Rabbi Heschel Greenberg has launched a new series of classes on the Rambam’s Mishneh Torah in response to the Rebbe’s call to learn at least one halacha in depth.
The Rebbe initiated a major effort to unite all Jews with the study of the entire encyclopedic work, Mishneh Torah, by learning three chapters a day and completing the entire work in less than a year. Alternatively, one can learn one chapter and complete the entire Mishneh Torah in close to three years. The Rebbe also gave a third option to study Maimonides’ companion work, Sefer Hamitzvos that parallel the Mishneh Torah.
In addition, the Rebbe requested that we learn one halacha in depth.
We recently began the 42nd cycle of Mishneh Torah which inspired Rabbi Greenberg to record brief classes on selected passages of the Mishneh Torah.
Rabbi Heschel Greenberg is a shliach of the Rebbe in Buffalo NY and the Director of the Jewish Discovery Center, and, for the past 50 years, has taught thousands of classes on all aspects of Jewish knowledge.
Rabbi Greenberg has also authored dozens of works on diverse subjects including several volumes of commentary on the Mishneh Torah.
Many of Rabbi Greenberg’s classes can be accessed on his website rabbigreenberg.com.
In this episode of Rambam In-Depth, we explore the crucial distinction between different types of theft in Jewish law. Through careful examination of the Rambam’s analysis, we discover why secretly stealing (geneivah) carries a deeper spiritual flaw than open robbery (gezeilah) – a concept illustrated by the Torah’s requirement for double payment. The class reveals how the very act of stealing in secret demonstrates a fear of human witnesses but not of divine oversight, while exploring the difference between crimes that diminish ownership versus those that represent inherently unethical acts. This concise analysis shows how the Rambam’s legal distinctions reveal profound insights about ethics and human psychology that remain relevant to contemporary discussions of property rights.
