Download or read book Ibn Ezra s Commentary on the Pentateuch Exodus Shemot written by Abraham ben Meïr Ibn Ezra and published by . This book was released on 1988 with total page 800 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Commentary of Abraham Ibn Ezra on the Pentateuch Deuteronomy written by Abraham ben Meïr Ibn Ezra and published by KTAV Publishing House, Inc.. This book was released on 2003 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Border Interrogations written by Benita Sampedro and published by Berghahn Books. This book was released on 2008 with total page 282 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Under the current cartographies of globalism, where frontiers mutate, vacillate, and mark the contiguity of discourse, questioning the Spanish border seems a particularly urgent task. The volume engages a wide spectrum of ambivalent regions-subjects that currently are, or have been seen in the past, as spaces of negotiation and contestation. However, they converge in their perception of the "Spanish" nation-space as a historical and ideological construct that is perpetually going through transformations and reformations. This volume advocates the position that intellectual responsibility must lead us to engage openly in the issues underlying current social and political tensions.

Download or read book Encounters of the Children of Abraham from Ancient to Modern Times written by Antii Laato and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2010-09-14 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Christianity, Judaism and Islam - the Children of Abraham - constitute the spiritual foundations of Western civilization. They affect the interactions of entire nations and individuals, though their history is often understood as one of conflict and controversy. The present volume documents past encounters and confrontations, though it also shows that the history of the three faiths is not merely one of conflict but also one of co-existence and dialogue. The rich shared theological traditions of the Abrahamic religions provide positive encouragement to present-day meetings between their followers. The book contains 16 contributions by scholars from various fields of religious studies. It should appeal to everyone interested in interreligious encounters.

Download or read book The Exodus Itinerary Sites written by Michael D. Oblath and published by Peter Lang. This book was released on 2004 with total page 308 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Israelite exodus from Egypt forms the foundational national origin narrative in the Hebrew Bible. Although it is a compelling and popular tale, only minimal supportive circumstantial evidence exists beyond the Bible. In this book Michael D. Oblath details the geographical context within which the Hebrew Bible was written. With this backdrop, he presents the geographical conceptualization of the exodus as described by the biblical sources. Within their references to the various exodus itinerary sites, these sources consistently locate the sites in proximity to known geographical locations. Oblath indicates that, within the geographical memory of the biblical sources, the presupposition of an exodus from Egypt is incorrect. Rather, the narrative describes events originating in the southern region of ancient Israel, between the Negeb and the Gulf of Elath.

Download or read book Jews Bible and Prayer written by Stefan C. Reif and published by Walter de Gruyter GmbH & Co KG. This book was released on 2017-05-08 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In his articles Stefan Reif deas with Jewish biblical exegesis and the close analysis of the evolution of Jewish prayer texts. Some fourteen of these that appeared in various collective volumes are here made more easily available, together with a major new study of Numbers 13, an introduction and extensive indexes. Reif attempts to establish whether there is any linguistic, literary and exegetical value in the traditional Jewish interpretation of the Hebrew Bible for the modern scientific approach to such texts and whether such an approach itself is always free of theological bias. He demonstrates how Jewish liturgical texts may illuminate religious teachings about wisdom, history, peace, forgiveness, and divine metaphors. Also clarified in these essays are notions of David, Greek and Hebrew, divine metaphors, and the liturgical use of the Hebrew Bible.

Download or read book Creating Judaism written by Michael L. Satlow and published by Columbia University Press. This book was released on 2006 with total page 355 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How can we define "Judaism," and what are the common threads uniting ancient rabbis, Maimonides, the authors of the Zohar, and modern secular Jews in Israel? Michael L. Satlow offers a fresh perspective on Judaism that recognizes both its similarities and its immense diversity. Presenting snapshots of Judaism from around the globe and throughout history, Satlow explores the links between vastly different communities and their Jewish traditions. He studies the geonim, rabbinical scholars who lived in Iraq from the ninth to twelfth centuries; the intellectual flourishing of Jews in medieval Spain; how the Hasidim of nineteenth-century Eastern Europe confronted modernity; and the post-World War II development of distinct American and Israeli Jewish identities. Satlow pays close attention to how communities define themselves, their relationship to biblical and rabbinic texts, and their ritual practices. His fascinating portraits reveal the amazingly creative ways Jews have adapted over time to social and political challenges and continue to remain a "Jewish family."

