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“Lad and elder lay on the ground in the streets, my young women and my young men fell by the sword. You killed on the day of Your wrath, You slaughtered, had no compassion” (Lament...
“You have called, as on the appointed day, my fears from all around, and there was no refugee or remnant on the day of the Lord’s wrath. Those whom I nurtured and reared, my enemy ...
“All our enemies have opened their mouth against us” (Lamentations 3:46).“[All our enemies] have opened [patzu] their mouth against us” – why does peh come before ayin?74The verses...
“My enemies hunted me like a bird, without cause. They bound my life in the pit, and cast stones at me” (Lamentations 3:52–53).“My enemies hunted me like a bird, without cause. The...
“The blind wandered in the streets, having been sullied with blood, so that one could not touch their garments” (Lamentations 4:14).“The blind wandered in the streets.” The blind a...
“For You have despised us, You have been exceedingly angry with us” (Lamentations 5:22).“For You have despised us, You have been exceedingly angry with us.” Rabbi Shimon ben Lakish...
“In the third year of his reign, he made a banquet for all his princes and his servants, the elite of Persia and Media, the nobles and governors of the provinces before him” (Esthe...
“And governors of the provinces before him.” Rabbi Elazar and Rabbi Shmuel bar Naḥman: Rabbi Elazar said: Like the court in Geder, where the king sits in judgment above, and all th...
“The drinking was as customary, without coercion, for so did the king establish with all the stewards of his house, to do as every man desired.” (Esther 1:8). “The drinking was as ...
Another interpretation: “Also, Vashti the queen made a women’s banquet.” Why did Scripture see fit to publicize the banquet of Vashti? Rabbi Yehoshua ben Korḥa said: Why to that ex...
“The king was very angry and his fury burned within him.” Rabbi Yoḥanan said: At that moment, The Holy One blessed be He said to the angel appointed over fury: Descend and blow win...
“With the arrival of the turn of Esther, daughter of Aviḥayil uncle of Mordekhai, who had taken her as his daughter, to go to the king, she did not request anything except that whi...
Another interpretation: “After these matters” – it is written: “Though his haughtiness ascends to the heavens” – to the heights; “and his head reaches to the clouds”– the clouds2Th...
“Haman said: ‘Indeed, Queen Esther gave a feast and besides the king she did not bring anyone but me. And tomorrow too I am invited by her along with the king” (Esther 5:12).“Haman...
And usually, it's not something we relish. In fact, Genesis tells us, "It is not good for man to be alone" (Gen. 2:18). But what about God? Think about this: before anything existe...
A bit like trying to imagine the edge of the universe. Jewish tradition grapples with these kinds of mind-bending questions all the time, especially when we talk about the creation...
We often think of the act of creation as a singular event, a cosmic poof and then… nothing. But what if the story isn't quite that simple? What if creation is less of a noun and mo...
Sometimes, the deepest truths are hidden in plain sight, masked by complexity or sheer volume of information. This is something the author of The Wars of God seems to anticipate. R...
Are we, heaven forbid, idolaters, bowing down to wood and parchment? Rabbi Menasheh ben Yisrael, of blessed memory, addressed this very concern in his book, Teshuat Yisrael. He fel...
That feeling is at the heart of this story, a real-life exchange steeped in tradition and faith. It comes from a fascinating text called "The Wars of God," and it lays bare a disag...
Take those verses that seem to hint at a divine “we.” The big one, of course, is (Genesis 1:26): "Let us make man in our image, after our likeness." Seems pretty clear-cut. A plura...
The great medieval philosopher Maimonides, in his "Guide for the Perplexed," grapples with this very question in Chapter 6. He presents two fascinating possibilities. The first sug...
It's more than just a belief, it's a foundational principle that underpins everything. to what some of our tradition's greatest thinkers have said about it. We can turn to Maimonid...
