1,204 related texts · Page 16 of 26
According to the Kalach Pitchei Chokhmah, the answer lies in understanding the different levels of unity and revelation. The text poses a fascinating challenge: if the Torah stems ...
Jewish tradition, specifically the ancient Kabbalistic text Kalach Pitchei Chokhmah (Wisdom), suggests that our commandments, our mitzvot (commandments), can be divided in just tha...
"Yitro, the priest of Midian, heard all that God had done for Moses and His people Israel" (Exodus 18:1). What exactly did Yitro hear? Rabbi Levi Yitzchak of Berditchev says he hea...
The Mekhilta raises a question that cuts to the heart of the Passover story: why did God command the Israelites to select the Passover lamb four full days before slaughtering it? W...
And, what is more, with (the casket of) Jacob there went up the servants of Pharaoh and the elders of his household, while with Joseph there went up the ark and the Shechinah and t...
"the L–rd is a man of war': What is the intent of this? Because He revealed Himself at the sea as a hero waging war—"The L–rd is a man of war"—and He revealed Himself at Sinai as a...
The sea has no heart, and He gave it a heart. A terebinth has no heart, and He gave it a heart, viz. (II Samuel 18:4) "He (Avshalom) was yet alive in the heart of the terebinth." T...
(Exodus 15:26) "And He said: If pay heed, you shall pay heed": From here it was derived: If a man paid heed to one mitzvah, he is caused to pay heed to many mitzvot (commandments)h...
In (Exodus 16:9), Moses instructed Aaron to tell the entire congregation of Israel to "draw near before the Lord." Two rabbis in the Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael disagreed about what ...
Rabbi Eliezer interpreted the mysterious rise and fall of Israel's fortunes during the battle with Amalek. When Moses raised his hands toward heaven, Israel grew strong. When he lo...
When Amalek attacked Israel in the wilderness, Moses did not simply organize a military response. He turned to God with an argument that struck at the heart of the divine project i...
The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael preserves a fascinating tradition about the name of Jethro, Moses's father-in-law. His name was not always Jethro. In the beginning, the Torah calls h...
The Mekhilta notices something peculiar about how the Torah identifies Yithro. In the beginning of the story, Moses is the one who boasts about the relationship. When Moses returns...
Yithro's plan for restructuring Israel's judicial system was built on precise mathematics. He told Moses to appoint "officers of thousands, officers of hundreds, officers of fiftie...
One might think that he went but did not do so. It is, therefore, written (Judges 1:16) "And the children of Keni, the father-in-law of Moses, went up from the city of date-palms,"...
The Torah records that the Israelites "journeyed from Refidim and came to the desert of Sinai" (Exodus 19:2). But the Mekhilta notices a problem. The previous verse already stated ...
Rebbi (Rabbi Yehudah HaNasi) raises a fascinating question about the communication chain at Sinai. What exactly did God tell Moses to relay to Israel, and what did Israel say to Mo...
Concerning this it is stated in the Tradition (Song of Songs 2:14) "My Dove in the clefts of the rock … Show me Your face; let me hear Your voice. For Your voice is sweet and Your ...
Rabbi Akiva challenged Rabbi Eliezer with a question about what happened when God spoke the commandments at Sinai. Moses spoke and God answered — but what does that mean? Rabbi Eli...
Before offering the Torah to Israel, God first approached every other nation on earth. The Mekhilta DeRabbi Yishmael explains that this was not because God expected them to accept....
The sages offered an alternative view of how the Ten Commandments were arranged on the two tablets. While Rabbi Chanina ben Gamliel taught that five commandments appeared on each t...
R. b. R. Ilai says: Because they were scorched by the sun above them, the Holy One Blessed be He said to the clouds of glory: Drip the dew of life upon My children, etc. (Psalms, I...
(Exodus 20:17) says that God came to Sinai "in order to exert you." The Mekhilta reinterprets this: "exert" actually means "to make you great." God's arrival at Sinai was not meant...