Download or read book Bearing Yhwh s Name at Sinai written by Carmen Joy Imes and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2023-06-21 with total page 233 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Name Command (NC) is usually interpreted as a prohibition against speaking Yhwh’s name in a particular context: false oaths, wrongful pronunciation, irreverent worship, magical practices, cursing, false teaching, and the like. However, the NC lacks the contextual specification needed to support the command as speech related. Taking seriously the narrative context at Sinai and the closest lexical parallels, a different picture emerges—one animated by concrete rituals and their associated metaphorical concepts. The unique phrase ns' shm is one of several expressions arising from the conceptual metaphor, election as branding, that finds analogies in high-priest regalia as well as in various ways of claiming ownership in the Ancient Near East, such as inscribed monuments, the use of seals, and the branding of slaves. The NC presupposes that Yhwh has claimed Israel by placing Yhwh’s own name on her. In this light, the first two commands of the Decalogue reinforce the two sides of the covenant declaration: “I will be your God; you will be my people.” The first expresses the demand for exclusive worship and the second calls for proper representation. As a consequence, the NC invites a richer exploration of what it means to be a people in covenant with Yhwh—a people bearing his name among the nations. It also points to what is at stake when Israel carries that name “in vain.” The image of bearing Yhwh’s name offers a rich source for theological and ethical reflection that cannot be conveyed nonmetaphorically without distortion or loss of meaning.

Download or read book The Torah Chumash Shemot The Book of Exodus written by and published by . This book was released on 2006 with total page 706 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book The Commentary of Abraham Ibn Ezra on the Pentateuch Leviticus written by Abraham ben Meïr Ibn Ezra and published by KTAV Publishing House, Inc.. This book was released on 1986 with total page 192 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Poet, Biblical commentator, grammarian, astronomer, mathematician--Abraham ibn Ezra was one of the most remarkable men of his time and one of the relatively few whose works have become the heritage of all those who wish to understand the Hebrew Bible properly. Ibn Ezra combined a passion for the plain sense of the verse with a reverence for the Rabbis as transmitters of reliable tradition. His most widely used works are his commentaries on the Torah, which are admired for their depth and penetration into the mysteries of the Hebrew language, the text of the Torah and the meaning of the mitzvot. Because of their many-faceted character and elusive language, his commentaries are often difficult to understand in their original Hebrew, and have thus inspired many super-commentaries. Here for the first time is an English translation of ibn Ezra's commentary on the Book of Leviticus, and the Book of Deuteronomy based on those super-commentaries, in a style which is both faithful to the original and yet enables those who wish to fathom his meaning to do so. An English rendering of Leviticus and Deuteronomy appears at the top of each page; the bottom of each page contains the translation of ibn Ezra's commentary. This volume includes and Appendix of astronomical units, and indices of Biblical and Talmudic references.

Download or read book The Arabic Translation and Commentary of Yefet ben Eli on the Book of Proverbs written by Ilana Sasson and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2016-05-30 with total page 546 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This volume contains a critical edition and an introduction to the Arabic translation and commentary on the book of Proverbs by one of the most acclaimed, innovative, and prolific exegetes of the Karaite “Golden Age” (10th-11th centuries), Yefet ben ‘Eli ha-Levi. Yefet’s commentary on Proverbs attests to his rationalistic and revisionist ideology and to his egalitarian approach. His work is an invaluable link in the history of interpretation of the book of Proverbs. This edition is accompanied by an introduction including a thorough study of Yefet’s style of writing compared with the Arabic model of his time, his hermeneutic devices contrasted with those of Saadiah Gaon and midrash, his theology in light of the doctrines of Islamic Mu‘tazila, and his polemics against various groups.

