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Midrash


The Evil Inclination The Evil Inclination
Monday, December 5, 2011 by Raphael Magarik | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features

The yetzer hara, usually translated "evil impulse," is an elusive rabbinic concept. The words derive from God's observation in Genesis 8:21 (paralleled earlier in 6:5) that "the imagination of man's heart is evil from his youth."
Mysteries of the Menorah Mysteries of the Menorah
Thursday, September 8, 2011 by Meir Soloveichik | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features

On the eve of Tisha b'Av, 2011, archeologists revealed artifacts newly unearthed from the great Jewish revolt against Rome (67–70 C.E.), including coins minted by the rebels and a stone incised with a sketch of the Temple menorah. But what is the menorah, and what does it symbolize?
What is Aggadah, and How to Read It What is Aggadah, and How to Read It
Thursday, July 7, 2011 by Elli Fischer | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features

Although the Talmud is best known for its discourse on religious law, its pages contain a vast amount of non-legal material, including ethical teachings, interpretations of biblical narratives (midrash), and excurses on topics from brain surgery to dream interpretation.
Israelites in the Anglo-Saxon Sea Israelites in the Anglo-Saxon Sea
Friday, June 17, 2011 by David Curzon | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features

Since it was first composed, there have been dozens—if not hundreds—of renderings of the Hebrew Bible. The process of translation and creative elaboration began during the first millennium B.C.E.
Talking Pictures Talking Pictures
Friday, February 5, 2010 | Jewish Ideas Daily » Daily Features

Ever since Art Spiegelman's landmark Maus (1986), comics and graphic novels have established themselves as a new form of visual-cum-verbal midrash. The best of them, re-imagining texts and the events of history, point beyond themselves. If Spiegelman paid tribute to his father, a survivor of the Holocaust, the hero of Joann Sfar's The Rabbi's Cat is witness to the vanished Jewish culture of Algiers. Other cartoonists have tackled the text of the Bible, as eloquent as it is famously laconic.  R. Crumb (of Fritz the Cat) has recently published his take on the Book of Genesis, rendered in his trademark mix of burlesque, Blake, and...
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Editors' Picks
Is Greed Good? Gil Student, Torah Musings. An investigation into classical Jewish commentaries on the accumulation of wealth, its benefits and its perils.
The Origins of Purim Avinadav Witkun, Muqata. Why was not even one copy of the scroll of Esther found among the Dead Sea Scrolls?—and other mysteries of Purim.
Master Illustrator Eve M. Kahn, New York Times. A new, annotated edition of Arthur Szyk's Haggadah brings back a long-neglected Jewish artist.
Biblical Seductions Gil Student, Torah Musings. In the hands of a sexual-harassment attorney, six key narratives in the Bible receive a bold and creative interpretation.