Take One Daf Yomi

Today’s Daf Yomi pages, Pesachim 8 and 9, remind us of the difficulty and importance of doing good deeds for their own sake. Producer Josh Kross returns to share a story of an emotional Thanksgiving, and teach us a lesson on life in the time of COVID-19. How does an ancient story about pilgrimage help us rethink our very modern priorities? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi pages, Pesachim 6 and 7, riff about blessings, which we always make before performing a mitzvah. With one notable exception: Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin returns to help us make sense of one more way the night of Passover is different. How is the seder like a ritual pool? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Pesachim 5, is serious about the prohibition on having any unleavened bread in the house before Passover. Author Meira Spivak joins us to share her full-proof method for physical and spiritual cleaning. Can true preparation occur in just under a week? Or is the task of prepping for Pesach a year-long obligation? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Pesachim 4, gives us a helpful reminder that any mitzvah worth doing is worth doing early. Dr. Elana Stein Hain joins us to explain this principle, and why it's essential in these busy and distracted times. Does the early bird always get the mitzvah? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Pesachim 3, finds the rabbis singing the praises of euphemisms and going to great lengths not to say bad words. Why? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Pesachim 2, kicks off Tractate Pesachim, and, as per usual with the Talmud, it does so in a quizzical fashion. Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin returns to introduce us to this new tractate. Why refer to Passover in the plural? And why start out the discussion with the word "light"? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi pages, Eruvin 103, 104, and 105, bring to a close Tractate Eruvin, one of the Talmud's most intricate and complicated volumes. Law professor Ethan Lieb joins us to celebrate, and muse on the Hadran, the blessing at the end of each tractate, which contains a surprising message we shouldn't ignore. Why does the Talmud animate each one of its tractates? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Eruvin 102, is very much in vogue, asking about the black hats that observant Jewish men so often wear. But why wear these hats at all? Rabbi Dovid Bashevkin returns to offer his observations on the meeting of style and substance, and what the black hat truly means. Are orthodox Jews fashion outliers? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Eruvin 101, discusses tradition, and why the way we used to do thing matters when we try to figure out what's right and what's wrong. Yehuda Goldberg joins us to discuss the importance of customs. How do customs help us build community? Listen and find out.

Today’s Daf Yomi page, Eruvin 100, has the rabbis warning against a husband trying to have intercourse with his wife without her explicit consent. Rabbi Aviva Richman joins us to explain why this rabbinic recognition of the notion of consent is tremendously meaningful even if it is deeply flawed. What can this passage teach us about the Talmud's approach to sex? Listen and find out.