Sifre on Numbers: An Annotated Edition

Sifre is a Tannaitic midrash on the book of Numbers, and is rightfully considered to be one of the fundamental assets of our ancient literature. Its previous edition was published about hundred years ago by R. Hayyim Shaul Horovitz. Since then, additional manuscripts have been discovered of Sifre, its first commentators, and medieval collections and midrashim that cite it. This was accompanied by the significant development of the methodological conceptions of the study of the Rabbinic literature, and of the ways to publish critical editions of this literature. All these factors justify the publication of a new scientific edition of this midrash.

The text of the new edition, that is based on MS. Vatican 32, includes many versions that differ from the earlier version, and that occasionally shed new light on the exegeses and halakhot of the Sifre. It is accompanied by the scholarly apparatus that lists and explains all of the edition's changes from the version of MS. Vatican. The number of direct and indirect textual witnesses presented in the "Textual Variants" section of the new edition is twice, and at times even triple, the number of textual witnesses that were available to Horowitz. In the detailed commentary on the expositions in Sifre, I made considerable use of all the Sifre commentators who preceded me, and who made a decisive contribution to the literal explanation of the midrash's exegeses and the clarification of their meaning. Thanks, however, to the diverse textual witnesses available to me and the great progress made in recent generations in the study of the language and teachings of the Tannaim, I believe that I have succeeded in recreating the original version of many expositions, in giving them a new and straightforward explanation, and in advancing the research of their redaction.

The edition is intended, first and foremost, for the scholars, in Israel and throughout the world, who are engaged in the research of all aspects of the Rabbinic literature. Additionally, the new edition will likely aid the community of Torah scholars who teach and study in yeshivot, and the educated public at large.

The first half of the work, comprising the portions of Naso and Beha'alotekha, was published by Magnes Press in 2011.

Contents

Part I: The Edition
Volume 1
Preface
Symbols of the textual witnesses of Sifre on Numbers
List of symbols in the edition
Introduction
Editing rules for the text and the accompanying scholarly apparatus
Textual variants
Parallels passages in Talmudic literature
The commentary
Edition of Sifre on Numbers, portions of Naso and Beha'alotekha (the base text, and below it: 1. Scholarly notes to the base text; 2. Talmudic parallels; 3. Textual variants)
Volume 2
Preface
Edition of Sifre on Numbers, portions of Shelach till Masei (the base text, and below it: 1. Scholarly notes to the base text; 2. Talmudic parallels; 3. Textual variants)
Part II
Commentary on Sifre, Piska‛ot 1-58 (portion of Naso)
Part III
Commentary on Sifre, Piska‛ot 59-106 (portion of Beha'alotekha)
Part IV
Commentary on Sifre, Piska‛ot 107-161 (portions of Shelach – Masei)
List of abbreviations of the primary sources and the scholarly literature
Indices