49 texts · Page 1 of 2
Ben Sira, in his wisdom, captures that feeling perfectly. He says, "My inward parts were hot as an oven for her, to behold her; Therefore I possessed her as a good possession." Wha...
The story centers around Nehemiah, a pivotal figure in Jewish history, known for rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem. But this isn't about bricks and mortar. This is about rekindling...
Abraham left the room to cool his father's anger. But Terah called after him: "Abraham!" "Here I am." "Gather the wood splinters from the gods I carved before you came, and prepare...
Abraham was still speaking to his father Terah in the courtyard of the house when a voice came down from heaven. Not a whisper. Not an intuition. A voice, falling from the sky in a...
The sun went down. Smoke rose from the ground like the smoke of a furnace (Genesis 15:17). The angels who held the portions of the sacrifice ascended from the top of the smoking fu...
Abraham turned to the angel in distress. "Why have you brought me up here? I cannot see anymore. I am already grown weak, and my spirit is departing from me." The mortal body was f...
While Iaoel was still speaking, fire closed in around them on every side. A voice was inside the fire, like the voice of many waters (Ezekiel 1:24), like the roaring of the sea in ...
A voice came from the midst of the fire. "Abraham, Abraham!" "Here I am." "Consider the expanses beneath the firmament on which you are now placed, and see that on no single expans...
Let’s delve into some vivid, frankly terrifying, descriptions of Gehinnom (the place of spiritual purification after death), often translated as Hell. It's a place depicted in anci...
You stand up for what you believe in, only to see those around you suffer because of it. That’s the pickle a few brave souls found themselves in during the reign of Nebuchadnezzar,...
The Heikhalot (the heavenly palaces) Rabbati, a text within the Heikhalot literature – those mystical explorations of heavenly palaces and divine encounters – gives us a glimpse in...
We all have. But where does it come from, and what happens to it as we age? The Kalach Pitchei Chokhmah, or "Hall of the Openings of Wisdom," wrestles with this very question, usin...
The Sefer Yetzirah (the World of Formation), or Book of Formation, one of the foundational texts of Jewish mysticism, dives right into that question. We’ve talked about the Sefer Y...
The mystical tradition of Judaism has some pretty amazing ideas about that. , shall we? The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a central text of Kabbalah, offers a fascinating glim...
We’re talking about flames. Not just any flames, but those described in (Deuteronomy 4:24): "For Ha-Shem your God is a devouring fire..." Fiery flames that embody the very essence ...
The Tikkun (spiritual repair)ei Zohar, a collection of commentaries that delve into the deepest secrets of the Zohar, doesn't deal in simple answers. It invites us into a world of ...
But then, the text takes a turn. A dark turn. It delves into the forces of evil, using visceral imagery that's hard to shake. We’re talking about the liver and the spleen. Now, I k...
"uvashel": "bashel" (here refers to flesh that was) roasted (before, the understanding being that it is forbidden to cook it even if it had been roasted previously), as in (Devarim...
Rabbi Yehudah argues that the Torah's command to "eliminate leaven from your houses" means one specific thing: you must burn it. Not scatter it, not crumble it into the wind, not t...
Would you say that? There is a difference (between neveilah, [from which benefit may be derived] and chametz, [from which benefit may not be derived,], so that the resultant equati...
The Mekhilta continues its relentless cross-examination of Rabbi Yehudah's position that chametz must be destroyed specifically by burning. A new argument emerges — and a new count...
One of the disciples of R. Yishmael said: It is written (Exodus 35:3) "You shall not light a fire in all of your dwellings on the Sabbath day." Burning was in the category (of all ...
"Pay shall he pay, the lighter of the fire": Why is this written? From (22:4) "a man," I would know only of a man. Whence do I derive (the same for) a woman, a tumtum (one of indet...
The Torah says "You may not light a fire in all of your dwellings" on the Sabbath. But what about executions ordered by a court? The judicial death penalty of burning requires fire...
The Mekhilta concludes its treatment of the Sabbath fire prohibition with a clean summary of the legal principle. Lighting a fire was one of the thirty-nine proto-labors forbidden ...
