Berachos 2:2 - 2:3

בין ויאמר לאמת ויציב לא יפסיק – As it is written, “But the LORD is truly God.” (Jeremiah 10:10). Therefore, we do not interrupt between [the words] “I the LORD your God” (Numbers 15:41) and “truth” and this is the Halakha.

והיה אם שמוע נוהג בין ביום ובין בלילה – As it is written (Deuteronomy 11:19), “and teach them to your children” and the study of Torah is practiced both during the daytime and during the nighttime.

ויאמר אינו נוהג אלא ביום – which includes the portion of the Ritual Fringes/Tzizit (Numbers 15:37-41) which are not observed at night, as I states (Numbers 15:39), “look at it.”

רבי יוסי אומר: לא יצא – As it is written (Deuteronomy 6:4): “Hear” – Cause your ear to hear what your mouth utters. And the first teacher [of our Mishnah] holds that “Shema” is recited in any language that you hear, and the Halakha follows this first teacher.

ולא דקדק באותיותיה – To emit them with one’s lips clearly – so that two words where the first letter of the second word begins with the same letter that concluded the first word – such as “Al L’va’vekha” (Deuteronomy 6:6 – “Take to heart”) עשב בשדך” (Deuteronomy 11:15 – “I will provide grass in the fields”), ועבדתם מהרה"” (Deuteronomy 11:17 – “and you will soon perish”) - that if you do not place a space between [these words] to separate them, you will end up reading these two (identicaletters as one letter.

רבי יוסי אומר – And the Halakha is like Rabbi Yosi. However, ab initio, one must take care to be exacting in pronouncing the letters of the words (of the Shema) and similarly, one should be careful not (concerning the usage of the SHWA), to make a moving SHWA a resting one or a resting one a moving one, nor to make a strong DAGESH of something which is soft or a soft DAGESH of something that is strong. And one must articulate clearly the ZAYIN of the word “תזכרו” (Numbers 15:40 –“Thus you will be reminded”) so that it does appear as if one is saying, “תשכרו” (to be rewarded), with the letter SIN, to say, that you should receive great reward [for the performance of the commandments] – for it is inappropriate (see Tractate Avot, Chapter 1, Mishnah 3) “to serve the master [i.e. God] in order to receive a reward.”

הקורא למפרע – Recite the third verse before he second and the second before the first, and other similarities.

לא יצא – As it is written (Deuteronomy 6:6), “these instructions [which I charge you this day],” as they are, that is to say, as they are organized in the Torah. But however, if one first read the "ויאמר" passage (Numbers 15:37-41) prior to the והיה אם שמוע"” passage (Deuteronomy 11:13-21), or the “והיה אם שמוע” passage prior to “שמע” (Deuteronomy 6:4-9), it would appear that it is not important read out of order, and one fulfills [one’s obligation] since they are not set up that way, one after the other in the Torah.

יחזור למקום שטעה – If between each section [of the Shema] he erred and did not know on which section he had interrupted (the appropriate order), and to which paragraph’s beginning he should return to, he should go back to the first interval – which is “והיה אם שמוע” (Deuteronomy 11:13-21). And Maimonides states that this is the first sentence: “ואהבת את ה' אלהיך” (Deuteronomy 6:5), and if he is in the middle of a section, he should stop [assuming that] he knows which section (of the Shema) that he is in, but if he doesn’t know which place and from which section he is in, he should stop and return to the beginning of that section. If he was reciting: “וכתבתם [על מזוזות]” and did not know if it was referring did not know if it was referring to “and you shall inscribe them” from the first section of the Shema (Deuteronomy 6:9) or the second section of the Shema (Deuteronomy 11:20), he should go back to the first mention of “you shall inscribe them” (Deuteronomy 6:9). But if he became doubtful after he had begun (the concluding verse of the second section of the Shema), “to the end that you and your children may endure” (Deuteronomy 11:21), he should not go back, since he is following the natural flow of the language [of the Shema].