About HEBREW BIBLE

Hebrew Name

תּוֹרָה

English Name

HEBREW BIBLE

Phonetic Spelling

TOH-RAH

What does HEBREW BIBLE mean?

Torah, Hebrew for “instruction,” generally refers to the Hebrew Bible or, more specifically, the Five Books of Moses.

וַיֹּ֨אמֶר יְהֹוָ֜ה אֶל־מֹשֶׁ֗ה עֲלֵ֥ה אֵלַ֛י הָהָ֖רָה וֶהְיֵה־שָׁ֑ם וְאֶתְּנָ֨ה לְךָ֜ אֶת־לֻחֹ֣ת הָאֶ֗בֶן וְהַתּוֹרָה֙ וְהַמִּצְוָ֔ה אֲשֶׁ֥ר כָּתַ֖בְתִּי לְהוֹרֹתָֽם׃
Hashem said to Moshe, “Come up to Me on the mountain and wait there, and I will give you the stone tablets with the teachings and commandments which I have inscribed to instruct them.”
vai-YO-mer a-do-NAI el mo-SHEH, a-LEH ay-LAI ha-ha-RAH ve-h'-YEH-sham, ve-et-NAH l'-KHA et lu-KHOT ha-E-ven ve-ha-to-RAH ve-ha-mitz-VAH a-SHER ka-TAV-tee l'-ho-RO-tam
Exodus 24:12

תּוֹרָ֥ה צִוָּה־לָ֖נוּ מֹשֶׁ֑ה מוֹרָשָׁ֖ה קְהִלַּ֥ת יַעֲקֹֽב׃
When Moshe charged us with the Teaching As the heritage of the congregation of Yaakov.
TO-rah tzi-VAH-la-NU mo-SHEH mo-RA-sha KE-hi-LAT ya-a-KOV
Deuteronomy 33:4

Description about HEBREW BIBLE

Torah, Hebrew for “instruction,” generally refers to the Hebrew Bible or, more specifically, the Five Books of Moses. Through its commandments and powerful stories of the lives of our forefathers and foremothers, the Torah is God’s instruction book for how to live a life of holiness. The numerical value of the word Torah is 611, just two shy of the number of commandments in the entire Torah, 613. The sages explain the discrepancy by distinguishing between the first two of the Ten Commandments, which God spoke directly to the Israelites at Mount Sinai, and the other 611 commandments, which were heard exclusively by Moses, who then wrote them in the Torah and taught them to the nation. According to Jewish tradition, there is both a Written Torah and an Oral Torah. The Written Torah comprises the text of the Five Books of Moses, while the Oral Torah is a collection of teachings that God gave to Moses that explain and elucidate the commandments and stories of the Written Torah. Without these oral teachings, the Written Torah would be incomplete and unclear. After the destruction of the Second Temple and the dispersion of the Jewish people throughout the world, the Oral Torah was put into writing because the sages were concerned that its teachings would be forgotten and lost. Much of the Oral Torah was written in the books of the Mishnah and Talmud, the most important Jewish texts after the Hebrew Bible itself. The Hebrew words for “teacher” and “parent” are moreh and horeh, two words that are linguistically related to the word Torah, for teachers and parents instruct their students and children in the ways of holiness, just as the Torah does for Israel and for all of humanity.

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