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The Targum Jonathan on (Deuteronomy 15) contains a bleak prophecy hidden inside a law about debt forgiveness. The Hebrew says "the poor will never cease from the land." The Targum ...
The Torah says do not fear superior armies. Targum Jonathan says something far more radical—all the enemy's horses and chariots "are accounted as a single horse and a single chario...
The first-fruits ceremony in (Deuteronomy 26) is beautiful in the Torah. Targum Jonathan makes it lavish. Where the Hebrew says simply to bring produce in a basket, the Targum adds...
"This month shall be for you." It shall be turned over to you. R. Yehoshua b. Levi said, "It's like a king who had a horologue. When he looked at it, he would know what time of day...
According to Chagigah 12a, there are seven heavens stacked above the earth, each with a distinct name and function. Reish Lakish listed them: Vilon, Rakia, Shehakim, Zevul, Ma'on, ...
At the end of days, God will host a banquet for the righteous, and the main course will be the Leviathan. According to Bava Batra 74b, this is not metaphor. The Sages described the...
The Jewish people were redeemed from Egypt because of the righteous women. According to Sotah 11b, Rav Avira taught that while the men had given up hope under Pharaoh's slavery, th...
The Talmud in Tractate Avodah Zarah says that every afternoon, God plays with Leviathan—the colossal sea creature described in (Job 41:1) and (Psalms 104:26). The fourth quarter of...
The Hebrew Bible commands: "Hear, O Israel! God is our Lord, God is one" (Deuteronomy 6:4). Targum Onkelos translates the Shema—Judaism's central declaration of faith—with perfect ...
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." ...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said: ‘and God delivered Israel that day’ (Exodus 14:30); and when Israel went out of Jerusalem Jeremiah said: ‘God has put me into the hands o...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said ‘Judah became His -holy one, Israel, His dominion’ (Psalms 114:2); and when Israel went out of Jerusalem, Jeremiah said ‘“Away! Unclean!” ...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said ‘the sea saw them and fled, the Jordan turned backward’ (Psalms 114:2); and when Israel went out of Jerusalem, Jeremiah said ‘by the river...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said ‘the mountains skipped like rams’(Psalms 114:4); And when Israel went out of Jerusalem, Jeremiah said 'I look at the mountains, they are q...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said ‘God your God has been with you these past forty years: you have lacked nothing’ (Deuteronomy 2:7); and when Israel went out of Jerusalem,...
When Israel went out of Egypt, Moses said ‘and in the wilderness, where you saw how God your God carried you, as a man carries his son’(Deuteronomy 1:31); and when they went out of...
The people of Israel are similar to a ship. If there is a hole in the lower hold, one does not say, ‘Only the lower hold has a hole in it.’ Rather they must immediately recognize t...
[1] "And God spoke all these words, saying, I am the Lord your God, etc." (Exodus 20:1-2) Blessed is the Place, blessed is He, who chose Israel from all His handiwork and acquired ...
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...
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...
Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary) Read-but-not-Written I) But [the children of] Benjamin would not yield (Judges 20:13). The word the children of is missing, for they did ...
Rabbi Shimon bar Yochai boarded a ship bound for Rome on a mission to the emperor. That night, on the water, a figure appeared in his dream. It was Ashmedai, king of the demons. "A...
(16) (Ib. b) (Ex. 34, 6), And the Lord passed by before him and proclaimed. R. Jochanan said: "Had this passage not been written, it would have been impossible to think of it, for ...
(24) (Fol. 21b) It is written (Ps. 12, 7) The words of the Lord are pure words, as silver refined in the crucible of earth, purified seven times. Rab and Samuel both explain it. On...
A Kuthean disputed with R. Meir as to the righteousness of Jacob who only separated Levi tithed as one of the io tribes, instead of separating one more for the remaining two. For h...
Mesha, the king of Moab, heard the story of the Binding of Isaac and drew exactly the wrong conclusion. He learned that Abraham, the father of the Israelites, had been willing to s...
R. Joshua b. Levi met the angel of death, who brought him to the wall of the Garden of Eden. R. Joshua took the angel’s sword and jumped into the garden. He returned the sword at t...
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 ben Yose was making his pilgrimage to Jerusalem — one of the three annual journeys that every Jewish man was commanded to undertake. Along the way, he passed through ...
Rabbi Ishmael ben Jose was making his way to Jerusalem on a pilgrimage when a Samaritan stopped him on the road. The Samaritans — who lived on and around Mount Gerizim and claimed ...
The birth of Moses was no ordinary event. According to the ancient chronicles preserved in Jerahmeel and the writings of Josephus, the arrival of Israel's greatest prophet was prec...
The Leviathan — the great sea creature that God created on the fifth day — was so enormous that the sages struggled to find words adequate to describe it. The Talmud (Bava Batra 74...
Abraham ibn Ezra and Yehuda Halevi were two of the greatest Jewish minds of medieval Spain — but their partnership was as unlikely as it was legendary. Ibn Ezra was a wandering poe...
When a lion roars, every animal in the forest freezes. Even the ones who have never been hunted. Even the ones too far away to be prey. The sound itself is the message: there is so...
"A little that the righteous have is better than the abundance of many wicked" (Psalm 37:16). The rabbis of Aggadat Bereshit loved this verse because it turned ordinary logic on it...
Three days after his circumcision, Abraham sat at the entrance of his tent in the heat of the day — sore, exhausted, ninety-nine years old. And God appeared to him (Genesis 18:1). ...
After the conquest of Canaan, God deliberately left certain nations in the land — not because He couldn't remove them, but to test Israel (Judges 3:1-2). The rabbis found this prac...
Before the sun existed, there was light. This is one of the oldest puzzles in Genesis — God creates light on the first day, but the sun and moon don't appear until the fourth. The ...
Joseph was brought down to Egypt (Genesis 39:1). Lamentations gives the frame: "Good is the man who sits alone and is silent, for he will bear the yoke upon himself. He will put hi...
Jacob said: "My way is hidden from the Lord, and my justice has passed away from my God" (Isaiah 40:27). This was Israel speaking — the whole nation's complaint condensed into one ...
"Listen to Me, O Jacob, Israel, whom I have called: I am He — I am the first, and I am the last as well" (Isaiah 48:12). God speaks with the full weight of eternity — before everyt...
That feeling, that raw, unfair sting, is at the heart of the story of Jacob and Esau, and the stolen blessing. The scene is set: Isaac, now old and with failing eyesight, calls for...
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...
This week, we're diving into a powerful message about gratitude, using the ancient text of Bamidbar Rabbah, specifically Bamidbar Rabbah 1. It all starts with a verse: “The Lord sp...
In Bamidbar Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Numbers, we find a fascinating discussion sparked by the verse "it will be that instead…" from (Hosea 2:1). Th...
"And stand it before Aaron, the priest, and they shall serve him." This seemingly simple instruction reveals a whole world of responsibility. But what does it mean to "serve him"? ...
This particular passage revolves around the census taken of the Israelites in the desert – "Count every firstborn male…" it says. (Numbers 3:40) But it's not just about counting he...
