Tosefta

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Part of a series of articles on
Jews and Judaism

Judaism · Core principles
God · Tanakh (Torah / Nevi'im / Ketuvim)
Talmud · Halakha · Holidays · Prayer
Ethics · 613 Mitzvot · Customs · Midrash

Jewish ethnic divisions
Ashkenazi · Sephardi · Mizrahi · Lost tribes

Population (historical) · By country
Israel · Iran · USA · Russia/USSR · Poland
Canada · Germany · France · England
India · Spain · Portugal · Latin America
Muslim lands · Turkey · Iraq · Syria
Lists of Jews · Crypto-Judaism

Jewish denominations · Rabbis
Orthodox · Conservative · Reform
Reconstructionist · Liberal · Karaite
Alternative · Renewal

Jewish languages
Hebrew · Yiddish · Judeo-Persian. Ladino
Judeo-Aramaic · Judeo-Arabic
Juhuri · Krymchak · Karaim · Knaanic
· Yevanic · Zarphatic · Dzhidi

Political movements · Zionism
Labor Zionism · Revisionist Zionism
Religious Zionism · General Zionism
The Bund · World Agudath Israel
Jewish feminism · Israeli politics

History · Timeline · Leaders
Ancient · Temple · Babylonian exile
Jerusalem (In Judaism · Timeline)
Hasmoneans · Sanhedrin · Schisms
Pharisees · Jewish-Roman wars
Diaspora · And Christianity · And Islam
Middle Ages · Kabbalah · Hasidism
Haskalah · Emancipation · Holocaust
Aliyah · Israel (History) · Arab conflict

Persecution · Antisemitism
The Holocaust
History of antisemitism
New antisemitism

v • d • e

The Tosefta is a secondary compilation of the Jewish oral law from the period of the Mishnah.

1 Overview
2 Commentary Editions
- 2.1 Orthodox scholars
- 2.2 Non-Orthodox scholars
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] Overview

In many ways, the Tosefta acts as a supplement to the Mishnah (tosefta means "supplement"). The Mishnah is the basic compilation of the Oral law of Judaism; it was compiled around 200 CE. The Tosefta is a Halakhic work which corresponds in structure almost exactly to the Mishnah, with the same divisions for sedarim ("orders") and masekhot ("tractates"). It is mainly written in Mishnaic Hebrew, with some Aramaic.

The Mishnah was redacted by Judah haNasi in consultation with members of his yeshiva ("academy"), while the Tosefta was edited by Rabbis Hiyya and Oshaiah on their own, thus the Tosefta is considered less authoritative in the Orthodox Jewish world. (Rashi in his commentary on Talmud Sanhedrin 33a).

The text of most of Tosefta agrees nearly verbatim with the Mishnah, and often varies only slightly. The Tosefta offers authors' names for laws that are anonymous in the Mishnah; It also augments the Mishnah with additional glosses and discussions. The Tosefta as we have it today functions like a commentary on unquoted Mishnaic material; It offers additional aggadic and midrashic material, and it sometimes contradicts the Mishnah in the ruling of Halakha (Jewish law), or in declaring in whose name a law was given.

Much of the Tosefta is currently regarded as being written shortly after the Mishnah was redacted. However, recent scholarship, especially by Professor Shamma Friedman, reveals that the Tosefta draws on source material earlier than the later material in the Mishnah. It may well be that parts of the Tosefta predate the Mishnah.