WAggadah is the non-legalistic exegesis which appears in the classical rabbinic literature of Judaism, particularly the Talmud and Midrash. In general, Aggadah is a compendium of rabbinic texts that incorporates folklore, historical anecdotes, moral exhortations, and practical advice in various spheres, from business to medicine.
WThe Book of Jubilees, sometimes called Lesser Genesis (Leptogenesis), is an ancient Jewish religious work of 50 chapters, considered canonical by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church as well as Beta Israel, where it is known as the Book of Division. Jubilees is considered one of the pseudepigrapha by Protestant, Roman Catholic, and Eastern Orthodox Churches. It is also not considered canonical within Judaism outside of Beta Israel.
WThe Book of Tobit is a book of scripture that is part of the Catholic and Orthodox biblical canons. It was recognized as canonical by the Council of Hippo, the Councils of Carthage of 397 and 417, and the Council of Florence, and confirmed in the Counter-Reformation by the Council of Trent (1546). Many Anglicans, Lutherans, and Methodists have it in their canon of scripture.
WThe Copper Scroll (3Q15) is one of the Dead Sea Scrolls found in Cave 3 near Khirbet Qumran, but differs significantly from the others. Whereas the other scrolls are written on parchment or papyrus, this scroll is written on metal: copper mixed with about 1 percent tin. The so-called 'scrolls' of copper were, in reality, two separated sections of what was originally a single scroll about 8 feet (240 cm) in length. Unlike the others, it is not a literary work, but a list of 64 places where various items of gold and silver were buried or hidden. It differs from the other scrolls in its Hebrew, its orthography, palaeography and date.
WThe Dead Sea Scrolls are ancient Jewish religious manuscripts that were found in the Qumran Caves in the Judaean Desert, near Ein Feshkha on the northern shore of the Dead Sea in the West Bank. Scholarly consensus dates these scrolls from the last three centuries BCE and the first century CE. The texts have great historical, religious, and linguistic significance because they include the second-oldest known surviving manuscripts of works later included in the Hebrew Bible canon, along with deuterocanonical and extra-biblical manuscripts which preserve evidence of the diversity of religious thought in late Second Temple Judaism. Almost all of the Dead Sea Scrolls are held by the state of Israel in the Shrine of the Book on the grounds of the Israel Museum, but ownership of the scrolls is disputed by Jordan and Palestine.
WThe deuterocanonical books are books and passages considered by the Catholic Church, the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Oriental Orthodox Churches and the Assyrian Church of the East to be canonical books of the Old Testament but which are considered non-canonical by Protestant denominations. They date from the period 300 BC–AD 100 approximately. While the New Testament never quotes from or ascribes canonical authority to these books, some say there is a correspondence of thought, while others see texts from these books being paraphrased, referred or alluded to many times in the New Testament, particularly in the Pauline epistles depending in large measure on what is counted as a reference.
WGabriel's Revelation, also called Hazon Gabriel or the Jeselsohn Stone, is a stone tablet with 87 lines of Hebrew text written in ink, containing a collection of short prophecies written in the first person. It is dated to the late 1st century BCE or early 1st century CE and is considered important for understanding Jewish messianic expectations in the Second Temple period.
WThe Habakkuk Commentary or Pesher Habakkuk, labelled 1QpHab was among the original seven Dead Sea Scrolls discovered in 1947 and published in 1951. Due to its early discovery and rapid publication, as well as its relatively pristine preservation, 1QpHab is one of the most frequently researched and analyzed scrolls of the several hundred now known.
WThe Hebrew Bible, which is also called the Tanakh, or sometimes the Miqra (מִקְרָא), is the canonical collection of Hebrew scriptures, including the Torah. These texts are almost exclusively in Biblical Hebrew, with a few passages in Biblical Aramaic. The form of this text that is authoritative for Rabbinic Judaism is known as the Masoretic Text (MT) and consists of 24 books, while Protestant Bibles divide essentially the same material into 39 books. Catholic Bibles and Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bibles contain additional materials in their Old Testaments, derived from the Septuagint and other sources.
