Free Daf Yomi Reading Plan for the Babylonian Talmud

If you are using Logos Bible Software, follow the link and get the free Daf Yomi reading plan for the Babylonian Talmud.  Naturally Logos will sell you a copy of the Babylonian Talmud (30% off this week).

What is the Dafi Yomi reading plan? Daf Yomi (“page of the day”) is a reading plan which will guide a reader through the Talmud in about seven and a half years. According to the Logos site,

In 1923, Rabbi Meir Shapiro proposed a reading plan for Bavli which consisted of reading one page (two sides) per day, following the most common pagination (that found in the Bomberg/Venice Talmud of 1523, which was followed by most subsequent editions, including the popular Vilna Talmud of 1835). Thus each cycle covers the entire Talmud in about 7 years, 5 months. Unlike reading plans which can start at any time, Daf Yomi (Page of the Day) has each reading fixed to the calendar so that the entire community is reading the same Daf together each day. This synchronization has encouraged new benefits in the digital age, with blogs and podcasts and other internet resources dedicated to helping answer questions about the day’s Daf—very handy for new readers of the Talmud.

Daf Yomi has grown to be a very popular approach to Talmud study. Since 1923, the entire cycle has been completed 12 times, with the last finishing on August 2, 2012 (an event which culminated in the celebration of Siyum HaShas with an estimated 300,000 participants in large venues around the world marking the occasion). This reading plan starts the next day on August 3rd and covers the complete 13th cycle, which will finish in January of 2020.

Like most people, reading through the Talmud is an intimidating prospect, the Daf Yomi reading plan makes it possible to achieve this goal over the next 7+ years.  Despite being called a “reading plan,” I had to load the reading plan as a book on both my desktop and iPad versions of Logos.  The Desktop version worked fine, but the link for “today’s reading” did not work on the iPad app, and the link to the actual reading opens in a reference window rather than jumping to the portion directly.  I was able to scroll down and get to the right place, but it is two or three step process.  Hopefully the links can be fixed.

While this resource might not be valuable for all, kudos to Logos Bible Software for making the Daf Yomi reading plan available for free.

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