The difference between Oral Torah and Written Torah

3-24-16

Elliana Bogost

Jewish History

March 25, 2016

In Judaism there is the written Torah and the oral Torah.  The written Torah

refers to the five books of Moses.  The oral Torah refers to the laws, statutes and

Jewish code that were not written down in the first five books.  They were oral laws

passed down from generation to generation until finally after the destruction of the

Second Temple in 70 CE, they were written down.  The Oral Laws consist of the

Mishnah and the Gamra, which combined, are the Talmud.  The Orthodox Jews

believe that the Oral Law was passed from God to Moses and Moses needed to

interpret God’s will and teach to the Jewish people. The Oral Law reflects the

interpretations on the Torah by various Rabbis over the centuries.

There are different examples of how the Oral Law interprets the Written

Law.  For example God tells us to not work on the Sabbath.  However, the Torah

does not tell us what kind of work he means.  Therefore there has to be oral

interpretation to determine what kind of work is not allowed.  Another example is

that in the Torah God tell the Jewish people that they must slaughter an animal from

their herd.  However, there is no written law on how to slaughter the animal.  The

Mishna tells us how to slaughter to make the animal kosher.  The written Torah is

strictly interpreted and the Oral Torah is commentary, however they cannot exist

without each other.  In the Written law, the Torah demands an “eye for an eye”.

How does a Jew interpret this?  Does God mean that if someone destroys your eye,

you must literally take his eye?  The oral law helps us understand that what God

means is that what someone does to another person the other person must also be

punished in a similar way.

The Oral Torah allows for much more interpretation.  The fact that it

remained oral for centuries allowed for different interpretations.  When a law is

interpreted from Oral tradition it becomes more flexible.  Generations have passed

down their own ideas of what the laws are and made them more applicable to the

time period of each generation.  Because the Talmud is based on oral law, the rules

are not as strict.  There is much more room to analyze and learn from what

generations have handed down to us.  The written law does not leave much room

for different interpretations and therefore the written law is much more difficult to

apply to modern Judaism.

The Modern Reform movement does not take the Oral Laws literally.  They

view these laws with their own interpretations of modern day life.  They see that the

Rabbis, Jewish Scholars and religious leaders are all legitimate but differing

opinions on the Oral Laws.  Reform Jews living in the modern world need to view

the Written laws and Oral laws as complementary.  They help us understand our

history and what God has asked of us.  However, we cannot literally live by these

very outdated laws.  The idea of Oral law is important to understand that

generations that came before us were allowed to give their own meaning to the laws

and we as Modern Jews should be allowed to apply the general principals but do so

in a way that applies to our daily lives that will give it meaning.