WThe historical books are a division of Christian Bibles, grouping 12 books of the Old Testament. It includes the Former Prophets from the Nevi'im and two of the ungrouped books of Ketuvim of the Hebrew Bible together with the Book of Ruth and the Book of Esther which in the Hebrew are both found in the Five Megillot. These 12 books make up the historical books in the Protestant Bible, but several other books not found in the Hebrew Bible are also included in Catholic and Eastern / Greek Orthodox Bibles.
WThe Jewish apocrypha, known in Hebrew as הספרים החיצונים, are books written in large part by Jews, especially during the Second Temple period, and were not accepted as sacred manuscripts (canonical) when the Torah was fully canonized. Some of these books are considered sacred by some Christians, and are included in the Old Testament. The Jewish apocrypha is distinctive from the Christian Apocrypha and biblical apocrypha as it is the only one of these collections which works within a Jewish theological framework.
WThe First Book of Maccabees, also called 1 Maccabees, is a book written in Hebrew by a Jewish author after the restoration of an independent Jewish kingdom by the Hasmonean dynasty, about the latter part of the 2nd century BC. The original Hebrew is lost and the most important surviving version is the Greek translation contained in the Septuagint. The book is held as canonical scripture by the Catholic, Orthodox, and Oriental Orthodox churches, but not by Protestant denominations nor any major branches of Judaism; it is not part of the Tanakh. Such Protestants consider it to be an apocryphal book.
WMidrash is biblical exegesis by ancient Judaic authorities, using a mode of interpretation prominent in the Talmud. The word itself means "textual interpretation", "study".
WMidrash halakha was the ancient Judaic rabbinic method of Torah study that expounded upon the traditionally received 613 Mitzvot (commandments) by identifying their sources in the Hebrew Bible, and by interpreting these passages as proofs of the laws' authenticity. Midrash more generally also refers to the non-legal interpretation of the Tanakh. The term is applied also to the derivation of new laws, either by means of a correct interpretation of the obvious meaning of scriptural words themselves or by the application of certain hermeneutic rules.
WThe Mikraot Gedolot "Great Scriptures," often called the "Rabbinic Bible" in English, is an edition of the Tanakh that generally includes four distinct elements:The Biblical text according to the masorah in its letters, vocalization, and cantillation marks Masoretic notes on the Biblical text Aramaic Targum Biblical commentaries
WThe Mosaic of Reḥob, also known as the Tel Rehov inscription and Baraita of the Boundaries, is a late 3rd–6th century CE mosaic discovered in 1973, inlaid in the floor of the foyer or narthex of an ancient synagogue near Tel Rehov, 4.5 kilometers (2.8 mi) south of Beit She'an and about 6.5 kilometres (4.0 mi) west of the Jordan River, containing the longest written text hitherto discovered in any mosaic in the Land of Israel, and also the oldest known Talmudic text.
WThe Poetic Books are a division of the Christian Bible, grouping 5 or 7 books in the Old Testament. The term Sapiential Books refers to the same set, although not all the Psalms are usually regarded as belonging to the Wisdom tradition.
WThe prophetic books are a division of the Christian Bible, grouping 18 books in the Old Testament. In terms of the Tanakh, it includes the Latter Prophets from the Nevi'im, with the addition of Lamentions and Daniel, both of which are included among the books of the Hebrew Ketuvim. Baruch is also part of the prophetic books, but isn't part of the Hebrew Bible, and is seen by Christians as deuterocanonical, for which reason it is excluded from Protestant Bibles.
