Introduction to the Study of Torah

There is nothing more basic in Judaism than the study of Torah. Torah is the beginning of all other religious texts. It is the record of communication between God and Humanity. It stands above all other texts because it records what God expects from us. Since all texts can be connected to Torah, this is why the study of any Jewish text is also called “Torah”.

While almost every Jewish text can be called “Torah” because it derives its legitimacy from its connection to the the original scrolls, in its minimalist incarnation, Torah refers to the Five Books of Moses: Berayshit (known also by its English name – Genesis), Shemot (Exodus), Vayikra (Leviticus), Bamidbar (Numbers) and Devarim (Deuteronomy). It is the first of the three divisions of the Jewish Bible [called Tanach, an anacronym for Torah, Neviim (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings)]. Torah is considered the oldest of the three and the most holy although all three parts are considered holy books. As a legal text, Torah is comparable to the Constitution of the United States; it is the basic document of law that all subsequent laws must be able to have a direct line of connection to its words. The difference, of course, is the Constitution is a document written by human beings and therefore can be amended or rescinded. The Torah represents the word of God. To amend it or to rescind it would be to say that God made a mistake; a theological proposition that not only undermines the source of authority for the law, but calls into question the very foundation of Judaism. We don't say that God is wrong. God is right; the Torah is right and when we follow its laws, we are right too.

But as a law code, the Torah is woefully incomplete. For example there are many married people in the Torah but there is almost nothing about a marriage ceremony. The Torah provides for divorce by having a “sefer keritut” a document of separation prepared but it never spells out what that document should say. There is no good definition provided to ascertain the meaning of the word “Shabbat”. We are told that we cannot do “Melacha” on Shabbat, but melacha is not defined anywhere either. The usual word for “work” is “avoda;” what is the difference between avoda and melacha? The Torah gives us no clue. Laws in Shemot are repeated in Devarim but there are significant differences in the way the laws are written. What do the differences imply? Why are they different? What do we learn from these differences?

As a history book, the Torah is not much better. Some stories are clearly not told in chronological order. Were there two times Moses struck the rock to bring water to the people or are they really just one story? How many times does Moses go up and down Mt. Sinai before the Ten Commandments are given? What are we to make of the seven days of creation in the light of the billions of years of history on this planet? Why is there no other historical record anywhere of Abraham, Sarah, Moses, Aaron, Miriam, the Exodus or the conquest of Canaan? Are the stories of the Torah religious mythology or historical facts? How can we know for sure? How can we separate the fact from the myth?

If the Torah is not a law book or a historical record, then what is the purpose of this document? I look at it as a moral text. A text that teaches us what we are supposed to do at the many crossroads we encounter in our lives. Remember the story of George Washington and the cherry tree? Is that story historically true? Who knows? But the purpose of the story is to teach us that real leaders don't lie; a moral lesson not wasted on our children. The lives of the personalities in the Torah all point out lessons in how we should live our lives. The stories are true in the sense that they teach us truths about our world. Is the rest of the Torah historically true? Who knows? This does not mean that the Torah is misleading us. What it means is that we need to be careful not to make the Torah our guide for things that the Torah was never designed to teach. There may be some historical notes in the text and that the Torah gives us laws is undisputed. The purpose of these five books, however, to me seems to be more about moral lessons than about any specific aspect in the life of Jacob or Moses. It does not bother me that the Torah says the world was created in seven days and geology tells me something different. The Torah does not really care how many days creation took, what matters is what we learn from the creation story about how God acts in this world and what those actions mean for us.

