All the strength of the soul's mourning is from the third to the thirtieth day, during which time she sits on the grave, still thinking her beloved might yet return (to the body whence she departed). When she notices that the color of the face is changed, she leaves and goes away; and this is what is written (Job. xiv. 22), "But his flesh upon him shall have pain, and his soul shall mourn over him." Then the mouth and the belly quarrel with one another, the former saying to the latter, "All I have robbed and taken by violence I deposited in thee;" and the latter, having burst three days after its burial, saying to the former, "There is all thou hast robbed and taken by violence! as it is written (Eccles. xii. 6), 'The pitcher is broken at the fountain.'"
Ibid., chap. 100.
Job said, "Even the devil shall not dissuade me from comforting those that mourn; for I would tell him that I am not better than my Creator, who comforts Israel; as it is said (Isa. li. 12), 'I, even I, am He that comforteth you.'"
Psikta Nachmu.
Once Rabbi Shimon ben Yehozedek addressed Rabbi Sh'muel ben Nachman and said, "I hear that thou art a Baal Aggadah; canst thou therefore tell me whence the light was created?" "We learn," he replied in a whisper, "that God wrapped Himself with light as with a garment, and He has caused the splendor thereof to shine from one end of the world to the other." The other said, "Why whisperest thou, I wonder, since Scripture says so plainly (Ps. civ. 2) 'Who covereth Himself with light as with a garment'?" The reply was, "I heard it in a whisper, and in a whisper I have told it to thee."
Bereshith Rabbah, chap. 3.
"As the tents of Kedar" (Cant. i. 5). As the tents of the Ishmaelites are ugly without and comely within, so also the disciples of the wise, though apparently wanting in beauty, are nevertheless full of Scripture, and of the Mishnah and of the Talmud, of the Halacha and of the Aggadoth.
Shemoth Rabbah, chap. 23.
"Write thou these words" (Exod. xxxiv. 37). That applies to the Law, the Prophets, and the Hagiographa, which were given in writing, but not to the Halachoth, the Midrashim, the Aggadoth, and the Talmud, which were given by the mouth.
Ibid., chap. 47.