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There are fast days through the year which commemorate the process leading to the destruction of the temple. The way I learned them, there was a date marking the beginning of the siege, one for the...
Forgive my ignorance; I am not Jewish but interested in Judaism, and know a bit of Biblical Hebrew. I'm confused about the term Baal Shem. I'm assuming Shem refers to God's name, as in HaShem. But...
In the Talmudic discussion of the Sotah ritual, the halacha is derived that, because part of the ritual requires uncovering the woman's hair, the obligation would otherwise be to keep the hair cove...
The mishna (4:8) in Taanit reads אָמַר רַבָּן שִׁמְעוֹן בֶּן גַּמְלִיאֵל, לֹא הָיוּ יָמִים טוֹבִים לְיִשְׂרָאֵל כַּחֲמִשָּׁה עָשָׂר בְּאָב וּכְיוֹם הַכִּפּוּרִים, שֶׁבָּהֶן בְּנוֹת יְרוּשָׁלַיִם...
When giving matanot l'evyonim on Purim, I know that the mitzvah is fulfilled by giving money out on THAT day -- but must it be money that was set aside to be given on that day? If I have a box and...
What are the rules regarding a mamzer who is the child of a kohen (and a woman with whom the kohen could not enter into a proper marriage)? Could the child eat trumah? What aspects of the status of...
Usually, if someone accidentally misses a davening, he makes the shemoneh esrei up by saying it twice the next time (called tashlumin) [source needed]. If someone misses davening accidentally, but ...
In my shul (and i'm sure in others as well), they turn half of the lights off on Tisha B'av night as a way of mourning. Am I allowed to intentionally sit under the lights that are on to help me see...
Must a Nazir explicitly break the terms of his Nezirut on the day that his term of Nezirut ends (or the day after the last day)? If he doesn't is there any notion of his implicitly accepting anothe...
If someone b'mezid, intentionally, prayed shacharis without tefillin, would he have fulfilled his obligation? Or would he have to pray again with tefillin.
It seems that there is a similarity between the "Drakkon" figure , as the Gemmara describes it, and the Chinese worshiped, mythical beast Loong. Avoda Zara 43a.6: תנו רבנן איזהו צורת דרקון פירש רש...
I was recently asked what the difference was between the words fleishik and fleishike, and was unable to come up with an answer. If it were just a matter of masculine/feminine case coming over from...
This past Shabbat I was reminded (while watching the torah reader rolling the scroll) that all (or nearly all?) of parshat Balak is written as one long paragraph in the scroll -- three solid column...
In the Yalkut Shimoni on Nach 499.2, he writes: שנו רבותינו בשעה שמלך המשיח בא עומד על גג בית המקדש והוא משמיע להם לישראל ואומר ענוים הגיע זמן גאולתכם Our Rabbi's taught, at the time that the k...
Does Chida mention Moses Mendelssohn or any of his works in Shem HaGedolim?
I was reading about driving a car on Chol Hamo'ed and the article stated that many see the melacha of driving as tied to havarah (which I assume to refer to the burning of gas via combustion). The ...
Why did the Ark rest on Ararat? It seems random. Why not have it rest in Eretz Yisrael, for example?
While reading Megillat Ruth on Shavuot, I noticed that there were an unusually large number of words that were read differently than how they're written in the text. This includes outright omitting...
I noticed that Pesach goes from being a holiday marked by עני to one, a month later, called שני, moving from ayin (eye) to shein (tooth). Yeah, I know that the words don't actually mean that (pover...
In Devarim 3:27, when Moshe pleads with God to be allowed to go into the land, God says to him: עֲלֵ֣ה ׀ רֹ֣אשׁ הַפִּסְגָּ֗ה וְשָׂ֥א עֵינֶ֛יךָ יָ֧מָּה וְצָפֹ֛נָה וְתֵימָ֥נָה וּמִזְרָ֖חָה וּרְאֵ֣...
I have been taught that we count the omer at night with a b'racha. Counting at night makes sense; it's the first opportunity to fulfill the commandment each day and we should rush to fulfill a mit...
When Yisrael spent 40 years in the wilderness, they sometimes camped for longer periods of times and sometimes for shorter ones, sometimes even just two days (Bamidbar 9:21 -22): וְיֵ֞שׁ אֲשֶׁר־...
R' Yochanan ben Zakai, in leading the Jewish people during and immediately after the Destruction of the Second Temple, issued many decrees aimed at responding to the new post-Temple reality and pre...
I've heard a setting (by Debbie Friedman) of the song "Shalom Aleichem" that, in the last verse, says "shuvchem" instead of "tzeitchem" (recording, mixed group of singers). A rabbi who knew her to...
Following up on this question about the use of the words "menora" or "chanukiya" to refer to Chanuka lights: I find it interesting that the use of "chanukiya," popularized in 1897 through a secula...
