The Black Fire
Solomon Mowshowitz
'R. Simeon ben Lakish said: The Torah given to Moses was written with black fire upon white fire…(JT, Shel. 6:1, 49d). How did the actual text of the Torah, the Black Fire, get to be the way it is today? The Talmud cites passages from scripture that don’t exist in our version; the sages acknowledge that they sometimes changed the text of the “original” Torah. We will explore the content and the physical text of the Torah, from both traditional and higher-critical perspectives. Content topics include the documentary hypothesis (J,E,P and D), “typos,” tikkun soferim (changes introduced by the sages), vocalization, cantillation and variant texts (e.g. the Samaritan and Karaite Torahs). We’ll look at the physical text and delve into the crowned Assyrian “font,” the significance of the many different kinds of blank spaces, the outsized or broken or upside-down letters, the strange dots. We’ll discuss: What is the spiritual meaning of all of these things to us?
Mosh is a past Chair of the National Havurah Committee.
Categories
- Advanced Text
- Afternoon Course
