Join Rivka at 6:00pm on Saturday.
Pirkei Avot, Ethics of the Fathers, is a tractate of the Mishna that details the Torah's views on ethics and interpersonal relationships.
Atop Mount Sinai, over the course of forty days and nights, G‑d taught Moses the entire Torah. The Torah was a two-part study: the "Written Torah," transcribed in the Five Books of Moses (and later extended to include all the 24 books of the Scriptures), and the "Oral Torah," a commentary on the Written Torah. The Oral Torah was orally transmitted from teacher to student for many generations. In the 2nd century CE, Rabbi Judah the Prince felt that the Oral Law would be forgotten unless it was transcribed. So he compiled the basics into a six-part document called the Mishnah.
The Mishnah contains 63 volumes (tractates) which discuss all areas of Jewish law: agriculture, holidays, civil law, family relations, sacrifices, ritual purity, and much more. One of the tractates, however, is completely devoted to Jewish morals, values and ethics. This tractate is called Avot—literally translated as "Fathers." (See also Why is the Tractate Named "Fathers"?)
