Traités mineurs

The minor tractates (Hebrew: מסכתות קטנות, masechtot qetanot) are essays from the Talmudic period or later dealing with topics about which no formal tractate exists in the Mishnah. They may thus be contrasted to the Tosefta, whose tractates parallel those of the Mishnah. Each minor tractate contains all the important material bearing on a single subject. While they are mishnaic in form and are called "tractates," the topics discussed in them are arranged more systematically than in the Mishnah; for they are eminently practical in purpose, being, in a certain sense, the first manuals in which the data scattered through prolix sources have been collected in a brief and comprehensive form. There about 15 minor tractates. The first eight or so contain much original material; the last seven or so are collections of material scattered throughout the Talmud. Ancient authorities mention especially seven such tractates, which are doubtless the earliest ones. Their name and form suggests that they originated in the period of oral tradition which was dominated by the Talmud and the Midrash, so that these treatises are doubtless of great antiquity, some of them having been compiled in their main outlines before even the final redaction of the Talmud in the 6th century. The minor tractates are normally printed at the end of Seder Nezikin in the Talmud. They include: Avot of Rabbi Natan (Hebrew: אבות דרבי נתן), an expansion of Pirkei Avot. Soferim (Hebrew: סופרים – Scribes). This tractate appears in two different versions in the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds. Evel Rabbati (Hebrew: אבל רבתי – Elaboration on Mourning). Contains laws and customs pertaining to death and mourning, and is sometimes euphemistically called Semakhot ("joys"). Kallah (Hebrew: כלה – Bride). On engagement, marriage and co-habitation. Kallah Rabbati (Hebrew: כלה רבתי – Great Bride). An elaboration of the previous. Derekh Eretz Rabbah (Hebrew: דרך ארץ רבה) "Derekh Eretz" literally means "the way of the world," which in this context refers to deportment, manners and behavior.