One of the cardinal principles of Jewish faith is the giving of Torah at Mount Sinai. “Torah” is not only Written Tradition, but also Oral Tradition which explained and detailed laws mentioned by the Torah, and presented other laws not described in the Written Torah. In addition, our sages received principles and methods of Torah interpretation which enabled them to learn additional laws from the Written Torah.

It is thought that for the first thousand years after Sinai, Oral Tradition sources were actually learned in the context of the Torah verses they explained. When the scope of Oral Tradition grew to a point where this became overbearing, separate learning of Oral Tradition began according to topic. During the period of the second Temple, the Sadduccees (c. 3rd – 1st centuries BCE) denied the authority of many selections of Oral Tradition as put forward by our sages. In response, sages explained even well-known halachah by finding allusions to it from the verses in the Torah.

Study of Oral Tradition together with Written Tradition helps to assert and cement the relationship between them. Specific skills for study of Written Tradition clarify exactly what the verses are saying, and what Oral Tradition adds to the verses. For instance, the laws of kashrut forbid the eating of milk and meat together. Many Jews believe this is written in a verse in the Torah: “do not boil a kid in its mother’s milk.” However, the verse itself forbids only the cooking of a kid in the milk of its mother. Additional interpretations, such as the prohibition to eat meat and milk together, are of equally binding Torah stature, but derive from Oral Tradition, not Written Tradition. What are the appropriate skills for study of Written Tradition in preparation for Oral Tradition?

The most important aspect of Written Torah study is separation of the plain meaning of the text from later interpretations. Three skills are critical in understanding the context and plain meaning of Written Tradition: paragraph divisions, cantillation marks on verses, and the original meanings of words.
o The Torah is divided into paragraphs called “parashiyot”. According to Oral Tradition, these paragraph divisions are from the time of Moshe himself. They subdivide into “open parashiyot” and “closed parshiyot” depending on whether paragraph begins on the same line as the end of the previous paragraph (“closing” the previous line), or whether it begins on the following line (leaving the previous line “open”). Open parashiyot indicate major breaks in narrative, while closed parashiyot reflect minor breaks. Study of verses in context requires identification of the paragraph in which the verses are found.
o Each individual verse is divided into ideas or sections by cantillation marks. Every verse of more than several words is divided into halves, and often into quarters, according to the meaning of the verse. Each section of the verse transmits a given idea, or relates to a different aspect of the verse. The meaning of the verse is often dependent upon these divisions.
o The original meaning of each word can be checked by understanding its use throughout the Bible, and by its grammatical structure.

With these skills, many questions can be asked to delineate the plain meaning of a verse. For instance, one Torah verse tells us that we should take the words of Torah and “bind them for a sign upon your hand and for frontlets between your eyes.” What are frontlets? Where exactly is “between the eyes?” How are the words of Torah to be bound to our hand, and in what way are they to be a sign? By asking questions on the verses, we learn to appreciate the context of Oral Tradition as it amplifies upon the verses and answers many of the questions we asked.

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