There are anomalies in the text that point to a deeper issue. There are passages in the text that seem to indicate that the Torah is not one document. Scholars tell us that there may be four major documents that make up the text of Torah as it has been handed to us today. These documents were not created at the same time but in very different time periods in Jewish history. For some people this idea of different documents borders on heresy. This “documentary hypothesis” sees the text of the Torah more as the work of humanity and not a text that God handed to us on Mt. Sinai. This hypothesis has been around for centuries but only in the twentieth century were scholars able to speak about it without worrying about religious censors. It is unfortunate that the early scholars of this hypothesis were anti-Semites looking for a way to de-legitimize the Jewish bible. The evidence today is pretty clear about the fact of the different documents, but scholars still argue over which passages are to be included in one document or the other. An extraordinary introduction to this hypothesis can be found in the first chapter of the book, “Who Wrote The Bible” by Richard Freedman.

So can the Bible still be divine if it was written by human beings? I think so, but we will have to be a bit more particular about what we mean by a divine text. What does it mean to have a divine text? What inspired human beings to write these texts? Where does creativity come from? What guided the hand of the “redactor” who put the different documents into the five books we have today? Just how would an infinite God put pen to parchment to write a book? What could be better than human hands following divine instructions? I may not know how God got into these “books” but I do know that God is in there and that is why I study the Torah so diligently.

I am not the first one to comment on Torah, nor am I the last. The study of Torah is what I call “The longest running classroom discussion in the history of the world.” My comment is designed for everyone to add their own comments. This blog is a discussion not a lecture. So feel free to challenge me, question me and argue with me. Let me just share with you some of my Torah learning resources.

The Torah has its origins in Hebrew. The more biblical Hebrew you know, the deeper you will understand the text. The best modern Hebrew texts are from the Jewish Publication Society (JPS) and Koren Publications in Israel. You will need a Hebrew text from time to time to see the words in the Hebrew; I can only hint at the issues when I am writing in English.

The best English translation I believe is the JPS translation. Shocken Books also has a translation that is good, that was translated by Everett Fox. There are two JPS translations, one that dates back to 1919 and the other from the 1960's. The newer one is called the “new” JPS translation and that is the one I use (sometimes it is noted as NJPS).

Jews NEVER just read the text of the Torah. There are centuries of commentary on the Torah and that too is now part of the “text” of Torah. Different commentaries have different agendas. Scholarly commentaries focus on literary style, historical comparisons and cross references to other books, Jewish and non-Jewish. JPS has a five volume commentary. Soncino has a one volume that is a survey of the classic Jewish commentators. JPS also has a “Jewish Study Bible” that is used in college courses. All of these are good resources. JPS and the Rabbinical Assembly put out a one volume commentary called Etz Hayim that includes not only a survey of the JPS commentary but other modern commentaries that speak to the moral and legal issues the text raises. It includes extensive essays in the back that cover other aspects of the Bible and Jewish life. This is one of the best commentaries of the 21^st century.

Many individuals have penned Bible commentaries that speak to the issues in their day. The classic commentary is by Rashi but there are others by Sforno, ibn Ezra and Abravanel that speak to the Jews of France, Spain and the Provence. The modern commentaries of S.R. Hirsch and Joseph Hertz speak to the needs of the Jewish community in the 19^th and 20^th centuries. Those who are interested in modern Orthodox commentaries that do not include references to historical or documentary issues, can use the Stone commentary. It is a good idea to consider a number of commentaries before asking your own questions and trying to put together an answer. You don't need to own all these books but finding a Jewish library with them in it will make your study easier and more fulfilling.

Finally, try not to come to the text armed only with what you remember from religious school years ago. Our minds may not remember the stories correctly, we may have learned them wrong or we may have learned them based on later commentators and not on what the text actually says. There are parts of the Bible that are considered too “racy” for young children and somehow we never get around to talking about the adult parts of the text. We will look at the text in Hebrew and English and try to understand it by getting past the usual explanations and stories that are mere excuses for serious difficulties in the text. The text itself has many levels of meaning and we will try to explore these texts on all of these levels.

Now we are ready to start at the “beginning”.

