful,...
Imagine, instead, a ladder in your house that does lead somewhere incredible. A ladder to the divine, to the very Throne of Glory itself! That's the image we get from Heikhalot (th...
It’s a powerful image, isn’t it? The freedom, the potential… “Blessed be thou, O Lord, who art wise in secrets and master of hidden things. Amen. Amen...." But what if that ladder ...
The word Partzuf (פַּרְצוּף) in Kabbalah literally means "face" or "persona," but it represents something far grander. Think of them as divine configurations, specific arrangements...
Jewish mysticism, particularly the Kabbalah, is full of these! It's like trying to grasp smoke, or maybe…decipher a dream. One of the trickiest areas involves understanding the str...
It's not just a random collection of stuff, but a carefully structured system. But is it a simple top-to-bottom hierarchy? Not so fast. We often talk about the four worlds: Atzilut...
But the idea behind it? Absolutely massive. The text is, essentially, a declaration of faith and reliance on God. It begins with a powerful affirmation: "Blessed be God for ever Am...
It’s there, I promise you. It’s like peeling back the layers of an onion, each layer revealing a new depth of meaning. Take, for instance, the verse: "And Yaakov told Rachel that h...
It speaks of a profound secret, a key to unlocking the King's desire, and it all revolves around…Her. Who is this "Her" the text refers to? It’s Malkhut (Sovereignty), often transl...
Jewish mysticism, especially the Zohar, the central text of Kabbalah, grapples with this feeling. It explores the idea of completeness, and how we achieve it, not just as individua...
It might be hiding in plain sight, in the way we treat those closest to us. The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a central text of Kabbalah, hints at this very idea, connecting r...
Jewish mysticism wrestles with this very idea – the nature of perception, of revelation, and how we encounter the Divine. to a fascinating passage from Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei ...
The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a later expansion and sort of "fix" to the foundational Zohar, gives us a glimpse into this celestial postal service. It paints a picture of ...
Jewish mysticism is full of those moments. The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a collection of commentaries and expansions on the original Zohar, often delves into the esoteric ...
And today, we're diving into a fascinating little corner of that world – a peek into the Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar. The Tikkunei Zohar? Think of it as the Zohar's super-cha...
Jewish mysticism often explores this very idea, the hiddenness of God, the hiddenness of ourselves. And sometimes, that hiddenness is tied to moments of judgment, moments when thin...
And it's all wrapped up in… well, in letters. The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a later and more esoteric expansion on the Zohar itself, that foundational text of Kabbalah, un...
And then, every now and then, you stumble across a passage that makes those connections sing. to a fascinating idea tucked away in the Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, specifical...
Specifically, Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar 121 calls out to the very foundations of our faith, the patriarchs themselves. "Rise O Patriarchs, Masters of the Covenant!" the tex...
"These are the generations of Isaac, the son of Abraham" (Genesis 25:19). Rashi comments simply: "these are Jacob and Esau, who are discussed in the portion." But Rebbe Elimelech o...
"And Jacob settled in the land where his father dwelled" (Genesis 37:1). Rebbe Elimelech of Lizhensk opens his commentary on Parashat Vayeshev not with Joseph's coat or his brother...
"After two years' time, Pharaoh dreamed that he was standing by the Nile" (Genesis 41:1). Rebbe Elimelech of Lizhensk, in Parashat Miketz, turns Pharaoh's dream into a warning abou...
The Torah lists the patriarchs in a specific order: Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. In (Exodus 3:6), God introduces Himself to Moses at the burning bush as "the God of your father, the ...
And thus do you find with the forefathers, that they deported themselves with circumspection (in this regard), viz.: (Genesis 22:3) "And Abraham arose early in the morning," (Ibid....
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus, turns to one of the most severe prophecies in the Hebrew Bible: the destruction of Esau's descendants. The prophet Obadiah declares: ...
The Mekhilta, the tannaitic midrash on Exodus, takes up a question about the Israelites' first stop after leaving Egypt: a place called Succoth. "And they traveled from Rameses to ...
Rebbi (Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi) noticed the same numerical tension between two biblical verses about the duration of Israel's time in Egypt. One says "they shall serve them and they s...
Rabbi Nathan noticed something striking in the Torah's language about the Exodus. The text uses two verbs — "who brought up" and "who brought" — when describing God's act of taking...
(Exodus 13:19) "For hashbea hishbia the children of Israel": He (Joseph) had made them (his brothers) swear ("hashbea") that they would beswear ("hishbia") their children. R. Natha...
When the Israelites saw the Egyptian army bearing down on them and the Red Sea blocking their escape, the Torah says they "were exceedingly afraid." But what did they do with that ...
The Mekhilta adds a further proof that the Hebrew root "pegiyah" means prayer, citing the prophet Jeremiah: "Let them now pray (yifgu na) to the Lord of hosts, that the vessels whi...
The Mekhilta draws yet another proof of prayer's supreme power from Jacob's blessing over the tribe of Judah. The Torah declares: "A lion's whelp is Judah" (Genesis 49:9). On the s...
What is written of Moses? (Numbers 20:14-16) "And Moses sent messengers from Kadesh to the king of Edom … And our fathers went down to Egypt … and He hearkened to our voice." He (t...
Rabbi Bana'ah taught that God split the Red Sea for the Israelites in the merit of their ancestor Abraham. The proof lies in a striking verbal parallel between two verses. When Abr...
Rabbi Elazar ben Azaryah taught that God split the Red Sea for the Israelites in the merit of their forefather Abraham. His proof comes from a sweeping passage in (Psalms 105:42-43...
The Mekhilta reinforces Rabbi Tarfon's teaching about the tribe of Judah with a verse from Psalms. "When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from the people of a foreign t...
The eighth, that of Solomon, viz. (Psalms 30:1) "A psalm, a song of the inauguration of the Temple of David." Now did David built it? Did not Solomon build it? viz. (I Kings 6:14) ...
The tenth (song) in time to come, viz. (Isaiah 42;10) "Sing to the L–rd a new song, His praise from the end of the earth (Ibid. 48:42) "Say: The L–rd has redeemed His servant Jacob...
When God responded to the Israelites' hunger in the wilderness, He used a single Hebrew word that two rabbis read in completely different ways. (Exodus 16:4) records God telling Mo...
Rabbi Eliezer Hamodai taught that Moses was one of four great tzaddik (a righteous person)im (the righteous) — righteous people — to whom God gave a subtle hint about the future. T...