The verse in question is (Genesis 2:5): "And God made every green herb of the field, before it was upon the earth, and every grass before it had sprung up." Seems a bit… backwards....
This is precisely the puzzle posed in The Midrash of Philo. It's a beautiful, thought-provoking exploration of the early chapters of Genesis, attributed to Philo of Alexandria, a J...
We all know the story – God breathes life into Adam. But what kind of life? What kind of being was this first human? It's a question that has haunted thinkers for millennia. And it...
It’s a question that has fascinated thinkers for millennia, and one place we find a really intriguing take is in the writings of Philo of Alexandria. Philo, a Jewish philosopher wh...
Specifically, I’m thinking of (Genesis 2:14). It's not just that the Euphrates river is mentioned. Oh no, we also get that the Pishon "goes round all the land of Evilat," the Gihon...
It’s something that’s been pondered for centuries, and even makes an appearance in ancient Jewish texts. The Midrash of Philo, a collection of interpretations and elaborations on t...
There’s a fascinating little corner of Jewish thought that suggests a truly different picture of those early days. It’s tucked away in the Midrash of Philo, a collection of interpr...
Even Adam, the first human, apparently felt that way. The Torah tells us that God paraded all the animals before Adam (Genesis 2:19-20). Adam named them, categorizing them, underst...
The earth beneath his feet, the rivers flowing nearby, the vast ocean, the air he breathed, the very light that illuminated his path, the heavens above… all were at his service. Ev...
It’s a question that’s haunted humanity for ages, and our tradition, with its rich tapestry of stories, offers some pretty fascinating answers. Today, we're diving into one of thos...
Philosophers have scratched their heads, trying to unravel the mystery of slumber. But you know, sometimes the answers are closer than we think. Our own tradition, through the wisd...
The ancient sages did. They saw in the creation of Adam and Eve, not just the beginning of humanity, but the blueprint for a thriving, balanced life. Philo, a Jewish philosopher fr...
Why wasn't she just... there? Well, according to a fascinating interpretation found in the Midrash of Philo 22, it's not just a random detail. It speaks to something much deeper ab...
But the ancient rabbis, those masters of hidden meanings, saw layers upon layers in even the simplest verses. to just one little phrase from the story of creation and see what they...
Our starting point here is a fascinating text referred to as "The Midrash of Philo." Now, when we say "Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary)," we're talking about a particular...
Take this one little verse from Genesis, 2:25: "And the man and his wife were both naked, and were not ashamed." Simple enough. But wait a minute. Why does it even need to tell us ...
It wasn't just about the lush vegetation or the talking animals, although I’m sure those were According to this Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary), Adam and Eve weren't ash...
The Torah tells us plainly, but the why is left hanging, ripe for interpretation. And oh, have the interpretations grown! One fascinating perspective comes to us from, well, Philo....
a passage that offers a rather… pointed perspective. The Midrash of Philo, a collection of interpretations attributed to Philo of Alexandria, a Jewish philosopher from the 1st cent...
And it's a question that dances at the heart of a fascinating passage from the Midrash of Philo. Philo, a Jewish philosopher who lived in Alexandria in the first century CE, grappl...
That internal struggle... it's been a topic of contemplation for millennia. And interestingly, sometimes it's been explored through the lens of gender. Now, I know what you might b...
The Midrash of Philo, a collection of interpretations and expansions on the Hebrew Bible attributed to the Jewish philosopher Philo of Alexandria, offers a fascinating perspective....
Take the very first name ever given to a woman: Chava, or as we know her, Eve. Philo, the great Jewish philosopher from Alexandria, Egypt, writing around the first century CE, give...
In (Genesis 3:22), we read, "Behold, Adam has become as one of us, to know good and evil." One of us? Who is the "us" here? It's one of those little lines that can send you spirali...
It's one of those verses that’s sparked endless debate and contemplation throughout Jewish history. The Hebrew there is, of course, "Na'aseh adam b'tzalmeinu kidmuteinu"—and that p...