Hello Again

It has been a while since I last posted to this site. I have not forgotten which negative commandment comes next, nor have I abandoned the blog. These past months have  been a time of reassessing what I want to accomplish with this forum. For eight years now I have written about Liturgy, Halacha, Mishna and Mitzvot. There are still plenty of topics to cover but the world of Jewish education has changed over the years, and I have changed over the years as well. What started out as a new opportunity for me to teach a wider Jewish audience, is now in need of a facelift. I dedicated this forum to the memory of my father after his death and one of the many legacies he left me was never to be afraid to reinvent myself.
In 2003 blogging was new and exciting. Today we live in a world of Facebook, Twitter and Google+. In 2003 Jewish education was built around religious school and day school. Now we have Hebrew language charter schools, home schooling and private tutors. The world of Jewish education grapples with parents who are much older when they start having children and who don't see themselves as part of the world of the synagogue anymore. If you are a follower of my other blog, "Jewish Common Sense" you know that even the very essence of the synagogue is changing. If the synagogue is the primary location of Jewish education, then how can these changes impact the way we deliver information about our faith?
I find myself grappling more and more with theology. What do we know about God? What difference does our understanding of God have in our lives? How does prayer, meditation and spirituality fit into this picture? I have been writing about Mitzvot for a long time but I never thought to talk about the whole notion of what it means to be commanded; a challenge made by the chancellor of the Jewish Theological Seminary a few years ago and a topic I have been teaching as part of my adult studies seminars.
Now you see why I have not written for awhile. I have been contemplating not only this blog, but the very foundation of what I am trying to share with my students. Over the past months I have taught bible in a new way, spent ten days on a silent retreat, began to prepare for my first lessons in the field of mysticism and offered my synagogue students the chance to explore in a deeper manner, the latest discussions in understanding about what we mean when we talk about God.
In one way or the other, it all goes back to how we understand Torah. What is the nature of these five books? What did they mean to our ancestors and how do we learn from these words today? I hope to use this blog to travel, chapter by chapter through the Torah and share with you some of the insights I have learned from my teachers, colleagues and students.
Forgive me if I do not complete the study of Mitzvot. I hope to make this new venture a chance to go back to the source of all that is Jewish, to learn not only Mitzvot but the entire range of what Judaism has to offer us as individuals, as Jews and as human beings.
I hope you will find this new journey interesting and compelling and that you will want to share your ideas and comments as well.

14-5771 Mitzvah N-109

Torat Emet
14-5771 Mitzvah N-109
02/28/11

Negative Mitzvah 109 – This is a negative commandment: do not redeem the firstling of a pure (kosher) animal.
Hafetz Hayim – As Scripture says: “but the firstling of an ox... you shall not redeem” (Numb. 18:17). At the time that the Sanctuary is not in existence, it is permissible to sell it; but the buyer has to treat it in accordance with the holiness of a firstborn animal. As for a firstling with a disfiguring defect, it is permissible to sell it, whether it be alive or ritually slaughtered, provided it is not sold at the meat-market. This is in effect, everywhere and in every time for both men and women.
This is also not a law for vegetarians or vegans.



The law of the Torah is that the firstborn of kosher animals is to be sacrificed on the alter. Parts of the animal are then eaten by the priests who are officiating. The rest is burned on the alter. Non-kosher animals were not permitted to be sacrificed and they had to be redeemed so that they could be used for other purposes. The owner would pay a priest a set price and the animal would lose its sanctity as a first born. Kosher animals had to be sacrificed and could not be redeemed. They belonged to the priests. (The firstborn son is also holy and must be redeemed; this is the origin of the Pidyon HaBen ceremony). If the firstborn animal had a defect that would not permit it to be sacrificed, then that animal was to be redeemed and the money paid to a priest. We should see this as a livestock “tax” that was paid to the priests from the firstborn of cattle (oxen, sheep and goats).
That was the law if the Temple was still in existence. Since the Temple was destroyed, the animals can no longer be sacrificed and therefore we need to handle them differently. The rule here is that we are permitted to sell a firstborn animal, but a Jew who buys it should not put it to work like any other beast of burden. It is a holy animal and should not be plowing or threshing. If the animal has a defect it can be sold and used as normal. One can use it for personal consumption but should not sell it for its meat to a butcher. This is how it is handled differently from other animals.
I must admit that this is not a mitzvah that is of use to anyone other than those engaged in animal husbandry. This would be a special area of Jewish Law and I am not an authority in this area. It is interesting how these firstborn animals were handled differently in ancient times and how we should handle them differently today. I don't see any reason to go into this in more detail than we have.

