[This is from our MUST READ/MUST OWN book titled: Pentateuch and Haftarahs, ed. Dr. J.H.Hertz; highlights and reformatting added.] ———————- Ruth Jack M. Sasson The literary analysis of Ruth differs significantly for those who treat it as a folktale with an earlier, oral form and for those who examine the fine elaboration of its literate narrative […]
Read more[As former Messianics with opportunities to teach Bible, we used to connect many details in the “Old” Testament with the “New” (supposedly updated and not simply a continuation of the former), and particularly the ‘ministry’ of Jesus as the Christian Messiah/Savior/Son-God. One question we would ask of our students: “Why do you think Jesus […]
Read more[The privilege of the first-born . . . still exists to this day in families of most if not all cultures, prominent in royal families where the first child if specifically male, becomes the successor to the throne. Surely this ‘privilege’ is rooted in the Hebrew Scriptures, in the pronouncements of YHWH in these very […]
Read more[And so the census begins, according to tribe. The head count of each tribal group runs into not a few thousands but huge numbers which is mindboggling when you think that this is only a segment of the population that left Egypt. If one man or one family ventured out into the wilderness and tried […]
Read more[In addition to the commentary from Pentateuch & Haftarahs, ed. Dr. J.H. Hertz, we are adding commentary from The Torah for Dummies by Arthur Kurzweil which he calls “A Reference for the Rest of Us!” This book, while teaching Torah, also updates readers on rabbinical interpretation of their Scriptures, thereby giving us a glimpse into one major world religion— […]
Read more[When we first read this book and discovered that only male Israelites were included in the ‘census’, the women among us understandably took offense. We had already soured over the fact that the practice of having multiple wives and concubines was tolerated in the patriarchal culture of YHWH’s chosen people, the worst record being the […]
Read more[This INTRODUCTION is from Pentateuch & Haftarahs, ed. Dr. J.H. Hertz.] THE BOOK OF NUMBERS NAME. The oldest name for the fourth book of the Pentateuch is ‘the Fifth of the Musterings’; i.e., that one of the five of Moses which describes the numbering of the Israelites. Later it came to be known by the fourth word in […]
Read more[When a commentator chooses to lump two books together in one study, there must be good reason. And that might be because the connection between the two books is established since Shophtiym/Judges demonstrates the immediate albeit unexpected consequences of taking possession of the ‘promised’ Land as narrated in detail in Yahushuwah’/Joshua—-consequences that are quite disappointing […]
Read more[This is from Pentateuch & Haftarahs.] TABLE OF PROHIBITED MARRIAGES In Force Among Jews To-Day A man may not marry:— A woman may not marry:— (a) His mother, grandmother, and ascendants; the mother of his grandfather; his stepmother, the wife of his paternal grandfather, and of his ascendants; and the wife of his maternal grandfather. […]
Read moreD. THOU SHALT LOVE THY NEIGBOUR AS THYSELF Leviticus XIX, 18 The ‘Golden Rule’ in Judaism. The world at large is unaware of the fact that this comprehensive maxim of morality –the golden rule of human conduct—was first taught by Judaism. No less a thinker than John Stuart Mill expressed his surprise that it […]
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