The Mishnah is the essential source text for Rabbinic Judasim. According to Jewish tradition, God presented Moses with an oral law, known as the Oral Torah, as a complement to the written Torah (the Five Books of Moses). Without this tradition, it would be impossible to fully understand the written Torah. In some cases, the Oral Torah overturns the literal meaning of verses in the written Torah (one famous example being "an eye for an eye" of Exodus 21:23-25). The text of the mishnah used at Wikisource was made available by Mechon Mamre.