WRabbinic literature, in its broadest sense, can mean the entire spectrum of rabbinic writings throughout Jewish history. However, the term often refers specifically to literature from the Talmudic era, as opposed to medieval and modern rabbinic writing, and thus corresponds with the Hebrew term Sifrut Chazal. This more specific sense of "Rabbinic literature"—referring to the Talmudim, Midrash, and related writings, but hardly ever to later texts—is how the term is generally intended when used in contemporary academic writing. On the other hand, the terms meforshim and parshanim (commentaries/commentators) almost always refer to later, post-Talmudic writers of rabbinic glosses on Biblical and Talmudic texts.
WThe Rule of the Blessing (1QSb) is a very fragmentary text once thought to be part of the text of the Community Rule scroll found in Cave 1 at Qumran as part of the Dead Sea Scrolls. It is added as one of two appendices following the book of the Community Rule, on one of the first seven scrolls discovered at the Qumran site. The Rule of the Blessing includes three benedictions for use during the eschaton: one for the general assembly of the eschatological Tribe of Israel, which describes a sort of “living water” bringing them into a new covenant with God, one concerning the Kohen (priest) Sons of Zadok, chosen by God who will act “like angels” and lead Israel after the War. The third prayer is that for the messianic meal, to bless the “Prince,” or Davidic messiah, who has come to deliver Israel. Similar prayers are found elsewhere in the scrolls, and some believe that this particular manuscript may be a collection of prayers for general, daily use.
WThe Samaritan Pentateuch, also known as the Samaritan Torah, is a text of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, written in the Samaritan alphabet and used as scripture by the Samaritans. It constitutes their entire biblical canon.
WSefer Yetzirah is the title of the earliest extant book on Jewish mysticism, although some early commentators treated it as a treatise on mathematical and linguistic theory as opposed to Kabbalah. Yetzirah is more literally translated as "Formation"; the word Briah is used for "Creation". The book is traditionally ascribed to the patriarch Abraham, although others attribute its writing to Rabbi Akiva. Modern scholars have not reached consensus on the question of its origins. According to Rabbi Saadia Gaon, the objective of the book's author was to convey in writing how the things of our universe came into existence.
WThe Book of Sirach, also called the Wisdom of Sirach or simply Sirach, and also known as the Book of Ecclesiasticus or Ben Sira, is a Jewish work originally in Hebrew of ethical teachings, from approximately 200 to 175 BCE, written by the Jewish scribe Ben Sira of Jerusalem, on the inspiration of his father Joshua son of Sirach, sometimes called Jesus son of Sirach or Yeshua ben Eliezer ben Sira.
WThe Talmud is the central text of Rabbinic Judaism and the primary source of Jewish religious law (halakha) and Jewish theology. Until the advent of modernity, in nearly all Jewish communities, the Talmud was the centerpiece of Jewish cultural life and was foundational to "all Jewish thought and aspirations", serving also as "the guide for the daily life" of Jews.
WThe Book of Giants is an apocryphal Jewish book which expands the primeval creation to end of time narrative of the Hebrew Bible and, by its multifaceted elaborations on divine decrees of warning and doom, ties the ancient prophet Enoch closer to his generally recognized 'storyline' than does even the story's principal treatise of 1 Enoch. Together with 1 Enoch's Book of Watchers, as Enochian scholar James C. VanderKam maintains, "it stands as an attempt to explain how it was that wickedness had become so widespread and muscular before the flood; in so doing, it also supplies the reason why God was more than justified in sending that flood." The Giants discovery at Qumran dates the text's creation to before the 2nd century BC.
WThe War of the Sons of Light Against the Sons of Darkness, also known as War Rule, Rule of War and the War Scroll, is a manual for military organization and strategy that was discovered among the Dead Sea Scrolls. The manuscript was among the scrolls found in Qumran Cave 1, acquired by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and first published posthumously by Eleazar Sukenik in 1955. The document is made up of various scrolls and fragments including 1QM, and 4Q491–497. It is possible that The War of the Messiah is the conclusion to this document. The 4Q491–497 fragments were published by Maurice Baillet in Discoveries in the Judaean Desert, 7 and comprise a shorter recension of the War Scroll.