Before Chapter and Verse

"What a stimulating and impressive work! Stimulating in the ideas and insights that it advances, and impressive in the thoughtfulness around their explication."Rabbi Dr. David E. S. Stein, Bible scholar and editor.The Torah (Five Books of Moses), as well as the rest of the Bible,was not composed in chapters and verses. It was divided intochapters only in the thirteenth century CE. It took another twocenturies before numbered verses were used. How then was itcomposed? Is there any logic to the way its stories and laws wereassembled? Do its five books have clearly demarcated divisions?Can the identification of such divisions lead to deeperunderstandings? These are among the questions that formed thebasis of an extensive research project.Before Chapter and Verse, the fruit of that research, presents asurprising discovery. To read the Torah as it was written, the textmust be arranged in columns and rows, as tables, or more properly,weaves. Each of the eighty-six literary units that comprise the Torahwas constructed as a warp and woof, with the stone tablets of theDecalogue providing the prototype. In turn, these units were woventogether in the structures that form the five books. The weavinganalogy applies to both the micro level of the unit and the macrolevel of the books.Before Chapter and Verse provides you with the tools to read theTorah as it was woven. It includes an English translation of theTorah's eighty-six units, presented according to their literarystructures, as well as maps showing the structure of each book.