“And you shall write them upon the doorposts of your house …” (Deuteronomy 6:9) If you read this verse carefully — and literally — you might suppose that the words are meant to be directly inscribed on one’s doorposts. So why are mezuzot written on parchment subsequently attached to the doorposts? A beraita on today’s daf explains:
The sages taught: “And you shall write them upon the doorposts of your house …” (Deuteronomy 6:9) One might have thought that one writes a mezuzah on the stones of the entrance. Writing is stated here, and writing is stated there. Just as there it means on a scroll, so too, a mezuzah must be written on a scroll.
The rabbis are using a classical interpretive technique called gezerah shavah, creating a comparison between two verses that use the same language or word — in this case, “writing.” Just as in a different mitzvah, it uses the word “writing” and specifies that it’s to be written on a scroll, so too mezuzahs should be written on scrolls. What’s a bit puzzling is that the beraita does not, in fact, give us this second verse.
Rashi suggests that the second verse is Deuteronomy 24:1: “And he will write her a scroll of divorce.” Tosafot, the medieval commentators in Rashi’s school, point out that the Mishnah rules that a get (divorce document) can be written on surfaces other than parchment, such as olive leaves or cow horns. Therefore, Tosafot suggest Numbers 5:23 instead: “…. (the priest) will write these curses on a scroll.” This is the ordeal of the sotah, the woman whose husband suspects her of adultery who is brought to the Temple for a ritual that will determine her innocence. And they have another suggestion as well: Deuteronomy 17:18 states: “And one shall write for him this copy of the Torah in a scroll.” This is the requirement that the king write a copy of the Torah and keep it by his side perpetually. In all three of these verses, the writing in question is done on a scroll. Any one could provide textual support for the requirement that a mezuzah is written on parchment.
The beraita does, however, note that we could have learned a different gezerah shavah:
Or perhaps, go this way: Writing is stated here, and writing is stated there. Just as there, the words are written on the stones themselves, so too here, the mezuzah should be written on the stones.
Once again the beraita doesn’t explicitly reference its other source, but here commentators agree that it’s Deuteronomy 27:2–3: “As soon as you have crossed the Jordan into the land that the Eternal your God is giving you, you shall set up large stones. Coat them with plaster and inscribe upon them all the words of this teaching.” In this passage, the Israelites are commanded to write the law onto large stones erected by Joshua on the far side of the Jordan River just after entering the promised land. In this case, the writing is unambiguously committed to stone, not parchment. So should we conclude the text of a mezuzah should also be written on stone?
No. The beraita explains:
Let us see to which it is similar. We derive writing that is performed in all generations, from another writing that is performed in all generations, but we do not derive writing that is performed in all generations from writing that is not performed in all generations.
Given the panoply of choices, the rabbis choose to connect the mitzvah of mezuzah to the more similar mitzvah. The inscription of stones on the banks of the Jordan was a singular event. In contrast, all the verses that suggested writing on parchment (get, sotah, the king’s Torah) are commandments that apply, at least in theory, for all generations. The laws of sotah and the king’s Torah are not enacted today, in the absence of a Temple or a monarchy; however, unlike the commandment to inscribe stones, which is intended to apply only once, those commandments are theoretically applicable for all generations. Therefore, they serve as a better basis for learning the rules of mezuzah, which is likewise applicable in all generations. And so the beraita derives the law as we know it: that a mezuzah is written on a scroll, and only then affixed to a doorpost.
Read all of Menachot 34 on Sefaria.
This piece originally appeared in a My Jewish Learning Daf Yomi email newsletter sent on February 14, 2026. If you are interested in receiving the newsletter, sign up here.
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