Abstract: Traces the earliest evidence in Tannaitic texts for the idea that rabbinic halakhic tradition and other oral-literary traditions stem from a Mosaic origin. Building upon chapter four's discussion of “halakhah to Moses from Sinai,” the chapter studies key Tannaitic terms (e.g., “essence of the Torah,” “words of the Scribes”), tracking shifts in their meaning from the Mishnah, the Tosefta, and the earliest Tannaitic collections of midrashic commentaries on the Torah. The chapter concludes that there seems to be a tendency in the Tosefta and the midrashic commentaries to bring halakhic tradition of various times into close proximity to the idea of Sinaitic revelation.

Keywords: essence of the Torah, halakhah, Midrashic commentaries, rabbinic halakhic tradition, Sinaitic revelation, Tannaitic texts, words of the Scribes,