Shema Yisrael

The word שְׁמַע is the imperative of the verb to hear. In biblical Hebrew this verb is broader than the everyday sense of hearing: it covers both hearing so as to understand and hearing so as to obey. For this reason commentators usually read this first word as a call to attention, not as an announcement.

The word Israel here refers to the people of Israel, the descendants of the patriarch Jacob, who was given the name Israel according to Genesis chapter 32. The verse addresses the whole people as if speaking to one person, and throughout the first paragraph every word for you is in the singular. A story in the Talmud, tractate Pesachim folio 56a, also reads the word Israel here as the patriarch Jacob himself, and tells that his sons spoke this verse at his bedside as he was dying: hear, O Israel our father, God is one.

In a handwritten Torah scroll, the letter ע at the end of the word Shema is written noticeably larger than the other letters. This point is discussed together with the second large letter in the third phrase below.

The first word of this phrase is the proper Name of God in the Hebrew Bible, made up of four consonants and transliterated into Latin letters as YHWH. According to the tradition, this Name is not pronounced as it is written. When they meet it in prayer, Jews read it as Adonai, meaning my Lord. This is why the transliteration column gives Adonai, the sound the reader actually says, the Vietnamese column translates it as Đức Chúa, the Lord, and the English column, following the custom of older English Bibles, prints LORD in capital letters.

Prayer books print the Name in different ways. Some print all four letters with vowel points, as on this page, some print two letters יְיָ, and some print a single letter ה׳ with an abbreviation mark. The difference is only one of printing and does not change how it is read.

The word אֱלֹהֵינוּ, transliterated Eloheinu, is the word Elohim, God, with the ending meaning our. That the word our stands right inside a declaration about the one God shows that the verse speaks both about God and about the covenant between Him and a people. Commentators read the two halves of the verse in different ways, and the section on the word echad below sets out these readings.

The word אֶחָד, transliterated eḥad, ordinarily means one. The ways of understanding this word are set out in a separate section below.

Like the letter ע in the word Shema, the letter ד at the end of the word echad is also written large in a handwritten Torah scroll. Commentators give two explanations. The first is that it guards against misreading: if the ע were mistaken for an א, the word Shema, hear, would become a word meaning perhaps, and if the ד were mistaken for the very similar looking ר, echad, one, would become aḥer, other, that is, another god. The second is that the two large letters together form עד, transliterated ed, meaning witness, recalling Isaiah 43:10: you are My witnesses. On this reading, the person who recites the Shema is standing up as a witness. These explanations are recorded in the midrash Vayikra Rabbah 19:2 and in the commentaries of Baal HaTurim and Kli Yakar on verse 6:4.

The Talmud, tractate Berakhot folio 13b, records that whoever prolongs the word echad when reciting the Shema has his days prolonged, provided he sounds the final ד fully. The Shulchan Arukh code, section Orach Chayim chapter 61, instructs the reader to draw out the ח and the ד so as to meditate on the kingship of God, and to stress the ד so that it is not heard as a ר.

This is the only line in the table not taken from Scripture. Mishnah tractate Yoma chapter 6 records it as the response of the priests and the people in the Temple courtyard when they heard the High Priest pronounce the Name of God on Yom Kippur. In the recitation of the Shema, this line is placed right after verse 6:4 as a response, and it is said in an undertone, according to the rule in the Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 61:13.

Tradition gives two accounts of why it is said quietly. The Talmud, tractate Pesachim folio 56a, tells that when the patriarch Jacob was dying, his sons recited the Shema to declare that their hearts held only one God, just as their father's did, and Jacob answered with the Barukh shem line. The sages weighed the matter: Moshe did not write the line into the Torah, but the patriarch Jacob had said it, so they ruled that it should be said, but softly. The Talmud compares this to a princess who craved a fragrant sauce from the bottom of the pot and was too embarrassed to ask, so her servants quietly brought it to her.

The second account is in the midrash Devarim Rabbah 2:36: Moshe heard the angels chanting this line in heaven and brought it down to the people, like a man who took a piece of jewelry from the king's palace, gave it to his wife and told her to wear it only at home. That is why it is said in an undertone on ordinary days, and only on Yom Kippur, when people are likened to angels, is it said aloud.

The wording of the line is also understood in slightly different ways. The library's translation follows the words closely: blessed be the name of His glorious kingdom, with glorious going together with kingdom. Some prayer book translations, such as the English translation of the Metsudah edition itself, read it as blessed be His Name, whose glorious kingdom is forever and ever. Both ways of dividing the phrase are grammatically sound.

