376 myths · Page 10 of 13
Laban expected the deal to cost him little: Jacob would be paid only in lambs born black or spotted. Then the ewes kept giving birth to spotted lambs.
Jacob froze at the border of an unclean land even after hearing Joseph lived; only God's vow to go down with him unlocked the wagons south.
One hundred twenty mils from Rome, three sages cry at idol peace while Akiva laughs, reading empire's ease as proof of what God still owes the loyal.
Rabbi Yehudah ben Beteira kept a table in Netzivim worth walking to. Elazar and Yochanan never reached it. They turned around at a Phoenician port.
In the forest the iron left the handle and a neighbor fell. He ran marked roads toward a city that would hold him until a high priest died.
Two men stopped speaking. Three days of silence out of hatred, and the law no longer called their next collision an accident worth exile.
Even the high priest, if he killed without intent, had to flee. Ordinary exiles wait for his death to go free. If he is the exile, no door reopens.
Isaiah climbed to heaven and found every door bolted shut. Angels who carry prayers up were stuck outside. Only the gate of tears still opened.
When the ban on prayer was signed, Daniel went home, opened his windows toward Jerusalem, and knelt three times as if the Temple still held its fire.
A man flees a lion and runs into a bear. He gets home, leans on the wall, and a serpent bites him. Esther felt that order as the scepter came out.
Fire locked in his bones, Jeremiah walked the gates begging the house of Jacob to listen before the same word would reach them as dry bones in Babylon.
Rabbi Berechiah said that if God's kingdom is late, wait for it in the dust. Do your deeds with kindness, the midrash promised, and redemption comes at once.
From Adam to Solomon the Presence seeks a home below. Manasseh drags a four-faced idol into the Holy of Holies until God asks what He is doing there.
When the whip fell on Israel's back in Egypt, the Presence did not watch from a cool height. He was afflicted with them, and Job still blessed the Name in ash.
One rabbi said God filled the city's belly with worms, so Jerusalem was chewed from the inside while the sword took her sons at the gates.
At Mahanaim the guard changed in front of him. Angels of Aram finished their watch, angels of Canaan stepped in. Esau was still coming with four hundred men.
By the rivers of Babylon captors demand Temple songs for idols. Israel hangs its harps, chooses death over that music, and waits for Elijah's hand.
Ahab and Zidkiah seduce a court with borrowed holiness, then pull the high priest into a furnace test. They burn. Joshua walks out singed.
He was brought out of the tent and told to count the stars. He got partway and gave up, and the silence was written down as merit.
After the calf, Moses dragged his tent past the last row of Israel and planted it at the Sabbath limit, while the wicked watched him go with the evil eye.
Jacob tells Esau he is coming to Seir, then turns toward Succoth. Glory leaves Beersheba with him, and at Mahanaim two camps of angels fill the road.
The letters of one word Moses spoke add up to 852, the years Israel was given on its land. The exile came at 850, two years early.
The ground groaned outside a necromancer's door, and a voice from inside told Rav Katina what an earthquake actually is. Two tears, hitting the sea.
Ivory beds, pipe-goblets, and virgin oils filled Samaria while God quieted the world. The midrash calls that calm a prelude, not a blessing.
In every province the Jews tore clothes for a decree that only grew worse with time, because each sunrise stole one more day from the life still left.
The protective cloud lifted when Aaron died, and Canaanite kings struck the road while Israel searched every border for a door that would not open.
In the heavenly court God pleaded for Israel like a father. One twisted word later He stands as prosecutor, and the land itself begins to sell its people away.
A student reached for a coin and the sage stopped him. Refuse the half-shekel for the Temple, he said, and you will pay fifteen to a foreign king.
By the river Chebar Ezekiel sees wheels and living beings, then the shapes of letters themselves begin to teach what he saw.
Dov sat on a crate in a rented room while rain dripped through the window. Then he kissed the mezuzah (doorpost scroll) he had ignored for weeks and took.
