c. 200-500
Babylonian Talmud
The great body of rabbinic law, debate and story compiled in the academies of Babylonia. Its tales, like Honi and the carob tree, carry its wisdom as often as its rulings do.
Every line we carry
Each one links to its source, what it means, and the shirt in any of our looks.
- My fathers planted for me. I plant for my children.
Honi sees a man planting a carob tree and asks how long it takes to bear fruit. Seventy years, the man says, and explains that he found the world full of carob trees his ancestors planted. Do work whose payoff you may never see: plant, build and teach for the people who come after you.
Taanit 23a (Honi and the carob tree), our translation from the Greek