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The verse we’re looking at speaks of the poor being able to eat "in your gates and be sated." The rabbis, never ones to let a good turn of phrase go unexamined, ask: what does it r...
Not just any rain, mind you, but a gentle, life-giving shower falling on parched grass. The Sifrei Devarim, a collection of legal midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary)im on th...
We often think of tzedakah, usually translated as charity, as giving money to the poor. But what if it's something far more profound? The Sifrei Devarim, a legal midrash on the Boo...
R. ‘Aḳiba said: He who takes a peruṭah from charity when not in need of it will not depart from this world before he falls in need of his fellow-men. He also said: He who wraps rag...
Ben ‘Azzai said: He whose mind is at ease because of his learning,1The knowledge which he acquired did not make him overbearing, but confirms him in his faith and helps him to live...
R. ‘Aḳiba said: A fence1The ‘fence’ is here taken in the sense of a safeguard or an aid to. With this paragraph, cf. Aboth 3:17. to honour is [the avoidance of] jesting,2That this ...
TEN MIRACLES WERE WROUGHT FOR OUR FATHERS IN JERUSALEM:1The current editions read ‘in the Temple’. This is an error, because the list of miracles wrought in the Temple is given lat...
R. SIMEON SAID: THERE ARE THREE CROWNS: THE CROWN OF THE TORAH, THE CROWN OF THE PRIESTHOOD, AND THE CROWN OF ROYALTY; BUT THE CROWN OF A GOOD NAME EXCELS THEM ALL.1Aboth 4:17 (Son...
The Targum's version of (Numbers 34) maps the Promised Land's borders with a level of geographic specificity that goes far beyond the Torah's terse boundary markers. The southern b...
Rabbi said: which is the straight path that a man should choose for himself? One which is an honor to the person adopting it, and [on account of which] honor [accrues] to him from ...
With ten utterances the world was created. And what does this teach, for surely it could have been created with one utterance? But this was so in order to punish the wicked who des...
Rabbi Akiba was standing by the shore when he witnessed something terrible. A man — someone Rabbi Akiba knew — fell into the sea. The waves swallowed him instantly. One moment he w...
Rabbi Tarfon was one of the wealthiest men among the sages, but he was famously reluctant to part with his money. He studied Torah with passion, observed every commandment with pre...
Rav Hisda used to hang an open purse at his doorpost so that anyone who needed money could take some without being seen. This detail, preserved in the Exempla of the Rabbis (compil...
A philosopher approached Rabban Gamliel with what he considered an unanswerable objection to the practice of charity. "How can you Jews give so freely to the poor?" the philosopher...
Mar Ukba was a man of extraordinary generosity, but his generosity had one absolute rule: the recipient must never know who gave. Every day, Mar Ukba would slip coins under the doo...
The Talmud (Bava Batra 11a) records a teaching that transformed how the sages understood the mechanics of divine reward: charity does not merely help the recipient — it literally s...
Nahum of Gamzu — the sage whose name became a proverb, because to every misfortune he would say "Gam zu l'tovah," "This too is for the good" — learned the cost of delayed charity t...
The Talmud in tractate Baba Batra (8a) records a teaching about almsgiving that medieval Jewish communities took very seriously — so seriously that it became the foundation for how...
Bar Kappara was walking along the seashore when he encountered the survivors of a shipwreck — strangers, soaked and shivering, with nothing but the clothes on their backs. They had...
The Angel of Death came to an inn — and found the innkeeper so stingy, so devoid of charity, that even the angel was disgusted. The story, preserved in medieval Jewish ethical coll...
Charity rewarded — the phrase appears throughout rabbinic literature because the sages considered it not a pious hope but a cosmic law. The Talmud (Taanit 24a, Jerusalem Talmud Hor...
"Cast your bread upon the waters, for you shall find it after many days" (Ecclesiastes 11:1). This verse became the foundation for one of the most frequently told stories in the Je...
