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About this book

Deuteronomy

About this book
Chapter 6

1 Now these are the commandments, statutes, and ordinances that the Lord your God instructed me to teach you so that you may carry them out in the land where you are headed 2 and that you may so revere the Lord your God that you will keep all his statutes and commandments that I am giving you—you, your children, and your grandchildren—all your lives, to prolong your days. 3 Pay attention, Israel, and be careful to do this so that it may go well with you and that you may increase greatly in number—as the Lord, the God of your ancestors, said to you, you will have a land flowing with milk and honey.⁠ 4 Hear, O Israel: The Lord is our God, the Lord is one!⁠ 5 You must love the Lord your God with your whole mind, your whole being, and all your strength.⁠ 6 These words I am commanding you today must be kept in mind, 7 and you must teach them to your children and speak of them as you sit in your house, as you walk along the road, as you lie down, and as you get up.⁠ 8 You should tie them as a reminder on your forearm and fasten them as symbols on your forehead.⁠ 9 Inscribe them on the doorframes of your houses and gates.⁠ 10 Then when the Lord your God brings you to the land he promised your ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob to give you—a land with large, fine cities you did not build, 11 houses filled with choice things you did not accumulate, hewn-out cisterns you did not dig, and vineyards and olive groves you did not plant—and you eat your fill, 12 be careful not to forget the Lord who brought you out of Egypt, that place of slavery. 13 You must revere the Lord your God, serve him, and take oaths using only his name. 14 You must not go after other gods, those of the surrounding peoples, 15 for the Lord your God, who is present among you, is a jealous God—his anger will erupt against you and remove you from the land. 16 You must not put the Lord your God to the test as you did at Massah.⁠ 17 Keep his commandments very carefully, as well as the stipulations and statutes he commanded you to observe. 18 Do whatever is proper and good before the Lord so that it may go well with you and that you may enter and occupy the good land that he promised your ancestors, 19 and that you may drive out all your enemies just as the Lord said. 20 When your children ask you later on,⁠ “What are the stipulations, statutes, and ordinances that the Lord our God commanded you?”⁠ 21 you must say to them, “We were Pharaoh’s slaves in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out of Egypt in a powerful way. 22 And he brought signs and great, devastating wonders on Egypt, on Pharaoh, and on his whole family before our very eyes. 23 He delivered us from there so that he could give us the land he had promised our ancestors. 24 The Lord commanded us to obey all these statutes and to revere him so that it may always go well for us and he may preserve us, as he has to this day. 25 We will be innocent if we carefully keep all these commandments before the Lord our God, just as he demands.”

Texts in conversation

Berakhot Pictures God Wearing Tefillin

Hebrew Bible · Rabbinic

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Summary

Deuteronomy commands Israel to bind God’s words on their hand and forehead by wearing tefillin. Rabbinic tradition in tractate Berakhot describes God himself wearing tefillin, inscribed with verses praising Israel as a unique nation in the world.

Passages

Deuteronomy 6:8

Hebrew Bible
7 and you must teach them to your children and speak of them as you sit in your house, as you walk along the road, as you lie down, and as you get up. 8 You should tie them as a reminder on your forearm and fasten them as symbols on your forehead. 9 Inscribe them on the doorframes of your houses and gates.
750–400 BCE (scholarly estimate) Read in Deuteronomy

Berakhot 6a

Rabbinic · Babylonian Talmud
The Gemara asks: Since the Divine Presence rests even upon three, is it necessary to mention ten? The Gemara answers: The Divine Presence arrives before a group of ten, as the verse: “God stands in the congregation of God,” indicates that when the ten individuals who comprise a congregation arrive, the Divine Presence is already there. For a group of three judges, however, the Divine Presence does not arrive until they sit and begin their deliberations, as in the midst of the judges He judges. God aids them in their judgment, but does not arrive before them. The Gemara cites another aggadic statement: Rabbi Avin bar Rav Adda said that Rabbi Yitzḥak said: From where is it derived that the Holy One, Blessed be He, wears phylacteries? As it is stated: “The Lord has sworn by His right hand, and by the arm of His strength” (Isaiah 62:8). Since it is customary to swear upon holy objects, it is understood that His right hand and the arm of His strength are the holy objects upon which God swore. Specifically, “His right hand” refers to the Torah, as it is stated in describing the giving of the Torah: “From His right hand, a fiery law for His people” (Deuteronomy 33:2). “The arm of His strength,” His left hand, refers to phylacteries, as it is stated: “The Lord gave strength to His nation” (Psalms 29:11), in the form of the mitzva of phylacteries.
450–550 CE (scholarly estimate) Read in Berakhot

References

“... But the tallit was not God’s only ritual accessory. Some rabbis also claimed God wore tefillin—small pouches or boxes containing tiny scrolls bearing holy words found in portions of Exodus and Deuteronomy. Fixed to the head and the left arm (or the right for left-handed people), they appear to have been in use among Jewish groups from as early as the second century BCE, and are still worn in prayer by Jewish men (and, increasingly, some women) today. These sacred objects manifest obedience to one of the most authoritative of divine instructions in the book of Deuteronomy—an instruction which itself appears in one of the tiny scrolls contained in the tefillin boxes... According to teaching passed on by the fourth-century CE Rabbi Avin, evidence indicating that God wore tefillin was to be found in selected verses in Deuteronomy, Isaiah and the Psalms... To a reader unfamiliar with the interpretative gymnastics of rabbinic scriptural exposition, Rabbi Avin’s argument looks impenetrably esoteric. But it is the dynamic corporeal image of God’s body, conjured by the rabbi’s comfortable insistence that God wears tefillin, that is more striking. It is highly unlikely the rabbis of antiquity would have imagined these sacred objects magically appearing on God’s body in a sudden blinding flash or a mysterious puff of smoke. Instead, they naturally assumed that God did what they did: he bound a pouch containing a portion of the Torah onto his upper arm with a long strip of leather, winding the strap down his arm and around his hand. ...”
Francesca Stavrakopoulou, God: An Anatomy (Picador, 2022), 297–298.

References are not endorsements of their contents. Read each reference in full to understand its author's intentions in using these texts.

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Deuteronomy 6:8 and Berakhot 6a

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