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Besides writing Torah Scrolls, the scribe also writes several other holy objects, as I shall describe. The first of these that I shall discuss is the Tefillin. The Tefillin are bound on the arm, opposite the heart, and on the head, symbolizing the...
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The tefillin are a beautiful mitzvah (actually two, as the hand tefillin and head tefillin constitute two separate mitzvot.) Surprisingly, the Talmud puts what would seem to be disproportional emphasis on this precept. "The skull that has not...
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When I lived in Israel, I often got around by hitchhiking (what the Israelis call "tremping"). Once, I got a ride with a man who looked at me and said "Hey, aren't you the tefillin expert? What do you think of the guy with the new kind of...
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The divergent opinions as to the correct order of the Tefillin passages, while seemingly a minor detail, did in fact threaten the unity of the Jewish people. One view was clearly right, one clearly wrong, but which one was which? Although custom...
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In my last post, I described the two views concerning the order of the Torah passages in the Tefillin. Although most Orthodox Jews, even if they only wear RASHI's Tefiilin, are aware that there exists the alternative view of Rabbenu Tam, there...
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The Torah commands that we write "these words" on the doorposts of your homes, and upon your gates".(Deuteronomy 6:9). This has come down to us through the Oral Torah as meaning that a parchment scroll, hand written with intent (like a Torah...
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When I lived in Israel, I met a a neighbor's wife on a bus going from the Beit El settlement, where we lived, to Jerusalem. I asked her what she was going to do in Jerusalem. She informed me that she was taking a course to become a "to'entet"; a...
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Rabbi Nachman, commenting on the Talmudic dictum that the Torah was meant to be given after one thousand generations, but was, in fact, given after twenty six generations, because of "arrogant people", as follows:The world was created in "Ten...
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The "Hora'at Sha'ah" (ruling for the hour), is a provision in Jewish Law that allows a prophet, a beit din(court) or even a community rabbi, to decide that in extraordinary situations, a law, even a Biblical law, could be set aside for a greater...
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I have written several times in the past about the centrality of Deuteronomy 17:5-13, which is the very foundation of the Oral Torah and rabbinic authority. When there is a question of how to follow a Torah command, we are to turn to the sages,...
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