A passage from the Prophets recited after Torah reading.
Traditionally, on Shabbat and holiday mornings, a selection from
one of the biblical books of the Prophets is read after the
Torah reading. The portion is known as the haftarah (hahf-tah-
RAH, or in Ashkenazic Hebrew: hahf-TOH-rah). On two fast days,
Yom Kippur and Tisha B'av, a haftarah is recited at both morning
and afternoon services. While the Torah reading cycle proceeds
from Genesis through Deuteronomy, covering the entire Five Books
of Moses, only selected passages from the Prophets make it into
the haftarah cycle. A cluster or three or four berakhot
(blessings), depending on the occasion, follows the haftarah.
Their call for prophecy to be fulfilled and for God to restore
the Jewish people to Zion serve as a finale to the full set of
the day's scriptural readings, Torah and Haftarah together.
Prophets of Truth and Justice Rabbinic literature does not
discuss the origin of the practice of reading publicly from the
Prophets in a formal cycle. We mi