This verse raises something that surprises many first-time readers: love is given as a commandment. Jewish commentators understand the love here not only as a feeling that arises by itself, but as the direction of a whole life, expressed through deeds, through study and through faithfulness to the covenant.

The three phrases with all thy heart, with all thy soul and with all thy might are explained one by one in Mishnah tractate Berakhot chapter 9. With all thy heart: the word for heart here is written לְבָבְךָ with two ב letters instead of one, so the Mishnah reads it as loving with both inclinations of the human heart, the good inclination and the evil inclination. With all thy soul: even if He takes your soul, that is, even at the cost of your life. With all thy might: the word מְאֹדֶךָ, transliterated me'odekha, is originally an adverb meaning very or greatly, used here as a noun, which makes it hard to translate, and the Mishnah gives two readings: with all your wealth, or whatever measure He metes out to you, give Him thanks.

The word נַפְשְׁךָ, from the word nefesh, which the Vietnamese column translates as linh hồn, soul, is close in biblical Hebrew to life itself, to the living person, rather than to a soul separate from the body in the later philosophical sense.

The speaker of the word I in this verse, אָנֹכִי, transliterated anokhi, is Moshe according to the narrative frame of Deuteronomy, the one passing on God's words to the people. For this reason the Vietnamese column writes the pronoun ta, I, in lower case rather than capitalized.

The words this day are explained by Rashi, the medieval French commentator: these words should not be in your eyes like an old decree that no one pays attention to any more, but like a new decree that everyone runs to receive. The Shulchan Arukh, Orach Chayim 61:2, takes this very idea as guidance for those who recite the Shema each day: recite it as though it were something new.

The words upon thy heart, rather than in thy heart, have also been much discussed. A saying handed down in Hasidic circles, often attributed to the rebbe of Kotzk, explains that the human heart is not always open, so the words are placed on top, so that when the heart breaks open they fall inside. This is an orally transmitted remark, not a classical commentary.

The verb וְשִׁנַּנְתָּם shares a root with the word for sharp. Its literal sense is close to whetting, making sharp, so the English column, following the 1917 version, translates it as teach them diligently, while the Vietnamese column translates it as khắc sâu, engrave deeply. Rashi, following the Sifre, explains it as letting these words be sharp and ready in your mouth, so that when anyone asks you, you can answer at once without hesitating.

The words thy children are understood by the Sifre and Rashi to include students as well, since in the language of Scripture students are also called children.

The four scenes of sitting in the house, walking by the way, lying down and rising up take in the whole of a person's day. The last two, when thou liest down and when thou risest up, are the basis of the law of reciting the Shema twice a day. Mishnah tractate Berakhot chapter 1 records a debate over these two phrases. The school of Shammai took them literally: in the evening one reclines to recite, and in the morning one stands to recite. The school of Hillel took them as marking the time, that is, when people go to bed and when they get up, while each person recites in whatever posture they are in. The law follows the school of Hillel.

This verse is the basis of tefillin, two small leather boxes holding handwritten passages of the Torah, one bound on the arm and one placed on the head. Rabbinic tradition reads the verse literally: to bind means actually to bind, and the sign is a real object.

The word טֹטָפֹת, transliterated totafot, is a rare word, found only three times in the Torah, at Exodus 13:16, in this verse and at Deuteronomy 11:18, and its original meaning is still unclear today. The English column, following the 1917 version, translates it as frontlets, meaning something worn on the forehead, and the Vietnamese column translates it as vật đeo, something worn. The Talmud, tractate Menachot folio 34b, explains the word by splitting it into two words borrowed from two other languages, each meaning two, and from this derives that the head tefillin has four compartments.

The words between thine eyes are not understood as a spot between the two eyes. The Talmud, tractate Menachot folio 37a, places it on the top of the head, where a baby's skull is still soft, so the head box is set at the hairline, above the point between the eyes. The separate section on tefillin and mezuzah below says more about the different readings of this verse.

The word מְזֻזוֹת, transliterated mezuzot, literally means doorposts, door frames. Over time the name of the doorpost itself came to be used for the object fixed to it: the mezuzah, a parchment scroll with the first and second paragraphs of the Shema written by hand, rolled up, placed in a small case and fixed to the doorpost.

Read the five verses together and the words can be seen moving from inside to outside. They begin upon the heart, then reach the mouth in teaching one's children and in conversation, then the body when bound on the hand and on the head, then the house when written on the doorposts, and finally the gates, where the house meets the road.

The word gates, שְׁעָרֶיךָ, in Scripture usually refers to city gates, where the elders sat to judge cases, as in the book of Ruth chapter 4. Later law applies the commandment of mezuzah to the doors of houses, the doors of rooms that are lived in and courtyard gates, under conditions discussed in detail in the codes of law.