In this web site you will be learning Mishnah Avot 2:4. The web site is divided into 7 sections. Each section deals with one principle at a time.
In sections 1 and 2 you will be introduced to Rabbi Young demonstration so that you later have a better idea of how to learn on your own.
In sections 3 through 7 you will read the text, get some evoking questions, discuss it with your classmates, and come up with your own ideas of what the Mishnah 2:4 messages are.
First, take a look at the 'Outline & Assignments', then move on to 'Mishnah Avot 2:4'. At any stage of the learning you are most welcome to E-mail Rabbi Young for assistent.

What Pirkei Avot are all about?

Pirkei Avot, literally Chapters of Our Fathers, is a section of the Mishnah, one of the most fundamental works of the Jewish Oral Law. , the sixth in is different from all the other in the .

According to Rashi, "this is called , because it includes the words of our first ancestors (great rabbis), that received the Torah one from another". According to others, means main ideas. Truly, the statements in this are, main ideas to fulfill the mitzvoth of the Torah, according to the words of the sages. "One who wants to be righteous - should fulfill the words that are in ".

In there are five , that are divided into 3 units:

1. from the beginning until 2:14, organizes the statements according to their historical order; from the time of Shimon HaTzaddik to the students of Rabban Yochanan ben Zachai.
   
2. From 2:15 until the end of the 4th , is generally organized by the contents rather than the time period of those who said them.
   
3. The majority of the fifth is organized according to a structure of groups of numbers (7 marks of a boor…4 characteristics…), without any indication of the name of the Tanna who said it.