Mishnah

The Mishnah (; Hebrew: מִשְׁנָה, romanized: mišnā, lit.'study by repetition', from the verb לִשְׁנוֹתlišnot, "to repeat") is the first written collection of the Jewish oral traditions. These oral traditions are known as the "Oral Torah", to differentiate them from the (written) Torah, and both are believed in rabbinic tradition to have been revealed alongside each other to Moses at Mount Sinai. While the Torah was passed down in writing, the Oral Torah is believed to have been transmitted by Jewish scholars until the compilation of the Mishnah in the late second or early third century CE. The Mishnah is viewed as authoritative and binding revelation by most Orthodox Jews and some non-Orthodox Jews. The Mishnah is also the basis of the Babylonian Talmud and the Jerusalem Talmud, which are both commentaries on the Mishnah.

According to tradition, the Mishnah arose during the persecution of Jews in the late second or early third century. Fearing that these events would lead to the oral traditions of the Second Temple period (516 BCE – 70 CE) to being forgotten, Judah ha-Nasi compiled the Mishnah in its current form, either in Beit Shearim or in Sepphoris. It was mainly written in Mishnaic Hebrew, but some parts are also in Jewish Aramaic. The oldest surviving physical fragments are from the 6th to 7th centuries.