Jewish tradition grapples with this very idea when it comes to the people of Israel. Are we a numbered nation, or something… more? Bamidbar Rabbah, a collection of Midrash (rabbini...
It all starts with the verse, "Bring the tribe of Levi near and stand it before Aaron the priest, and they shall serve him" (Numbers 3:5–6). This is where our sages begin to unpack...
Bamidbar Rabbah (5) dives deep into this, using the verse "Do not rob the impoverished as he is impoverished..." (Proverbs 22:22) as a springboard for profound ethical reflection. ...
We're going to unpack the rules surrounding the offerings brought at the conclusion of their period of separation. The verse we’re focusing on is (Numbers 6:19): “The priest shall ...
Bamidbar Rabbah 12, a section of the classic midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary)ic text, wrestles with this very question, using the construction of the Tabernacle – the mis...
The Bamidbar Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Numbers, explores this very idea through a verse from Job: "Who preceded Me, that I should repay? Everything ...
They believed every single letter, every seemingly insignificant word, held profound secrets. Take the very first verse of Genesis, Bereshit (בראשית): "In the beginning, God create...
The Book of Genesis touches on this very question, and the Rabbis of the Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary), never ones to shy away from a good debate, certainly had opinio...
Jewish tradition grapples with this very question, comparing different eras and communities that faced divine judgment. to some intense comparisons drawn from Bereshit Rabbah, a cl...
The Torah tells us he was "righteous in his generation" (Genesis 6:9). But what does that really mean? Bereshit Rabbah, a classic collection of rabbinic interpretations of Genesis,...
Bereshit Rabbah, a classic collection of rabbinic interpretations of the Book of Genesis, delves into this very idea, exploring how God’s mercy permeates everything. The verse from...
It all starts with God promising Abraham countless descendants: "Look now to the heavens, and count the stars, if you can count them… So will your offspring be." But it's the phras...
The Torah portion Vayera, and specifically (Genesis 18:19), offers a glimpse into this very idea: "For I love him, so that he will command his children and his household after him,...
That’s kind of the vibe we get from a fascinating passage in Bereshit Rabbah (49), a collection of rabbinic interpretations of the Book of Genesis. It centers around the verse in (...
The sages of the Midrash (rabbinic interpretive commentary), those brilliant interpreters of our sacred texts, really dug into this. Bereshit Rabbah, a classic collection of rabbin...
And guess what? It offers some pretty profound, and surprisingly practical, advice. Our jumping-off point is the book of Ecclesiastes (Kohelet) and its rather cryptic verse: "In th...
Our tradition is filled with stories that suggest it might. Today, we're diving into a few tales from Devarim Rabbah, a compilation of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Deuteronomy...
In Devarim Rabbah, a compilation of rabbinic teachings on the Book of Deuteronomy, we find a fascinating connection between looking after the Levites – members of the tribe of Levi...
It goes way beyond just being "fair." It's actually about a profound and intimate relationship between us and the Divine. Devarim Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic teachings on the ...
But what does it really mean? Kohelet Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic interpretations on the Book of Ecclesiastes, digs into this very question, using the verse from (Ecclesiastes...
The book of Ecclesiastes, or Kohelet as it's known in Hebrew, has something to say about that. "A handful of tranquility is better than two handfuls of toil and herding wind" (Eccl...
It turns out, that feeling has deep roots in Jewish thought. We find it beautifully expressed in (Ecclesiastes 4:9-12): “Two are better than one; because they have a good reward fo...
We all have. But in Jewish tradition, the words we speak – and the intentions behind them – carry immense weight. Kohelet Rabbah, a collection of rabbinic interpretations on the Bo...
It all starts with the verse from (Ecclesiastes 5:6): "So it is with a multitude of dreams and vanities and many words; rather, fear God.” The verse seems to be saying that too muc...
Could I do more?" The sages certainly wrestled with that feeling, and they had some pretty strong opinions about what happens when we ignore it. The Book of Ecclesiastes, or Kohele...
