In Persian Yehud, as Deuteronomy’s covenant with YHWH was championed as the new path to national security and blessing, the book of Ruth countered with a conservative vision—one in which the survival and well-being of two vulnerable widows are secured not through covenantal fidelity, but through traditional values and customary law.
Genesis 36 references a story about Anah, the grandson of Seir the Horite and the father-in-law of Esau, who found הימם “Hayemim” while grazing his father's donkeys in the wilderness. What does this mean and why is this story in the Torah?
Upon a childless husband’s death, Deuteronomy states “his wife shall not marry a strange man outside.” This phrase originated as a contract clause, and the case was a practice exercise for scribes who were learning contract clauses.
How do the laws of Leviticus 18 compare to the laws and practices of the Babylonians, Hittites, and Egyptians, and to the rest of the Bible?
Karaism is often characterized by its rejection of the Talmud in favor of a super-literalist interpretation of the Torah. But Karaism is better understood as an alternate, parallel form of Judaism based on the Bible.
A polyphonic approach to reading the Torah
The history and geography of the Judahite clan of Shelah as portrayed in the Bible and in the extra-biblical Sources.
By withholding his son Shelah from Tamar, Judah sins against her. Powerless to oppose him legally, Tamar must resort to subterfuge to achieve what is justly hers, the possibility of children from her deceased’s husband’s family.
The book of Ruth presents a different model of justice from that afforded by statute, custom, and precedent, one that seeks restorative as opposed to retributive justice.
Deuteronomy commands a man to marry the childless widow of his brother (yibbum). And yet, a close look at the Priestly text of the Torah shows that it did not have the option of yibbum.
Popular legend tells us that Rabbenu Gershom (d. ca 1028) was the first to prohibit polygyny. The Damascus Covenant’s understanding of the law in Leviticus 18:18, however, suggests that polygyny may have been prohibited more than a thousand years earlier by the Priestly authors.