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Erev Rav (Hebrew: עֵרֶב רַב ‘êreḇ raḇ "mixed multitude") was a group that included Egyptians and others who had joined the Tribes of Israel on the Exodus. [1] According to Jewish tradition, they were accepted by Moses as an integral part of the people.
Mar 25, 2018 · When the Jewish People escaped from Egypt the Torah tells us (Exodus 12:38) that an erev rav, a mixed multitude of other people, also escaped with them. Who were these people who joined our...
- The Meaning of The Term ʿerev Rav
- The ʿerev Rav and The ʾasafsuf
- Foreigners Who Join The Exodus
- Foreigners Who Were Intermarried with Israelites
- The Magicians: The Zohar’s Mystical Reading
- ʿerev Rav as A Slur in The Talmud
- Modern Usages
When the Israelites left Egypt, Exodus 12:38 states: עֵרֶב—Starting with the first word, ע.ר.ב, Shaul Bar, professor of Bible at the University of Memphis, notes that in a number of biblical contexts (Jer 25:20, 50:37, Ezek 30:5), the term ערב seems to refer to soldiers. Similarly, Israel Knohl, professor emeritus of Bible at Hebrew University, sug...
Reading ʿerev ravas reduplicative strengthens the traditional argument that this group is the same one that is referenced in Numbers 11: The story tells of how the Israelites, spurred on by an obscure group called the ʾasafsuf, complain about the lack of meat, which leads to God bringing quail, and eventually to the deaths of many of the complainan...
One possibility is that they are meant to be a group of Egyptians and/or other ethnic groups who were living among the Israelites and decided to leave with them.
An alternative possibility is that the term reflects not a group of people that joined the Israelites at the time of the exodus, but people who had become part of the Israelites already, through intermarriage. As the Bible envisions Israelites living among Egyptians for decades or even centuries (depending on the source), it is not hard to imagine ...
The 13th century mystical work, the Zohar, which blames many evils on the intermixing of Israelites with the ʿerev rav, argues that the term cannot refer to a mass of peoples who joined the Israelites but instead refers to a specific shift of Egyptian magicians who worked from midday to early afternoon דהיינו ערב רברבא, “which is called ‘the great ...
Despite the existence of some positive evaluations, the tendency to view the ʿerev ravwith a jaundiced eye can already be seen in the rabbinic period. Thus, the Babylonian Talmud recounts (b. Beitzah 32b):
This same usage of the term as a slur continues in our day. In modern Jewish, and especially Israeli, parlance, ʿerev rav is translated as riffraff or rabble, sometimes even traitors. Describing the late 20th century actions of Rabbi Uzi Meshulam, Motti Inbari of the University of North Carolina notes that “Meshulam identified the Israeli left with ...
Jan 31, 2020 · In tomorrow’s Torah reading, the Bible states that, when the Jews went out of Egypt, a “mixed multitude” (erev rav) accompanied them. At least, this is how the King James Bible and most traditional Jewish commentaries understand the phrase, taking its first word (erev) to mean “mixture” and the second (rav) to mean “many” or ...
Apr 6, 2023 · When the Jewish People escaped from Egypt the Torah tells us (Exodus 12:38) that an erev rav, a mixed multitude of other people, also escaped with them. Who were these people; and why does it...
THE EREV RAV: Understanding the Mixed Multitude – The Gentiles who left Egypt with the Jews – with Rabbi Michael Skobac. When the Israelites were liberated from their servitude in Egypt, the Torah tells us that a mixed multitude of people went out with them. Who these people were is not exactly clear.
Feb 4, 2017 · In Hebrew, the term for "mixed multitude" is "erev rav." " Erev " here is a homonym (a word that sounds, and may even be spelled the same as another, but has a different, unrelated meaning) to the word that means "evening"; in this case it is from a root ( ayin, resh, vet ) that means "mixed."
