Guide
Palestinian Talmud
2nd–4th Centuries
By Carol Bakhos
The Palestinian Talmud, redacted in the latter part of the fourth century CE, is notable for its concision. It contains brief comments, glosses, and explanations of the Mishnah, in addition to some narrative materials and exegesis, and has less aggadic material than its Babylonian counterpart. Like the Mishnah that serves as the basis for its discussions, perhaps the most salient and striking feature of the Oral Torah—one featured prevalently in the Talmuds—is its embrace of disputes and dissenting views, despite its ostensibly normative agenda.
Related Primary Sources
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Kil’ayim
R. Simeon ben Lakish said: I will walk before the Lord in the land of the living (Psalm 116:9). But are not the lands of the living Tyre and its environs, Caesarea and its environs, [for] there…
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Shevi‘it
[A vote was taken and it was stated:] Regarding the entire Torah, whence do we know that if a non-Jew orders a Jew to transgress any of the commandments written in the Torah except for idolatry…
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Ḥagigah
R. Joshua b. Levi said [in reference to Deuteronomy 9:10: And the Lord gave me the two tablets of stone inscribed by the finger of God, and upon them the exact words that the Lord has addressed to you…
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Nedarim
R. Simeon ben Lakish discoursed: If one were to know that taking a vow of abstinence is like putting one’s neck in an iron collar would one take a vow? It is like a guard who passes a fortress and…
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Sanhedrin
Said R. Yoḥanan, “One who does not know how to derive that a reptile is pure and impure in one hundred ways, may not investigate [testimony] in merit [of the defendant].”
Rabbi…
Primary Source
Yerushalmi Gittin
If he transgressed and annulled [the divorce document]? Let us hear from the following: If he annulled, it is annulled, the words of Rabbi. Rabban Simeon ben Gamaliel says: He can neither annul it nor…