13-5771 Mitzvah N-108

Torat Emet
13-5771 Mitzvah N-108
02/15/11

Negative Mitzvah 108– This is a negative commandment: do not slay ritually both a pure [kosher] animal and its young in one day.

Hafetz Hayim – As Scripture says: “And whether it is a cow or a ewe, you shall not slay it and its young both in one day” (Lev. 22:28). If someone transgressed and did ritually slay them, the meat is kosher [permissible]. The day follows the night [a day is reckoned from sunset to sunset]; therefore if a person ritually slew the mother-animal at the beginning of the night of the fourth day of the week, he should not slay the young until the beginning of the fifth day. But if he slew the mother-animal toward the end of the fourth day, he may ritually slay the young at the beginning of the night of the fifth. This is in effect, everywhere and in every time for both men and women.

This is not a law for vegetarians or vegans. The law is pretty straight forward; we are not permitted to kill a mother-animal and her young on the same day. If you make a mistake and do it, you have sinned, but the meat is still kosher and it is permitted to be eaten. A day,for the purpose of this law is not twenty-four hours from the first slaughter. One has to wait until the next sunset before the second animal can be killed.

It is interesting to me that there is no punishment listed for those who violate this law. I suppose that there is no point in wasting the meat as long as it has been killed properly, but the person who has killed mother-animal and her young on the same day clearly has no heart for the suffering of animals and has a pretty cruel attitude about his or her work. Just because one makes a living slaughtering animals for food, this does not allow that person to become cruel or indifferent. We are obligated by Jewish Law to alleviate the pain for animals.

There is a story about Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi who was walking on the street when a calf who was being led to slaughter ran from the man who bought her and hid under the Rabbi's cloak and mooed mournfully. Rabbi Yehuda returned the calf to the owner saying to the calf, “Go, for this you were created.” The story concludes that Rabbi was afflicted with a horrible illness for this act of cruelty to the animal. He suffers for many years until he, from his sickbed, speaks up for some mice in his home. For this act of kindness, he was cured. Judaism takes kindness to animals very seriously. Caring for animals is the first step in learning kindness to other people.

12-5771 Mitzvah N-107

Torat Emet
12-5771 Mitzvah N-107
01/17/11

Negative Mitzvah 107– This is a negative commandment: do not sow two kinds of seeds in a field.

Hafetz Hayim – As Scripture says: “you shall not sow your field with two kinds of seed” (Lev. 19:19). In lands other than Israel, a Jew is permitted initially, from the start, to sow two kinds of seeds together. As for mixed kinds of trees, which means grafting an etrog tree onto an apple tree, or anything similar, it is forbidden in the other lands as well. So too, it is forbidden to graft a tree onto a vegetable or a vegetable onto a tree, even in other lands. However, with both mixed kinds of seeds and mixtures of trees, even though a violation of the law is committed thereby, their produce is nevertheless permitted to be eaten, even by the one who did the forbidden act. As for mixtures of a vineyard (which means planting grain in a vineyard), it is forbidden to sow them, eat their produce or derive any benefit from them – in other lands, by the law of the Sages; and in the Land of Israel, by the law of the Torah.

Here we have to think like a farmer. There are so many acres of land that are ready to produce food. Clearly we want to use as much of the land as possible. By planting a mixture of different crops, we can not only feed our family but also have a hedge against the failure of any one crop. The problem is that the Torah forbids us from certain kinds of planting. We can plant one area with wheat, one area with barley and one with oat. But we can't mix these grains together in one field. The problem here is not grafting, we are not talking about hybrid grains. This is just not a proper way for Jews to plant grains. The law applies only in the Land of Israel.

