If the devil is in the details, then get ready to go to hell!

Just kidding ! But we wrote that line and then didn’t actually wanna delete it.

Shel Maala, your digital-first queer yeshiva, is doing a three class series on ~~Miraculous Minutiae~~ —- the details that make our torah, our Talmud and our study so gloriously nerdy and gay.

These are the complex, tiny, beautiful facets that we often don’t have time for in regular Talmud classes. We’ll be dedicating an hour and half-each, over three classes, to a choice triplet of these vibrant little facets. You can register here!

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First, we’ll be thoroughly exploring the dagesh - the lil’ dot that could. We’ll learn about what it does, how it affects pronunciations (across different diasporas) and what it tells you about the words and letters you find it in.

Second is the funky biblical vav - which seems to turn future verbs into past-tense ones and vice versa. That vav hides a lot of glorious nerdom within it - about biblical time and ancient storytelling verb forms - this is a can’t miss!

And last, we’ll be going on an in-depth journey, through the dicitonary-turned-queer-icon - Jastrow. This was a class recently put on in conjunction with our mama yeshiva, Svara, and will be refurbished for anyone who missed that last event.

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This is a lecture style class series, so no xevruta time will be required. You can attend any combination of the sessions that you want! One, two or all three! All sessions will be recorded and available for viewing afterwards. All you need for this class is your alef bet, although having even a little experience learning Talmud will help!

We’re asking for a suggested donation of 18$ per class that you plan to attend. This covers BOTH our time in preparing materials and funds our vital accessibility work to pay our gloriously gay closed captioners.

If you plan to attend all three sessions, that is 54$ total. You are obviously welcome to pay exactly as much as you are able (all the way from $180, to nothing at all!) Please register on the EventBrite where you can send us your donations and give us an accurate idea of how many people will be attending.

February 10th, 8-9:30 PM Eastern || 5-6:30 Pacific, Dagesh: The Lil’ Dot That Could

February 17th, 8-9:30 PM Eastern || 5-6:30 Pacific, The Flippy Vav: Time-Travelling Prefixes and Ancient Biblical Storytelling

February 24th, 8-9:30 PM Eastern || 5-6:30 Pacific, Jastrow: The Dictionary, The Man, The Queer Icon

These classes will be live captioned and recorded, and slides will be made available beforehand to those that register. Please reach out with any other access needs you might have.