Tag Archives: Midrash Tadshe

Time Travel in the Torah

Are there cases of time travel in the Torah and ancient Jewish texts? Is it possible that Adam, Enoch, and Moses were able to traverse the universe using faster-than-light technology? And how do we deal with apparent chronological contradictions in the Torah? Find out in this fascinating class, where we also uncover the true meaning of God’s Ineffable Name, propose a theory for how Adam was able to live 930 years, and calculate the speed of God’s divine “chariots”.

For a written summary and lots more information (including the time travel of Eliyahu briefly mentioned in the class), please see here.

For more on Block Universe Theory and Judaism, see ‘Time, Gravity, and Free Will’.

See also ‘How Did Adam Live 930 Years?’

The Watchers & the Book of Jubilees

A deep dive into the eye-opening ancient Book of Jubilees. Along the way, we unravel the story of Enoch and the mysterious “Watchers” and fallen angels in the pre-Flood generations, the difference between Nephilim and Anakim, how Jubilees envisions the End of Days, and what really happened with Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.

For lots more information on Nephilim and Anakim, please see here.
For more on Jubilees, see here.
The class on Noah’s Ark and the Tower of Babel
Part One and Part Two of this series on the Apocrypha.

Secrets of Pi

This week’s conjoined Torah portions of Vayak’hel and Pekudei conclude the description of the Mishkan’s construction. The Haftarah for Pekudei is a passage from the seventh chapter of I Kings (the exact verses vary by community) describing King Solomon’s construction of the Jerusalem Temple. One of the most breathtaking structures standing in front of the Temple was the “Molten Sea”, a large bathtub for the kohanim to immerse in (as per Rashi and II Chronicles 4:6). The Tanakh describes that the bath was circular, sitting upon a base of twelve oxen statues, and had a total depth of five cubits, roughly ten feet. It held a volume of alpayim bat, “two thousand baths” of water (I Kings 7:26). In fact, the Hebrew bat (בת) is likely the etymology for the English word “bath”!

Illustration of the First Jerusalem Temple, or Solomon’s Temple, with the Molten Sea on the right.

What’s most perplexing in the description is that we are told the diameter of the circular tub was 10 cubits, yet its circumference was 30 cubits. Throughout history, many have pointed out that this seems to be an error! We all know that the ratio of a circle’s circumference to its diameter is π or Pi, which is 3.1415926 (and so on). So, the Tanakh should have said that the diameter was 10 cubits and the circumference was 31 or 31 and a half cubits. How do we solve this puzzle, and what deeper significance does Pi hold in the Torah?

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