Jacob’s journey home to the Promised Land is prompted by a Divine call, but first he must meet with Esau. When they last saw one another, Esau wanted to kill Jacob. Jacob prepared his family for the worst case scenario and then he waited. This class covers a strange encounter. He is met, and struggles […]

In Class Eight we cover material associated with annual reading Va-Yetzay (Genesis 28:10-35:29). The material presented in this class concerns Jacob’s time away from the Promised Land – 20 years that he spent in the ancestral homeland of Patriarchs and Matriarchs. Jacob flees Esau at the beginning of our story and Laban at the end. […]

In our journey through the texts of the Pentateuch according to the annual cycle of readings we are moving into a new story, designated Eleh Toledot Isaac by the ancient compiler. This story begins in Genesis 25:19 when Isaac is forty years old and ends in Genesis 35:29 when Isaac dies. It is clear that […]

This is the third of three classes on the life of Abraham drawing from the material, assembled in an ancient work called, Eleh Toledoth Terach. This teaching focuses on the stories contained in Parashah Chayei Sarah (the life of Sarah – Genesis 23:1-25:18). By the close of this week’s section, the deaths of Sarah, Abraham, […]

In this class, we cover material primarily from parashah reading Va-Yera (Genesis 18-22). The life of Abraham lasted 175 years and is covered in fourteen chapters of the Book of Genesis and yet five chapters (17-21) record events that took place in a single appointed year. A close look at the texts reveals that the […]

Within the Bible’s Book of Genesis are traces of an ancient structure. There are ten sections, unnoticed by most, each beginning with the Hebrew phrase אלה תולדת / Eleh Toledoth, typically translated as “these are the generations.” One of these sections runs from Genesis 11:27 through Genesis 25:11. This section is called, according to its […]

The second parashah in the annual cycle of Pentateuchal readings is called Noah. This teaching reveals an underlying structure of the Bible’s Book of Genesis whereby the stories that we know were originally arranged by an ancient editor or redactor. This ancient structure organizes several separate stories into a flowing narrative. In this class, we […]

In our new series (Tishri 5782-Tishri 5783) we will work through the Five Books (The Pentateuch). Dr. James Tabor shares some insights from the first reading in the Annual Reading Cycle (Bereshit – Genesis 1:1-6:8). Don’t miss, Dr. Tabor’s class on Pentateuch Reading Bereshit. Watch on YouTube   Download and Print John “Baruch” Perry’s Teaching […]

In our new series we will work through the Five Books (The Pentateuch). In this introductory class presented during the Festival of Booths, we learn that the institution of a public reading of “the Teaching” is attributed to Moses (Deuteronomy 31:9-13). We trace the practice, and highlight two different systems for working through the material […]

According to a plain reading of the Bible’s Book of Exodus, the name YHVH was unknown until it was revealed to Moses (Exodus 6:2-3). From the story of the encounter at the bush (Exodus 3) throughout the remainder of the Bible, God is known by this memorial name. The Book of Exodus makes it clear […]