Grafting trees is the issue in the second part, since it does not matter if you plant different trees close to one another. Here the problem is creating hybrid fruits or vegetables. While Jews should not be doing these kinds of plantings, there is, significantly, no punishment for those who do the grafting nor is there a prohibition against using the hybrid fruits. The prohibition applies both in Israel and in other lands.

In a vineyard, one might think to use the space between the vines to grow grain. After all the vines are above so the grain could grow below. This is also forbidden. And if it is done, then the fruit of both grain and vine are forbidden to be eaten, sold or used in any way that the grower could derive a benefit.

So the question is, “Why?” Why are we forbidden to mix seeds? This is one of three laws in this one verse (Leviticus 19:19) which includes the prohibition of mating cattle with different animals and wearing cloth of two different materials (linen and wool). These laws are part of the priestly legislation that are very concerned with keeping things pure and preventing “impurity”. This law of “mixture” falls under a category of laws, in Judaism, called “Hukkim” or “laws that have no apparent logical explanation”. We are commanded to obey these laws, not because we understand them, but because God gave them to us. Etz Hayim, the Bible commentary published by the Rabbinical Assembly, USCJ and JPS, notes that, in Conservative Judaism, we accept hukkim when they do not affect us morally. When they do affect our moral sense, we reserve the right to challenge and change the law; challenging the Torah to be morally consistent in its laws (p. 697 comment on verse 19). These laws about “mixture” don't seem to have any moral issues associated with them so they stand as written.

There are number of commentators who try to find meaning in these “unexplainable” laws and their answers are interesting, midrashic in nature, explaining after the fact why such a division of species is a good idea. The Torah seems to be teaching that we have limits in how we can change nature. The Sages may limit these mixtures by location and species but the fundamental meaning behind them is unknown. Modern anthropologists have tried to make sense of these laws in Judaism and in other cultures with mixed results (eg: Mary Douglas, Purity and Danger). The reasons behind these laws still remains unclear and when we take up farming, we are bound by these purity laws.

11-5771 Mitzvah N-106

Torat Emet
11-5771 Mitzvah N-106
12/29/2010

Negative Mitzvah 106– This is a negative commandment: do not eat the kind of food eaten by a wayward and rebellious son

Hafetz Hayim – As Scripture says: “You shall not eat over blood.” (Lev. 19:26). Which is understood to mean “you are not permitted to eat the kind of meal that leads to bloodshed.” that is, the food eaten by a wayward and rebellious son. This verse of Scripture is also an injunction not to eat any flesh of an animal before its life expires. And it is also an injunction not to take any food before we pray. This is in force everywhere, in every time, for both men and women.

The wayward and rebellious son is a son who will not listen to his parents and who is totally out of control. The Torah declares that the parents should bring their son before the court and declare that their son is out of control. If the court agrees, then the son is liable for the death penalty. The Sages of the Talmud are so appalled by this law that they go to great lengths to limit it. After all, what kind of parent would come before a court to testify against their son in a capital offense? A minor is not responsible for his actions and an adult would not be responsible to his parents. So the Sages limited this law to the few months between 12 and 13 years of age when a child may be between childhood and adulthood. Later Sages declared that this law was never actually used; that it was written as a warning to children to listen to their parents.

For our purposes, the definition of a wayward and rebellious son was that he would eat meat at an inappropriate time and his parents could not stop him. ( It could also involve drinking, but that is not the direction of this Mitzvah). In ancient times, meat was only eaten on special occasions and to eat meat at other times was a waste of meat since a whole animal would have to be killed and one person could not eat it all. There was no way to preserve the rest of the meat so it was a great waste and a real act of rebellion to eat meat when others were not eating (which they might do on a holiday or other celebratory meal). This Mitzvah, therefore, tells us not to eat like a wayward or rebellious son and eat meat indiscriminately allowing the leftovers to be wasted.