Download or read book Essential Torah written by George Robinson and published by Schocken. This book was released on 2006-10-31 with total page 621 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Whether you are studying the Bible for the first time or you're simply curious about its history and contents, you will find everything you need in this "accessible, well-written handbook to Jewish belief as set forth in the Torah" (The Jerusalem Post). George Robinson, author of the acclaimed Essential Judaism, begins by recounting the various theories of the origins of the Torah and goes on to explain its importance as the core element in Jewish belief and practice. He discusses the basics of Jewish theology and Jewish history as they are derived from the Torah, and he outlines how the Dead Sea Scrolls and other archaeological discoveries have enhanced our understanding of the Bible. He introduces us to the vast literature of biblical commentary, chronicles the evolution of the Torah’s place in the synagogue service, offers an illuminating discussion of women and the Bible, and provides a study guide as a companion for individual or group Bible study. In the book’s centerpiece, Robinson summarizes all fifty-four portions that make up the Torah and gives us a brilliant distillation of two thousand years of biblical commentaries—from the rabbis of the Mishnah and the Talmud to medieval commentators such as Rashi, Maimonides, and ibn Ezra to contemporary scholars such as Nahum Sarna, Nechama Leibowitz, Robert Alter, and Everett Fox. This extraordinary volume—which includes a listing of the Torah reading cycles, a Bible time line, glossaries of terms and biblical commentators, and a bibliography—will stand as the essential sourcebook on the Torah for years to come.

