In Sefer Vayikra, Torah means “the rules of” or “procedures of” a given sacrifice, zot Torat ha-olah. Later, Torat Moshe refers to Chumash, and then expands to the entire Tanach (Torah sh’bichtav), and then everything Chazal called Torah sh’ba’al peh. Later still, it comes to encompass commentary on all the above, as well as Jewish philosophy, Kabbala, chassidut, machshava, and mussar – though some of these engendered significant debates. Per Gemara Chagiga (3a), “the words of Torah expand and multiply.”
Border cases tell us how Jews think. In the medieval period, the poems of Al-Harizi and Ibn-Gavriol, and for some even Moreh Nevukhim, were debated. More recently, Jewish history, Hebrew grammar, chassidishe mayses, academic Jewish scholarship, Jewish and Hebrew literature inspire arguments on each side.
Do publishing imprints and styles matter? Artscroll, Mesorah or Sha’ar? Koren, Maggid or Toby? Frum vs. academic publishers? Two columns of Rashi script and no punctuation seems to signal Torah. English and footnotes less so. What about pictures?
Halachically, we ask whether one makes a birchat ha-Torah, or whether a book can be read in the bathroom. The cultural test is similarly location-based: what can you read in shul without getting stares, which of course depends on the shul and the reader.
Defining Torah is how we articulate what reading and study move beyond interesting or even inspiring and pull us into the realm of kedusha.