Sometimes, it takes a seemingly simple story to peel back the layers of ancient wisdom. Our tale begins with a shofar blower from the tribe of Barzel. Now, the shofar, a ram's horn...
The Israelites are wandering in the desert, fresh from their miraculous escape from Egypt. They’re under divine protection. A pillar of cloud surrounds their camp, shielding them. ...
The ancient Israelites certainly did. And sometimes, their reactions… well, let's just say they weren't always their finest moments. We find a particularly vivid example of this in...
Like just when you think you've made it, something... shifts? Jewish tradition has a way of acknowledging that final, often fiery, transition. Pirkei DeRabbi Eliezer, a fascinating...
We read in Bamidbar (Numbers) 28:3, "And you shall say to them, 'This is the fire-offering which you shall offer up to the L-rd… two for the day.'" Simple enough. But what does "tw...
There's a passage in Sifrei Devarim 344 that speaks to this very idea. It's connected to (Deuteronomy 33:3), which refers to "the law of fire." But what does "the law of fire" even...
Genesis 38, the story of Judah and Tamar, is already one of the most dramatic chapters in the Torah. The Targum Jonathan amplifies every beat, adding prayers, prophecies, and moral...
The Ten Commandments in (Exodus 20) are a list in the Hebrew Bible. In the Targum Jonathan, they are a spectacle. Each commandment is a living entity of storm and flame that flies ...
And they have built the shrines of Topheth in the Valley of Ben-hinnom: Our Rabbis, may their memory be blessed, said that even though all the houses of idolatry were in Jerusalem,...
The son of Hananya joined a band of robbers and betrayed them to one of the great men of Rome. They found it out and killed him. In the funeral oration his father delivered, he tri...
A. & B. Abraham & Nimrod. Pirke de R. Eliezer, XXVI. Midr. Hagadol, Gen. Lekh Lekha. Gen. R. 38 § 19. Gen. R. of Moses Hadar- shan to 11, 28 and 46, 28. Horowitz, Eked, I, 40. Jera...
The martyrdom of Rabbi Hananya ben Teradyon is one of the most searing stories in all of rabbinic literature. The Talmud (Avodah Zarah 18a) records that the Romans found him sittin...
The martyrdom of Rabbi Hananya ben Teradyon is among the most harrowing passages in all of rabbinic literature. The Talmud (Avodah Zarah 17b-18a) describes his execution with the k...
When the Romans decreed that teaching Torah was punishable by death, Rabbi Hananya ben Teradyon did not stop. He gathered his students in the open, placed a Torah scroll in his lap...
In the distant lands of Persia, where fire altars burned day and night in honor of the elements, the Jewish communities faced a peculiar danger that was not from human persecutors ...
Jewish tradition has some pretty amazing, awe-inspiring imagery about that very question. Imagine this: a God of pure, untamed power, riding not on a cloud, but on the very wings o...
We find this powerful verse in (Genesis 15:7), where God says to Abraham, "I am the Lord who took you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it." It seems sim...
Take the writings attributed to Philo of Alexandria, for example. Now, there’s some debate about whether these are actually from Philo himself, but the collection known as “The Mid...
It’s a question that takes us to the heart of how we understand ourselves in relation to the world, and even to God. Philo of Alexandria, a Jewish philosopher living in Roman Egypt...
Go forth from the ark (Gen. 8:16). Scripture says elsewhere in reference to this verse: I counsel thee: keep the king’s command, and that in regard of the oath of God. Be not hasty...
And Joseph was brought down into Egypt (Gen. 39:1). May it please our master to teach us whether one may recite the Havdalah (the ceremony marking the end of Shabbat (the Sabbath))...
The tabernacle of the testimony (Exod. 38:21). This refers the Torah in which they labored. The Holy One, blessed be He, said: Because of the Torah and the sacrifices, I will rescu...
Another interpretation (of Lev. 6:2), “Command Aaron.” What is the function of Aaron here? Israel was bringing offerings whereas Aaron is mentioned, and Scripture says here, “Comma...
