The Mishnah adds further humiliation to the biblical sotah ritual for a suspected adulteress. Other rabbinic texts from the same period critique this expansion, as well as the gender inequality inherent in the ritual itself.
Prof.
Ishay Rosen-Zvi
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In halakha, the 39 melachot of Mishnah Shabbat 7:2 functions as a comprehensive list of primary categories of forbidden labor. A closer look at the list in context, however, reveals that it was composed and added as a supplement, to clarify a detail in the previous mishnah.
Prof. Rabbi
Judith Hauptman
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The Torah's program to democratize knowledge and create an educated laity.
Prof. Rabbi
Jeffrey Tigay
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An ancient Yelamdeinu Rabbeinu homily connects the covenantal nature of the prohibition to write down the Oral Law, and recite the Written Torah orally, to a novel reading of Gen 18:17-19: God’s choice of Abraham and his descendants to be exclusive participants in God’s own mystery cult.
Dr.
Shayna Sheinfeld
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Bringing wood for the altar was an important celebration in Second Temple times. To ground this practice in the Torah, Nehemiah (10:35) describes it as a Torah law, while the Temple Scroll (11Q19) and the Reworked Pentateuch (4Q365) include it in their biblical festival calendar.
Dr.
Alex P. Jassen
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