From the editor, Ephraim Meth, 1(1): In our nation’s earliest years, we were forbidden to publicly disseminate halakhah and lomdus through writing. Some Rishonim maintain that we were even forbidden from recording oral Torah thoughts for personal reference. R. Yehudah haNasi revoked both of these prohibitions. Nowadays, we may write Torah thoughts for our own growth, and for the public’s pleasure. Similarly, our publication has a dual purpose: first, to motivate and train its writers to formulate Torah thoughts clearly, concisely, and powerfully; second, to provide its audience with high-quality Torah thoughts via the medium of high-quality writing. Historically, our gedolim have demanded that only first-rate Torah thoughts be committed to writing. The Rambam wrote that one should review an essay’s content one thousand times before committing it to writing. Rav Ashi wrote two drafts of Shas; Rashi’s rough drafts are published alongside his final drafts in some masechtos; the Tosfos Rid wrote four drafts of his commentary, as did Rav Shach in our generation. When the Ketzos realized that some novellae he was ready to publish had already been printed by R. Yonason Eybeschutz, he deleted them from his manuscript to eliminate redundancy. The Chofetz Chaim checked every copy of his books for typographical errors. Our gedolim have long supported augmenting the Torah-writing skills of budding talmidei chachamim; we hope and pray that our publication lives up to their standards.