Download or read book Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh written by David Birnbaum and published by New Paradigm Matrix. This book was released on with total page 530 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The beating heart of all religious enterprise undertaken in the spiritof intellectual integrity is a riddle: how can a God who exists beyondthe ken of human beings—and outside of the spatial and temporalcoordinates that are the most basic of all factors that we bring to bearin our perception and evaluation of the world—how can such a Godbe known at all, let alone worshiped meaningfully?Classical Jewish sources approach the matter in different ways.The Bible, for example, takes a two-pronged approach, describingin some passages a God whom none can survive the experience ofseeing directly (Exodus 33:20) and with whom too close contact canphysically disfigure (Exodus 34:29), maim (Genesis 32:32), or evenkill (Leviticus 10:2), yet in others describing a God who appearsto individuals in a way that is neither terrifying nor inherentlydangerous. How to reconcile these contradictory approaches feelslike a serious desideratum, yet one left unaddressed by any biblicalauthor or text.But perhaps there is another way to approach the issue: couldthe contradiction be its own lesson, one intended to suggest thedifficulty—or even the near impossibility—that inheres in anyeffort at all to know God, or even to know of God? And, indeed,that lesson has an interesting concrete parallel in the description ofthe Holy of Holies, the inmost sanctum of the desert sanctuary in2 Martin S. Cohenwhich rested the Ark of the Covenant that held the tablets Mosesbrought down from Sinai (Deuteronomy 10:5, cf. 1 Kings 8:9). Thatspace was understood to be more intensely suffused with the presenceof the Almighty than any place on earth, but was also depicted as achamber without illumination of any sort other than the dim glowof the censor carried into it by the High Priest one single day of theyear. Could the resultant paradox—that the light of God’s presencein the world is imagined to exist most palpably in a room devoid oflight—be intended to suggest the challenge that inheres in the deephuman desire to know a God who cannot logically be known?In a certain sense, this very conundrum hides behind the oracularnature of the Bible itself: every single book of Scripture has the stampof prophecy imprinted on its text either explicitly or implicitly. Andthis is so despite the inherent impossibility of imagining how, if Godexists outside the limits of human perceptive consciousness, anythingabout God at all, let alone God’s own words, could ever successfullybe transmitted in any language rooted in human experience. Yet theBible, fully realized in human language, exists!And then there are the names of God themselves. The God ofIsrael appears throughout Scripture under many different names,which themselves also suggest this paradox of divine knowability andunknowability. Some of these names are widely known, while othersare obscure. Some appear to be built on Hebrew roots, while othersresist being analyzed linguistically. Some seem related to some specifickind of communion with the Divine, while others seem more alignedwith how people use their names to distinguish themselves from otherpeople—but without anyone supposing that the etymological root ofany individual’s name is a reliable indicator of that person’s characteror personality. In the end, the full collection of divine names bothilluminates and obscures, each one saying something of the God itnames but usually leaving more unstated than revealed.3 PrefaceThe title of this volume, Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh, is presented inScripture as a name of God. It appears in Scripture only once,at Exodus 3:14, where it has a mysterious feel that resists easyexplication, even though the words are not at all obscure linguisticallyand, indeed, can be taken as a straightforward sentence in relativelysimple Hebrew. Adding to the mystery, it also has a shorter form towhich Scripture alludes in the same verse (simply “Ehyeh”)—but itis not obvious if the long form is to be taken as an elaboration of thebasic shorter name or if the shorter name is merely an abbreviatedversion of the longer one. Nor is it clear how the narrative context ofthe passage sheds light on the meaning of the name, if it does: theEhyeh name is one of many things revealed by God to Moses at theburning bush, but it is not clear to what extent that name is tied tothat specific one of the prophet’s encounters with the Divine. Andit also seems noteworthy that both forms of the Ehyeh name (thelonger and the shorter one) appear only one time in all of Scripture;we never read of Moses obeying God’s direct command and actuallyusing that specific name when speaking to the people—a detail thatseems important, yet is neither resolved nor even noticed within thenarrative.Furthermore, there is something deeply suggestive of the divine“I” in the Ehyeh name—a detail that is lost in translation from theoriginal. Taken as a simple Hebrew verb, ehyeh is the imperfectfirst-person singular form of a common verbal root that generallydenotes existence or being: outside this specific context, the wordehyeh appears dozens of times in Scripture with the simple meaningof “I am” or “I shall be.” It therefore feels as though the Ehyeh nameshould suggest a deep level of intimacy with the Divine—the levelon which the relationship between Creator and created takes onsomething of the intimacy Buber described with his “I and Thou”terminology. But there are no biblical passages, even those describing4 Martin S. CohenGod as deeply involved in the lives of human beings, in which theEhyeh name is used to hint at a special level of closeness with theDivine. That too sounds as though it must be deeply meaningful…but what Scripture means by revealing a name suggestive of divineintimacy and then never using it is, again, a riddle. (Readers shouldnote that, in this volume, the Hebrew expression ehyeh asher ehyehis printed in italicized lower case letters, while the divine names“Ehyeh” and “Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” are printed in Roman type andwith upper case initial letters.)The authors of the essays in this volume have taken on thechallenge of explaining this unique Hebrew phrase. They are adiverse lot, who bring to their work training and backgrounds inmany different fields. But what they have in common is a singulardevotion to the written word as a powerful vehicle for the sharingof spiritual ideas. Our authors have strong opinions, but no efforthas been made to bring those opinions in line with each other or toharmonize them within this volume. I feel sure that most, perhapseven all, our authors are in agreement about many things, but themission of the Mesorah Matrix series is to demonstrate how richan experience it can be to read a whole book of essays written bythoughtful, intelligent, scholarly, and deeply spiritual people seekingto grow personally through the act of writing essays such as these…and willing to invite others into that growth experience by makingtheir work available to the reading public.Unless otherwise indicated, all translations here are the authors’own work. Biblical citations of “NJPS” refer to the completetranslation of Scripture published under the title Tanakh: The HolyScriptures by the Jewish Publication Society in Philadelphia in 1985.I would like to take this opportunity to acknowledge the othersenior editors of the Mesorah Matrix series, David Birnbaum andBenjamin Blech, as well as Saul J. Berman, our associate editor.5 PrefaceAs always, I must also express my gratitude to the men andwomen, and particularly to the lay leadership, of the synagogue Iserve as rabbi, the Shelter Rock Jewish Center in Roslyn, New York.Possessed of the unwavering conviction that their rabbi’s literaryprojects are part and parcel of his service to them and, through them,to the larger community of those interested in learning about Judaismthrough the medium of the well-written word, they are remarkablysupportive of my literary efforts as author and editor. I am in theirdebt and am pleased to acknowledge that debt formally here andwhenever I publish my own work or the work of others.

