Oral Law in Judaism
Although the Hebrew term "Torah" is often translated as "Law", its actual meaning is "Instruction" or "Teaching". Rabbinic Judaism holds that the books of the Tanakh were transmitted in parallel with an oral tradition, as relayed by God to Moses and from him handed on to the scholarly and other religious leaders of each generation. Thus, in Judaism, the "Written Instruction" (Torah she-bi-khtav תורה שבכתב) comprises the Torah and the rest of the Tanakh; the "Oral Instruction" (Torah she-be'al peh תורה שבעל פה) was ultimately recorded in the Talmud (lit. "Learning") and Midrashim (lit. "Interpretations"). The interpretation of the Oral Torah is thus considered as the authoritative reading of the Written Torah. Further, Halakha (lit. "The Path", frequently translated as "Jewish Law") is based on a "Written Instruction" together with an "Oral Instruction". Jewish law and tradition is thus not based on a literal reading of the Tanakh, but on the combined oral and written tradition.
Read more about this topic: Oral Law
Famous quotes containing the words oral, law and/or judaism:
“We have seen over and over that white male historians in general have tended to dismiss any history they didn’t themselves write, on the grounds that it is unserious, unscholarly, a fad, too “political,” “merely” oral and thus unreliable.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“The law of nature is, do the thing, and you shall have the power: but they who do not the thing have not the power.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“Christianity is the religion of melancholy and hypochondria. Islam, on the other hand, promotes apathy, and Judaism instills its adherents with a certain choleric vehemence, the heathen Greeks may well be called happy optimists.”
—Franz Grillparzer (1791–1872)