שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל יי ְאֱלֹהֵינוּ יי | אֶחָד: וְאָהַבְתָּ אֵת יי אֱלֹהֶיךָ בְּכָל־לְבָבְךָ וּבְכָל־נַפְשְׁךָ וּבְכָל־מְאֹדֶךָ: וְהָיוּ הַדְּבָרִים הָאֵלֶּה אֲשֶׁר אָנֹכִי מְצַוְּךָ הַיּוֹם עַל־לְבָבֶךָ: וְשִׁנַּנְתָּם לְבָנֶיךָ וְדִבַּרְתָּ בָּם בְּשִׁבְתְּךָ בְּבֵיתֶךָ וּבְלֶכְתְּךָ בַדֶּרֶךְ וּבְשָׁכְבְּךָ וּבְקוּמֶךָ: וּקְשַׁרְתָּם לְאוֹת עַל־יָדֶךָ וְהָיוּ לְטֹטָפֹת בֵּין עֵינֶיךָ: ט וּכְתַבְתָּם עַל־מְזֻזוֹת בֵּיתֶךָ וּבִשְׁעָרֶיךָ:
Hear, O Israel; The Lord our God is one Lord; And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words, which I command you this day, shall be in your heart; And you shall teach them diligently to your children, and shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. And you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. And you shall write them upon the posts of your house, and on your gates.
Along with being our statement of belief in the God of Israel and accepting “the yoke of heaven”, as it is commonly referred to in Judaism, we also get commandments to do certain things in response to God.
1. Love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul and might.
2. Keep these words in your heart.
3. Teach them to your children.
4. Speak about them at home and when you travel.
5. Speak them when you go to bed and when you rise in the morning.
These above don’t need a great deal of asking “How do I do these?”
But the next show us the need for our Jewish tradition to help us obey God and honor His commandments.
6. You shall bind them for a sign on your hand.
7. They shall be as frontlets between your eyes.
8. You shall write them on the doorpost of your house and on your gates.
The Torah just gives us these commandments with none of the how to do them. From these commandments we get:
TEFILLIN
and
MEZUZAH
To fulfill the commandment to bind God’s words on your arm and forehead our tradition developed tefillin. The tefillin consist of two cube-shaped leather boxes, one worn on the head, the other on the arm, with leather straps fixed to them for attaching them to the head and the arm. Into these boxes, known as batim, “houses,” the four passages, written by hand, are inserted.
The hand tefillin (in the Rabbinic tradition the “hand” here means the arm) contains all four sections written on a single strip of parchment. In the head tefillin there are four separate compartments, one for each of the four. The four sections are: (a) Exodus 13:1-10; (b) Exodus 13:11-16; (c) Deuteronomy 6:4-9; (d) Deuteronomy 11:12-21. Although the box (bayit, “house,” singular of batim) of the head tefillin has to be in the form of an exact square (in the part into which the sections are inserted; this part rests on a larger base), it is divided into four compartments for the insertion of the sections, care being taken that these should not be separated from one another in such a way as to interfere with the square shape. The box of the hand tefillin consists of a single compartment into which all four sections, written on a single strip, are inserted. The boxes have to be completely black as well as square-shaped.
(from http://www.myjewishlearning.com/daily_life/Prayer/Ritual_Garb/Tefillin.htm)
They are traditionally worn by men at the Shacharit or morning prayer service on weekdays. In Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist Judaism there are also women who will wear tefillin at morning prayers.
The tradition of wearing tefillin can be seen back at least to Second Temple period from Yeshua referring to some of the Pharisees making extra large boxes for their tefillin:
But they do all their deeds to be noticed by men; for they broaden their tefillin and lengthen the tzitzit of their garments.
(Matthew 23:5)
In these words Yeshua is letting us know that it was understood at this time that to fulfill the commandment to bind God’s words to the head and arm, that this was to be done by wearing the tefillin. We also see in this verse that Yeshua was critical of the Pharisees for seeking to fulfill the commandment by making the tefillin larger to be seen or wearing extra long tzitzit. In so doing we see that at least in the time of Yeshua that tefillin were known and used.
Also in the Dead Sea community, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found, there were also tefillin found that is on display at the Shrine of the Book in Jerusalem. So then this is an ancient understanding of the how to do these commandments.
When it comes to writing the words on the doorposts of the house and on the gates, our tradition came to develop the mezuzah. Originally the words of the Shema were actually engraved on the doorposts of homes later the mezuzah a box that contained a scroll with the Shema was attached to the doors of homes and businesses.
So in these brief examples we can see that Jewish tradition developed by the Rabbinic sages helps us to understand and do God’s commandments.
May we seek to walk in God’s ways and live His Torah daily.
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