Just in time for the new parsha cycle, the weeklyTorah portion recited in synagogues every Shabbat, the Orthodox Union Torah web series Shnayim Mikra will be arriving at an inbox near you. Beginning with Bereshit (Genesis), the first parsha of the Jewish calendar year, the Shnayim Mikra series will launch a daily email on Saturday night, October 11, prior to the Torah reading on Shabbat, October 18.
The Torah obligation of Shnayim Mikra, translated literally as “the text twice,” is derived from the Talmud in Brachot 8a: “One should always complete the reading of one’s weekly Torah portion with the congregation, twice from the mikra (i.e. Torah) and once from the Targum (commentary).”
Shnayim Mikra email subscribers will receive a text synopsis of each aliyah with a link to an audio lecture on OU Torah at http://www.ou.org/torah/ . Inspired by OU Torah’s highly successful Nach Yomi (daily Prophets and Writings) series, the Shnayim Mikra website began in 2009. In addition to the lecture and synopsis, the website features the parsha’s original text in Hebrew with English translation.
Rabbi Jack Abramowitz, editor of OU Torah, who provides the synopsis, explained, “When we created the Nach Yomi series a number of years ago, many people were so happy with the program that they requested us to expand a series for the Chumash (the Five Books of Moses) as well. The Shnayim Mikra series was designed to facilitate readers’ ability to review the parsha that will be completed by the end of every week.” Each week, there will be seven installments, each day corresponding to one of the seven aliyot – the calling of a congregant to the bimah to read aloud a segment of the parsha – and to complete the parsha in its entirety by the end of the week.
Contributors include Rabbi Dr. Tzvi Hersh Weinreb, executive vice president, emeritus, of the OU; Rabbi Yitzchak Etshalom, Los Angeles-based educator and author of Between the Lines of the Bible; Rabbi Menachem Leibtag, Bible scholar and educator in Israel; and Rabbi Dr. Gidon Rothstein, rosh yeshiva (dean) of the Yeshiva University Community Kollel based in the Five Towns, among others. The text synopses, written in clear and concise everyday language, were prepared by Rabbi Abramowitz, author of The Shnayim Mikra Companion.
To subscribe to OU Torah’s Shnayim Mikra email, go to http://www.ou.org/torah/parsha-series/shnayim-mikra.