The Collected Writings: Origin of the Oral Law (5) - Hardcover

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Term used to denote the laws and statutes which, in addition to the Pentateuch, God gave to Moses. According to the rabbinical interpretation of Ex. xxxiv. 27, the words indicate that besides the written law——God gave orally to Moses other laws and maxims, as well as verbal explanations of the written law, enjoining him not to record these teachings, but to deliver them to the people by word of mouth (Giṭ. 60b; Yer. Meg. iv. 74a; comp. also IV Ezra [II Esdras] xiv.). The expression "Torah shebe-'al peh" denotes, therefore, "the law indicated in the word ' 'al peh,'" and hence only the law which was given to Moses orally. But even disregarding that Talmudic interpretation, the expression is equivalent to the Torah, which was given orally (), not in writing. Compare (Soṭah vii. 7), used of a recitation of the Biblical text by rote. In a wider sense, however, "Torah shebe-'al peh" includes all the interpretations and conclusions which the scribes deduced from the written Torah, as well as the regulations instituted by them (comp. Yoma 28a, b and Rashi ad loc.), and therefore comprises the entire traditional teaching contained in the Mishnah, the Tosefta, and the halakic midrashim, since these were taught only orally and were not committed to writing. In later haggadic statements, however, the complete body of rabbinical doctrine is said to have been revealed to Moses on Sinai; so that R. Joshua b. Levi declared (Yer. Peah ii. 17a) that all the rabbinical teachings, even those which the scholars found and promulgated later, were given to Moses on the mountain (comp. also Ber. 5a). These passages, on the other hand, are by no means intended to be taken literally, or to be supposed to imply that God imparted to Moses the entire rabbinical teachings as they were developed in the course of time.

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