The primary meaning of the biblical Hebrew word torahה ָרוֹתּ, coming from the root word yarah ה ָרָי meaning ‘to shoot’, is literally ‘teaching’, ‘direction’ or ‘instruction’, like an arrow shot from a bow in archery which hits its target exactly. It is 321
interesting to note that a BH cognate root word, harah,ה ָרָה is linked to the physical act of human conception. As in English, this particular word has the double inflexion of both mental enlightenment and physical impregnation. Thus the most 322
succinct translation of the word torah is ‘teaching’, and it implies a type of teaching which has direction, and both encourages and sparks growth, meeting ‘the target’ exactly. ‘Teaching’ therefore describes, in part, the essence and the genre that the Torah holds within Jewish collective consciousness. Rabbi Goldie Milgram beautifully describes Torah as ‘the sacred meeting place of generations’, where, much more than a collection of bible stories, it is a place where we have the invitation to,
‘dialogue and dance, wrestle with our ancestors’ visions and formulate our own. (The) Torah is a place to both find and make meaning. The meaning is often hidden,
buried inside the text, and inside of you.’ 323
The assertion that a primary function of the Torah as a covenantal document within the sacred community, necessitates the question, what does it mean to actually teach,
It is interesting to note that one of the biblical Hebrew verbs used for ‘sin’ is chata, אָטָח coming
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from the root meaning ‘to miss’, communicating the idea of ‘missing the mark’ or going off course. See BDB, 306.
See Mariner, The Torah, 8
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Rabbi Goldie Milgram, Meaning and Mitzvah: Daily Practices for Reclaiming Judaism (Woodstock, VT:
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and what does it mean to learn? At its most basic level, teaching could be 324
considered to be the act of imparting or transmitting knowledge or understanding, to a student. A ‘teacher’, then, is one who engages in and facilitates this act of transmission, and acts as a conduit between the student and the subject of learning. Learning, however, cannot be a simple absorption of pre-digested 325
information - true learning requires engagement and active participation, as expressed in the infamous phrase ‘tell me and I forget, teach me and I may remember…involve me and I learn’. That is why the Torah, in Jewish thought, is 326
the ultimate ‘teacher’ — the meaning is actively drawn out by the community and invites participation, and in so doing the directional meaning or deeper significance of the teaching is internalised.
In fact the relationship between the memory of Sinai in Jewish consciousness and daily life is crystallised by the communal response of ma’aseh ve’nish’ma - ‘we will do, and we will hear’ in Exodus 24:7. Such a formula is a radical alternative to a seemingly logical approach of hearing what it is you are to do first, understanding
The BH word for ‘year’, shanah, literally means ‘to repeat’, ‘to change’ and ‘to teach’, as well as
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‘year’. This offers interpretive possibilities understanding a year is repetition in some senses, but through that repetition we learn/are taught, and thus we also change year to year. See BDB, 1039.
In Biblical Hebrew, a second word exists for the word ‘teacher’ apart from torah/moreh. It is melamed
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which comes from the root lamed to learn. Therefore a student or a disciple (a talmid) learns (talmud) teaching (Torah) from the teacher (melamed). Pirke Avot, (‘Ethics of the Fathers’ - a written compilation of the wisdom and ethics of the Rabbis from the Mishnaic period, and famed for its well-known sayings and ethical principles) says - ‘I have learned from all my teachers, and from my students… most of all’. See Leonard Kravitz and Kerry Olitzky, eds., Pirke Avot: A Modern Commentary on Jewish Ethics (New Jersey: Behrman House, 1993)
This phrase has been widely accredited to Benjamin Franklin, but recent research presents that this
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is incorrect and the phrase most likely emerges from a Chinese proverb. see http:// www.barrypopik.com/index.php/new_york_city/entry/
tell_me_and_i_forget_teach_me_and_i_may_remember_involve_me_and_i_will_lear/ andhttp:// www.gazettextra.com/weblogs/word-badger/2013/mar/24/whose-quote-really/. Retrieved April 10 2015
why, and then doing it. ‘Hearing’ as conveyed in the Torah, is preceded by the communal act of ‘doing’, indicating that being an active participant releases the capacity to truly ‘hear’.
The broader goal of all teaching, whether religious or secular, is to educate and to inform, so that the student is enabled to reach their fullest potential, succinctly expressed in the Latin term educare, ‘to draw out that which lies within’. Thus, Torah understood in this vein is that which guides and enlightens, informs and instructs, and draws out ‘that which lies within’, for the covenanted community. Rolf Rendorff writes in his analysis of traditional theological issues in relation to the various documents and statements published by the World Council of Churches and its member churches on Christian relations with Jews and Judaism, that we can definitively conclude from the different denominational statements the “notion that one could earn salvation by fulfilling the Torah is not a Jewish idea…Torah means ‘teaching’ or ‘instruction’: how to live within the covenant God has established”. 327