Bava Batra 15a (טו.) — the Talmud in English

And by the three sons of Korah,

who recited the psalm “A Psalm, a Song of the Sons of Korah,” as well as many other psalms whose opening indicates that they were for the “sons of Korah.”

Jeremiah wrote

the

book, and he

also wrote

the Book of Kings and Lamentations,

the Scroll of Lamentations.

Hezekiah and his company

[the members of his generation who lived on after him]

wrote

the following books:

The mnemonic is Y-M-SH-K

for the initial letters of the names of the books.

The book of

Isaiah,

because the prophet Isaiah did not have time to write his book, as King Manasseh killed him, and the prophets would write their books only before their deaths.

The book of

Proverbs.

As is explicitly stated in the Book of Proverbs: “The proverbs of Solomon, which the men of Hezekiah king of Judah copied.” And although Hezekiah himself did not write it, as this verse makes clear that it was the men of Hezekiah who wrote it, nevertheless the book is named after Hezekiah, because he caused them to engage in Torah study, as explained in tractate Sanhedrin.

And Hezekiah and his company also wrote the Scroll of

Song of Songs and

the Scroll of

Ecclesiastes.

The Men of the Great Assembly,

namely, Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi, Zerubbabel and Mordecai, and their colleagues,

wrote

the following books:

The mnemonic is K-N-D-G

for the letters appearing in the names of the books.

Ezekiel,

because the prophet Ezekiel himself did not write his book, as he was outside the Land of Israel, and prophecy was not given to be written outside the Land of Israel.

And

they also wrote the Book of

the Twelve

[Trei Asar], because some of the prophecies in the Book of the Twelve were not written by the prophets who had uttered them, since their prophecies were small in quantity. Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi [who were the later prophets] came and wrote their own prophecies, joined all these short prophecies to their books, and made them together into one large book, so that those prophecies would not be lost on account of their brevity.

The Men of the Great Assembly also wrote the Book of

Daniel and the Scroll of Esther.

For Daniel and Esther could not write their prophecies, because they were outside the Land of Israel, and prophecy was not given to be written outside the Land of Israel.

Ezra wrote

his

book,

but did not finish it,

and

Ezra also wrote the

genealogical record of the Book of Chronicles,

that is, the Book of Chronicles, which deals with the order of the genealogies of the generations,

up to him,

until it reached his own genealogy.

And this beraita, which explains that Ezra wrote the order of his genealogy,

supports Rav.

For Rav Yehuda said in the name of Rav: Ezra did not ascend from Babylonia until he had recorded his genealogy, and

only then

did he ascend

And who completed it?

Who completed the writing of the Book of Ezra? [See the following note.]

Nehemiah son of Hachaliah!

The Master said: Joshua wrote his book, and

also wrote

the eight

final

verses

of

the Torah,

as will be explained below.

It was taught:

We learned in a beraita:

In accordance with the one who says

above that

the eight verses

at the end

of the Torah, Joshua

wrote them,

and not Moses.

For it was taught,

it is stated in Deuteronomy:

“And Moses the servant of the Lord died there.”

The beraita explains that it is impossible to say that Moses wrote these verses. For is it

possible

that

Moses was alive

and wrote, “And Moses died there”?

Rather, up to this point Moses wrote. From this point onward,

from “And Moses died” until the end of the Torah—the eight verses—

Joshua wrote; these are the words of Rabbi Yehuda.

And some say

that these are the words of

Rabbi Nehemiah.

Rabbi Shimon said to him:

If we say that Joshua completed the writing of the Torah after Moses’s death, it follows that before Moses died the Torah scroll had not been completed. This is impossible, for is it

possible

that

a Torah scroll was missing

even

one letter

before Moses’s death?!

And

it is

written

that Moses said to the Levites:

“Take this Torah scroll,”

indicating that the Torah scroll had already been complete at that time!

Rather, up to this point,

through the verse “And Moses died there,”

the Holy One, blessed be He, speaks

the words of the Torah to Moses,

and Moses writes

with ink.

But

from this point onward,

from “And Moses died,”

the Holy One, blessed be He, speaks, and Moses writes in tears,

not with ink. The beraita brings proof that this was indeed the order in which the Torah was completed: the Holy One, blessed be He, speaks and Moses writes, for this was also the order in which the Prophets were written.

As it is stated below

in the Book of Jeremiah [chapter 36], when the officers asked Baruch: “Tell us how you wrote all these words from his mouth” [from Jeremiah’s mouth]:

And he said to them: Baruch: He would call all these words to me from his mouth,

Jeremiah would call them to me from his mouth

and I would write them in the scroll in ink.”