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 Description: Torah, (תורה) is a Hebrew word meaning teaching, instruction, or especially Law. It primarily refers to the first section of the Tanakh–the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, or the Five Books of Moses.
The five books are Genesis (Bereishit בראשית), Exodus (Shemot שמות), Leviticus (Vayikra ויקרא), Numbers (Bemidbar במדבר) and Deuteronomy (Devarim דברים) . Collectively they are also known as the Pentateuch (Greek for "five containers", where containers presumably refers to the scroll cases in which books were being kept) or Hamisha Humshei Torah (חמשה חומשי תורה) (Hebrew for "the five parts of the Torah", or just Humash חומש "fifth" for short).
Jews also use the word Torah, in a wider sense, to refer to the entire spectrum of authoritative Jewish religious teachings throughout history. In this sense it might include the entire Tanakh, the Mishnah, the Talmud and the midrashic literature. In its widest sense, Jews use the word Torah to refer to any kind of teachings or philosophy.
The Torah is the primary document of Judaism, being the source of the 613 mitzvot [מצוות] and most of its ethical framework.
According to Jewish tradition, these books were given to Moses by God on Mount Sinai. This dictation included not only the "quotes" which appear in the text, but every word of the text itself, including phrases such as "And God spoke to Moses..."
The rabbis hold that not only are the words giving a Divine message, but indicate a far greater message that extends beyond them. Thus they hold that even as small a mark as a kotzo shel yod (קוצו של יוד), the serif of the Hebrew letter yod (י), the smallest letter, was put there by God to teach scores of lessons. This is regardless of whether that yod appears in the phrase "I am the Lord thy God," or whether it appears in that oft repeated "And God spoke unto Moses saying." In a similar vein, Rabbi Akiva, who died in AD 135, is said to have learned a new law from every et (את) in the Torah (Talmud, tractate Pesachim 22b); the word et is meaningless by itself, and serves only to mark the accusative case. In other words, the Orthodox view is that "And God spoke unto Moses saying..." is no less important than the actual statement.
One kabbalistic interpretation is that the Torah constitutes one long name of God, and that it was broken up into words so that human minds can understand it. While this is effective since it accords with our human reason, it is not the only way that the text can be broken up. In that sense, the Torah is for Orthodox Jews that rush of letters and sounds that can mean so many different things.
There is little support for Bible criticism in Orthodox Judaism; the accepted Orthodox view is that the Torah was dictated to the letter to Moses, which is widely considered one of the Jewish principles of faith. Most religious authorities consider Bible criticism a form of heresy. Rabbinic commentators who took issue with the scientific approach are Rabbis Meir Leibush Malbim and David Zvi Hoffmann.
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| Resource Specification | | CustomTeaserText: | Torah, (תורה) is a Hebrew word meaning teaching, instruction, or especially Law. It primarily refers to the first section of the Tanakh–the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, or the Five Books of Moses.
| | Date Added: | 16pm28UTC_f2005Wed, 16 Feb 2005 21:15:08 +000002pm28 |
| Last Updated: | 16pm28UTC_f2005Wed, 16 Feb 2005 21:15:08 +000002pm28 | | Author: | admin |
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