Download or read book The Murmuring Stories of the Priestly School written by David Frankel and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-09-03 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This book deals with the stories of Israelite complaint or murmuring in the wilderness found in the books of Exodus and Numbers that were composed and edited by the priesthood of ancient Israel. It discusses the significance of the theme of rebellion and complaint for the ancient priests and analyses the part they played in the development of the theme in the Pentateuch. After a general introduction on the theme of murmuring and on the Priestly School, the book goes on to analyze four major priestly texts: the manna story (Exodus 16); the story of the Scouts (Numbers 13-14); the story of the rebellions surrounding the figure of Korah (Numbers 16-17) and the story of the Waters of Merivah (Numbers 20). The significance of the book is two-fold. First, it develops a methodology that allows one to discriminate between early priestly narrative materials and later priestly editorial supplementation. Second, the work demonstrates the antiquity of the priestly narrative lore in the Pentateuch and the significant role which the priests played in creating and developing major narrative traditions in ancient Israel.

Download or read book The Exodus Itinerary Sites written by Michael David Oblath and published by . This book was released on 2001 with total page 596 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Download or read book Covenant and Conversation written by Jonathan Sacks and published by Maggid. This book was released on 2010 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this second volume of his long-anticipated five-volume collection of parashat hashavua commentaries, Rabbi Sir Jonathan Sacks explores these intersections as they relate to universal concerns of freedom, love, responsibility, identity, and destiny. Chief Rabbi Sacks fuses Jewish tradition, Western philosophy, and literature to present a highly developed understanding of the human condition under Gods sovereignty. Erudite and eloquent, Covenant Conversation allows us to experience Chief Rabbi Sacks sophisticated approach to life lived in an ongoing dialogue with the Torah.

Download or read book In the Image of God written by Judith S. Antonelli and published by Jason Aronson, Incorporated. This book was released on 1997-02-01 with total page 608 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the Image of God: A Feminist Commentary on the Torah is a unique blend of traditional Judaism and radical feminism and is a groundbreaking commentary on the Bible, the central document of Jewish life. Using classical Jewish sources as well as supplementary material from history, anthropology, sociology, psychology, ancient religion, and feminist theory, Judith Antonelli has examined in detail every woman and every issue pertaining to women in the Torah, parshah by parshah. The Torah is divided into fifty-four portions; each portion, or parshah, is read in the synagogue on the Sabbath (combining a few to make a yearly cycle of readings). This book is modeled on that structure; hence there are fifty chapters, each of which corresponds to a parshah. One may, therefore, read this book from beginning to end or use it as a study guide for the parshah of the week. The reader will discover in these pages that the Torah is not the root of misogyny, sexism, or male supremacy. Rather, by looking at the Torah in the context in which it was given, the pagan world of the ancient Near East, it becomes clear that far from oppressing women, the Torah actually improved the status of women as it existed in the surrounding societies. Not only does this book refute the common feminist stereotype that Judaism is a "patriarchal religion" but it also refutes the sexism found in Judaism by exposing it as sociological rather than "divine law."