Midrash is expansive Jewish Biblical exegesis using a rabbinic mode of interpretation prominent in the Talmud. The word itself means "textual interpretation", "study", or "exegesis", derived from the root verb darash (דָּרַשׁ), which means "resort to, seek, seek with care, enquire, require".
The Torah is the compilation of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, namely the books of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy. In Christianity, the Torah is also known as the Pentateuch or the Five Books of Moses. In Rabbinical Jewish tradition it is also known as the Written Torah. If meant for liturgic purposes, it takes the form of a Torah scroll. If in bound book form, it is called Chumash, and is usually printed with the rabbinic commentaries.
The Talmud is, after the Hebrew Bible, the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (halakha) and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the centerpiece of Jewish cultural life and was foundational to "all Jewish thought and aspirations", serving also as "the guide for the daily life" of Jews.
Rabbinic literature, in its broadest sense, is the entire spectrum of works authored by rabbis throughout Jewish history. The term typically refers to literature from the Talmudic era, as opposed to medieval and modern rabbinic writings. It aligns with the Hebrew term Sifrut Chazal, which translates to “literature [of our] sages” and generally pertains only to the sages (Chazal) from the Talmudic period. This more specific sense of "Rabbinic literature"—referring to the Talmud, Midrashim, and related writings, but hardly ever to later texts—is how the term is generally intended when used in contemporary academic writing. The terms mefareshim and parshanim almost always refer to later, post-Talmudic writers of rabbinic glosses on Biblical and Talmudic texts.
Torah study is the study of the Torah, Hebrew Bible, Talmud, responsa, rabbinic literature, and similar works, all of which are Judaism's religious texts. According to Rabbinic Judaism, the study is done for the purpose of the mitzvah ("commandment") of Torah study itself.
ArtScroll is an imprint of translations, books and commentaries from an Orthodox Jewish perspective published by Mesorah Publications, Ltd., a publishing company based in Rahway, New Jersey. Rabbi Nosson Scherman is the general editor.
Genesis Rabbah is a religious text from Judaism's classical period, probably written between 300 and 500 CE with some later additions. It is a midrash comprising a collection of ancient rabbinical homiletical interpretations of the Book of Genesis.
Elia Levita, also known as Elijah Levita, Elias Levita, Élie Lévita, Elia Levita Ashkenazi, Eliahu Levita, Eliyahu haBahur, Elye Bokher, was a Renaissance Hebrew grammarian, scholar, and poet. He was the author of the Bovo-Bukh, the most popular chivalric romance written in Yiddish. Living for a decade in the house of Cardinal Giles of Viterbo, he was one of the foremost teachers of Christian clergy, nobility, and intellectuals in Hebrew and in Jewish mysticism during the Renaissance.
Tkhines or teḥinot may refer to Yiddish prayers and devotions, usually personal and from a female viewpoint, or collections of such prayers. They were written for Ashkenazi Jewish women who, unlike the men of the time, typically could not read Hebrew, the language of the established synagogue prayer book. They were most popular from the 1600s to the early 1800s, with the first major collection of tkhines, the Seyder Tkhines, being printed in 1648. Unlike Hebrew prayers, tkhines dealt with issues specific to women. Despite being for women, it is thought that many tkhines were written by men and the authorship of most tkhines is often difficult to establish, due to multiple publications of the same tkhine and the use of pseudonyms.
Chumash is a Torah in printed in book bound form as opposed to a Torah scroll.
A Mikraot Gedolot, often called a "Rabbinic Bible" in English, is an edition of the Hebrew Bible that generally includes three distinct elements:
Hebrew Bible English translations are English translations of the Hebrew Bible (Tanakh) according to the Masoretic Text, in the traditional division and order of Torah, Nevi'im, and Ketuvim. Most Jewish translations appear in bilingual editions (Hebrew–English).
Soncino Press is a Jewish publishing company based in the United Kingdom that has published a variety of books of Jewish interest, most notably English translations and commentaries to the Talmud and Hebrew Bible. The Soncino Hebrew Bible and Talmud translations and commentaries were widely used in both Orthodox and Conservative synagogues until the advent of other translations beginning in the 1990s.
Jewish commentaries on the Bible are biblical commentaries of the Hebrew Bible from a Jewish perspective. Translations into Aramaic and English, and some universally accepted Jewish commentaries with notes on their method of approach and also some modern translations into English with notes are listed.
Shnayim mikra ve-echad targum, is the Jewish practice of reading the weekly Torah portion in a prescribed manner. In addition to hearing the Torah portion read in the synagogue, a person should read it himself twice during that week, together with a translation usually by Targum Onkelos and/or Rashi's commentary. In addition, while not required by law, there exists an Ashkenazi custom to also read the portion from the Prophets with its targum.
Koren Publishers Jerusalem is an Israeli publisher of Jewish religious texts. It was established in 1961 by Eliyahu Koren, with the aim of publishing the first Hebrew Bible designed, edited, printed, and bound by Jews in nearly 500 years. It produced The Koren Bible in 1962, The Koren Siddur in 1981, and the Koren Sacks Siddur in 2009, in addition to numerous editions of these books and other religious texts in Hebrew, English, and other languages.
In the early part of the sixteenth century, there were already attempts to translate the Bible into Yiddish, including Hebrew-Yiddish biblical dictionaries. One of the most authoritative was the Bible that Jekuthiel Blitz translated in 1678.
Ancient Hebrew writings are texts written in Biblical Hebrew using the Paleo-Hebrew alphabet before the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE.
Harry Mordecai Freedman was a rabbi, author, translator, and teacher. Among his more famous contributions are his translations done for several tractates of the Talmud, Midrash Rabbah, and Encyclopedia Talmudit.
Vaybertaytsh or mashket, is a semi-cursive script typeface for the Yiddish alphabet. From the 16th until the early 19th century, the mashket font distinguished Yiddish publications, whereas Hebrew square script were used for classical texts in Hebrew and Aramaic, and "Rashi" script for rabbinic commentaries and works in Ladino.