Issi ben Akiva raises a profound moral question about the scope of the prohibition against murder. Before the Torah was given at Sinai, he argues, humanity was already warned again...
The Mekhilta raises a fascinating question about the relationship between laws that existed before the giving of the Torah at Sinai and those that were introduced at Sinai itself. ...
We find him in the book of Exodus (3:1-6), a shepherd tending the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro, a priest in Midian. One ordinary day, Moses leads the sheep to Horeb, also kno...
It turns out, that instinct might be deeply woven into the fabric of our tradition. Because according to Midrash Tehillim, that feeling is intrinsically linked to music. Specifical...
The ancient rabbis certainly thought so. And they found echoes of this idea even in the seemingly simple words of the Psalms. Specifically, in Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rab...
It's like that guest who overstays their welcome, only on a cosmic scale. But it gets even more interesting. The Midrash Tehillim then pivots to a powerful statement of faith, of u...
The passage opens with an intriguing idea: prayer itself as judgment. David, contemplating his own mortality and the possibility of divine judgment, seems to be saying, "If my judg...
It's more than just challah and candles, you know. According to Midrash Tehillim, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Psalms, the Sabbath is a powerful, almost tangib...
It’s more than just a day off. It’s a legacy. Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating early medieval text, offers a beautiful parable to explain why. Imagine a person with incredibly...
The scene: Jacob is on his deathbed. He summons his beloved son, Joseph. This isn't just a goodbye; it's a moment of profound importance. Jacob says, "O my son! Swear to me by the ...
The Yalkut Shimoni, a compilation of rabbinic commentary on the Hebrew Bible, offers a breathtaking glimpse into just that moment. Rabbi Yochanan tells us that the world was create...
But our sages, drawing on ancient traditions, offer us some truly mind-bending glimpses. R' Levi, in the Yalkut Shimoni (a compilation of Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary)...
The haunting wail of the shofar, for instance. It's more than just a noise; it's a call, a cry, a connection to something ancient and profound. But have you ever wondered why it so...
But how long should that journey really take? The book of Bamidbar, Numbers, tells us (10:33), "And they journeyed from the mountain of the L-rd a journey of three days." Seems str...
The Torah gives us a powerful example in the story of Moses and Joshua. We find ourselves in the book of Numbers, Bamidbar, specifically chapter 27. God has commanded Moses to appo...
It seems like a simple question, but in the world of Jewish law and tradition, even something as seemingly straightforward as who speaks to Moses first becomes a subject of deep co...
It turns out, quite a bit. The Sifrei Devarim, a collection of early rabbinic legal interpretations on the Book of Deuteronomy, gives us a peek into the anxieties of Moses himself....
That’s something Jewish tradition has grappled with for centuries, especially when it comes to understanding the Torah.It's all about the idea of repetition, or shinun, and what ex...
We find a fascinating puzzle in the book of Devarim (Deuteronomy) regarding the location of the Temple. One verse (Deuteronomy 12:14) seems to say the Temple should be built "in th...
We often think of judges as these impartial figures, robed and removed, but Jewish tradition delves into the nitty-gritty of who sits on the beth din (court of law) and what makes ...
This question sits at the heart of a beautiful passage from Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary)im on the Book of Deuteronomy. It revolv...
Promises to ourselves, to others, maybe even to the Divine. But following through? That's the real test. The Sifrei Devarim, a legal midrash on the Book of Deuteronomy, shares a fa...
The standard census in the Book of Numbers is a dry headcount. But the Targum Jonathan transforms it into something far more dramatic, adding a theological reason for every exempti...
When God commanded Israel to give a half-shekel for the census, Moses was confused. Not by the amount — half a shekel was nearly nothing, a laborer's loose change. What baffled him...
The Hebrew Bible says the people told Aaron: "Make us gods that will lead us, for this Moses, we do not know what happened to him" (Exodus 32:1). Targum Onkelos translates this wit...
