Talmudical Hermeneutics

Talmudical hermeneutics (Hebrew: מידות שהתורה נדרשת בהן) defines the rules and methods for the investigation and exact determination of the meaning of the Scriptures, within the framework of Rabbinic Judaism. This includes, among others, the rules by which the requirements of the Oral Law and the Halakha are derived from and established by the written law.

These rules relate to:

Compilations of such hermeneutic rules were made in the earliest times. The tannaitic tradition recognizes three such collections, namely:

It must be borne in mind, however, that neither Hillel, Ishmael, nor Eliezer ben Jose sought to give a complete enumeration of the rules of interpretation current in his day. For some reason they restricted themselves to a compilation of the principal methods of logical deduction, which they called "middot" (measures), although the other rules also were known by that term (comp. Sifre, Num. 2 [ed. Friedmann, p. 2a]).

All the hermeneutic rules scattered through the Talmudim and Midrashim have been collected by Malbim in Ayyelet HaShachar, the introduction to his commentary on the Sifra, and have been reckoned at 613, to correspond with the 613 commandments. The antiquity of the rules can be determined only by the dates of the authorities who quote them, meaning that they cannot safely be declared older than the tanna to whom they are first ascribed. It is certain, however, that the seven middot of Hillel and the 13 of Rabbi Ishmael are earlier than the time of Hillel himself, who was the first to transmit them. At all events, he did not invent them, but merely collected them as current in his day, though he possibly amplified them. They were not immediately recognized by all as valid and binding. Different schools interpreted and modified them, restricting or expanding them, in various ways.

The Talmud itself gives no information concerning the origin of the middot, although the Geonim regarded them as Sinaitic (הלכה למשה מסיני, "Law given to Moses at Mount Sinai"; comp. Rabbi Samson of Chinon in his Sefer HaKeritot).

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