Translation:Mishnah/Seder Zeraim/Tractate Berakhot/Chapter 1/3/Translation
- The school of Shammai says:
- In the evening all people should recline and recite [the Shema], and in the morning they should stand,
- since it says [in the verse (Deut. 6:7)], “When you lie down and when you arise.”
- But the school of Hillel says:
- Each person may recite it in his usual way (posture),
- since it says (ibid.), “When you walk on the road.”
- If so, why does it say “when you lie down and when you arise”?
- —[It means:] at the time when people are lying down, and at the time when people are arising.
- Said Rabbi Tarfon:
- “I was once traveling on the road,
- and I reclined to recite [the Shema] in accordance with the view of the school of Shammai,
- and [by doing so] I put myself in danger of [attack by] bandits.”
- They [possibly the other Sages or possibly the robbers] said to him: “You would have deserved to be guilty for your own fate,
- since you went against the view of the school of Hillel.”