Because this is a rather limited use of this Mitzvah, and because it is only a hypothetical case (according to the Talmud it never happened in history), there are other meanings associated with this verse. Since the Torah tells us that “blood is the life” of an animal, we can also use this verse to prohibit not only the blood of a properly slaughtered animal, but also to prohibit the blood of an animal that has not yet died. This too is a rather limited situation; the animal is, after all dying and will be dead in a little while. Instead of listing this law here, we may be able to include this lesson in the law that prohibits eating a limb from a living animal. As the first two reasons seem to be very limited in their application, this may be the reason why there is a third lesson to be learned from this verse, the lesson that we should not eat before we have prayed.

I am not sure how the Sages make the connection from the rebellious son to the requirement to pray before we eat. I can see that they might learn it from the fact that there are blessings recited when slaughtering an animal and that might cover the time between the slaughter and eating. I can imagine that this could also refer back to the wayward and rebellious son who, they speculate, eats before he prays (if he didn’t, he would not be rebellious). I am just not sure how they made this connection. It is the rule, however, not to eat breakfast until after reciting the prayers of Shacharit.

10-5771 Mitzvah N-105

Torat Emet

10-5771 Mitzvah N-105

12/20/10

Negative Mitzvah 105– This is a negative commandment: eat no fruit of a tree in the three first years since its planting

Hafetz Hayim – As Scripture says: “three years it shall be as forbidden to you; it shall not be eaten” (Lev. 19:23). Even what is doubtfully (not certainly) orlah, fruit of the first three years, is forbidden. In lands other than Israel, there is a law given to Moses orally at Sinai that what is certainly orlah is forbidden, while fruit that is doubtfully orlah is permissible. Over certain, indisputable orlah in the Land of Israel, whiplashes are deserved; while in other countries one should be flogged with whiplashes of disobedience.

This is in force everywhere, in every time , for both men and women.

I see this law of “orlah” as similar to the eight day waiting period for Brit Milah, and for the time a calf can remain with the mother before being eligible for sacrifice. Just because we have something, does not mean that we can do what we please. These perhaps are “first born fruit” that belong to God just as the firstborn of the herd and the first born of the flock belong to God. In any event, the Torah is explicit that the first fruits cannot be eaten. But that is only one level of this Mitzvah. The Hafetz Hayim gives us much more to ponder as he explains orlah.

The first difference is between orlah in Israel and orlah outside of Israel. In both locations we cannot eat the fruit of a tree in the first three years after planting. But three years is a long time. We can forget exactly when we planted the tree or whether this was the new tree or if it was a completely different tree. We could be doubtful if we are holding fruits from the new tree or if they are mixed up with fruits from older trees. What happens when we are not sure that the fruit we have is orlah or not?

If we are in the Land of Israel, we treat fruit that we are unsure of as if they are orlah and we refrain from eating them. This is a strict law that only applies to the Land of Israel. Outside of Israel, fruits that are certainly orlah cannot be eaten, but fruits that are doubtful, can be eaten. The rules about fruit outside of Israel is not in the written Torah but is claimed to be a law from the Oral Torah, the law that Moses was taught while he was up on Mt. Sinai for 40 days and nights. This Oral Torah eventually will become the Mishna and the Talmud. The Rabbis see both the Written Torah and the Oral Torah as having equal standing under the law. Yet here, the punishment violating the law differs between Israel and the diaspora. When one is certain about the status of orlah, and uses it anyway, in Israel such a person is flogged as one who violated a biblical command. Outside of Israel, the biblical command is not in force, but the Rabbis commanded that the person be flogged for disobeying a rabbinic ordinance. This is a different kind of flogging, one that is not the formal punishment of the court but one that is used to insure compliance with rabbinic law. These whippings are not tied to the same formal rules as the biblical flogging but were still limited to 39 lashes in most cases.