What is the Torah? If you think it’s just the Five Books of Moses, you’re only seeing the surface. The Torah encompasses the written law, the oral law, the Mishnah, the Talmud, and an extraordinary chain of transmission and interpretation that stretches from Mount Sinai to today.

In this episode of Jewish Insights with Justin Pines, historian Rabbi Ken Spiro walks through the full story of the Torah — what actually happened at Sinai (including the part most people don’t know), when the written and oral laws were given and why God would deliver a law orally, the dramatic moment when King Josiah’s workers discovered a lost Torah scroll in the Temple, Ezra’s public reading at the Water Gate that transformed Jewish life after the Babylonian exile, why the oral law was eventually written down, how the Torah system survived the destruction of the Temple and centuries of exile, the role of the Rambam in organizing and transmitting the tradition, what the Dead Sea Scrolls revealed about the accuracy of the text over two thousand years, how traditional Judaism responds to the Documentary Hypothesis, and the living process by which rabbis derive Jewish law from these ancient sources today.

Rabbi Ken Spiro is a historian, author, and Senior Lecturer at Aish HaTorah in Jerusalem. He holds an MA in History and rabbinic ordination from Aish HaTorah and has lived in Israel since 1982. He served in a combat infantry unit in the IDF and is a licensed tour guide in Israel. He is the author of “WorldPerfect — The Jewish Impact on Civilization,” “Crash Course in Jewish History,” and “Destiny — Why a tiny nation plays such a huge role in history.” His work has been featured on BBC, National Geographic, the History Channel, and Fox News. He hosts the weekly podcast “Remember What’s Next” on Spotify and YouTube, and his writings can be found at kenspiro.com and aish.com.

This is Part 2 of a special 2-part Sukkot & Simchat Torah series on Jewish Insights with Justin Pines.

👉 Watch Part 1 – “Who is the Jewish Messiah?”: https://youtu.be/aNsY9qx2Ygs

👉 Watch Ken Spiro’s earlier series, “All of Jewish History in Two Hours”: Part 1 — Rise of a Nation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CrSSwp0Nhk Part 2 — https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqS-LIYB6k8&t=5s

Jewish Insights with Justin Pines airs on JBS (Jewish Broadcasting Service), available on Comcast, Spectrum, DirecTV, and Verizon. Watch more episodes at jbstv.org.

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