Rabbi Yitzy Ceitlin began studying the Talmud at the age of 10. Now, with rabbinic and master’s degrees, Ceitlin is more than qualified to teach a course on the “book that defines Judaism” with Chabad of Washington D.C. and TheSHUL of the Nation’s Capital.

“Decoding the Talmud” is a six-week Rohr Jewish Learning Institute course on Wednesday evenings from May 7 to June 11. Jewish Learning Institute courses seek to stimulate all three areas of a learner’s brain: visual, textual and conversational, according to Ceitlin.

“Talmud essentially is the source of all Jewish knowledge, ideas, concepts, instruction, law, history, ethics — it’s all in the Talmud,” Ceitlin said. “The general idea [of the course] is to tackle and fully understand and to get a taste of the Talmud now.”

While he has taught Talmud to yeshiva students for years, this is the first time Ceitlin is teaching a course on the Talmud.

“We call it ‘Decoding the Talmud’ because there’s so many codes in the Talmud,” he said. “It’s not a clear, straight-up book you take off the shelf and read. You have to learn how it works. You have to learn its methodology. You have to navigate the page. And we’re going to break it down for everyone and give them many different insights on what the Talmud is, the methodology and how to actually study it.”

Ceitlin is attempting to compress seven years of yeshiva study into six “very short” lessons.

“That’s kind of to give everyone a taste of yeshiva, a taste of how it works,” he said. “It can be very logical, so if you like brain twisters [and] good Talmudic logic, then this is definitely the course to do that.”

The course doesn’t require a potential participant to have any background knowledge of the “Jewish encyclopedia” or belong to Chabad of DC. Ceitlin said any adult with a college degree and an interest in the Talmud is welcome to join.

“Talmud is for anyone,” Ceitlin said. “You just have to have a curiosity and a willingness to want to understand it.”

He added that studying the Talmud is uniquely challenging because the text is written in Hebrew and ancient Aramaic, the latter being a tongue “no one even knows now,” according to Ceitlin.

“The language of the Talmud is the trickiest part simply because it isn’t a set language,” he said. “The hardest part is the wording — not just the translation of the word, but the decoding [of] the words.”

Ceitlin said understanding the text is much more accessible than it’s ever been thanks to modern translations. While he doesn’t assign any homework, Ceitlin provides voluntary exercises and resources to anyone who wants to learn a little extra after the course.

He looks forward to seeing participants learn new skills and connect with a Jewish text.

“I want the students to leave with many ‘aha’ moments: ‘That’s why Judaism [teaches this],’ or ‘That’s why the Talmud is so special,’” he said. “They should be leaving with an ability to pick up a Talmud and to read any tractate that they want on any topic that they want.”

https://www.washingtonjewishweek.com/chabad-of-washington-dc-decodes-the-talmud/