Rabbinic literature Books

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Book SynopsisA finalist for the 2020 National Jewish Book Award for scholarship--a broad, systematic account of one of the most original and creative kabbalists, biblical interpreters, and Talmudic scholars the Jewish tradition has ever producedBeautifully written, Moshe Halbertal's groundbreaking book is exceptional in its capability to penetrate to the heart of Nahmanides's thinking and worldview. An admirable achievement.Adam Afterman, Tel Aviv UniversityMagisterial. . . . Halbertal displays here his well-established talent for making abstruse ideas accessible to a non-specialist readership.Los Angeles Review of Books' Marginalia Rabbi Moses b. Nahman (11941270), known in English as Nahmanides, was the greatest Talmudic scholar of the thirteenth century and one of the deepest and most original biblical interpreters. Beyond his monumental scholastic achievements, Nahmanides was a distinguished kabbalist and mystic, and in his commentary on the Torah he dispensed esoteric kabbalistic teachings thTrade ReviewFinalist for the National Jewish Book Award, Scholarship category, sponsored by The Jewish Book Council “Beautifully written, Moshe Halbertal’s groundbreaking book is exceptional in its capability to penetrate to the heart of Nahmanides’s thinking and worldview. An admirable achievement.”—Adam Afterman, Tel Aviv University“Moshe Halbertal masterfully analyzes and synthesizes the thought of a major Jewish intellectual icon. This book is without peer.”—Jonathan Dauber, Yeshiva University“Moshe Halbertal is the lucid expositor of complex ideas par excellence. In this magisterial volume he meets his ideal subject, positioning Nahmanides at the apex of a creative revolution in Jewish thought.”—Elisheva Carlebach, Columbia University “Moshe Halbertal’s splendid book deeply engages Nahmanides's oeuvre. Its comprehensive analysis explores the variegated intellectual activity of one of the pillars of the Jewish Middle Ages, profoundly illuminating Nahmanides's worldview.”—Moshe Idel, author of Kabbalah: New Perspectives

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Book SynopsisTrans Talmud places eunuchs and androgynes at the center of rabbinic literature and asks what we can learn from them about Judaism and the project of transgender history. Rather than treating these figures as anomalies to be justified or explained away, Max K. Strassfeld argues that they profoundly shaped ideas about law, as the rabbis constructed intricate taxonomies of gender across dozens of texts to understand an array of cultural tensions. Showing how rabbis employed eunuchs and androgynes to define proper forms of masculinity, Strassfeld emphasizes the unique potential of these figures to not only establish the boundary of law but exceed and transform it. Trans Talmud challenges how we understand gender in Judaism and demonstrates that acknowledging nonbinary gender prompts a reassessment of Jewish literature and law. Trade Review"In a world that seeks to erase our history and our bodies, these texts provide images of a past where we may have existed, albeit with complexities. To study Talmud is to dream our past into the future, and to engage in the act of traveling through time accompanied by our ancestors’ voices. . . . As queer, trans and nonbinary Jews do the work of consciously creating a usable past, Trans Talmud invites us to do so with more integrity and precision." * Lilith *"Dr. Max Strass­feld, Assis­tant Pro­fes­sor of Reli­gious Stud­ies at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Ari­zona, now offers us a wel­come guide to Tal­mu­dic gender(s) in this metic­u­lous, far-reach­ing, and lyri­cal book. It wel­comes a wide vari­ety of read­ers with patient expla­na­tions of cen­tral con­cepts in the fields of gen­der and queer stud­ies and the world of the Tal­mud and rab­binic lit­er­a­ture of late antiq­ui­ty." * Jewish Book Council *"Strassfield…nourishes the discussion of the ancient texts on a marginalized community then and now. Recommended to interested individuals and academic libraries." * Association of Jewish Libraries Reviews *"Trans Talmud regularly disrupts our understandings of sex, gender and sexuality, and so too of what scholarship itself is meant to be. Strassfeld makes these texts come to life as he sprinkles gems of insight and relevance throughout." * Journal of Jewish Studies *"A thought-provoking book. . . . [that] will be a point of reference for future studies on bodies that challenge the binary categorization of sex/gender in late ancient Jewish literature and beyond." * Religious Studies Review *Table of ContentsContents Acknowledgments Introduction 1. Transing Late Antiquity: The Politics of the Study of Eunuchs and Androgynes 2. The Gendering of Law: The Androgyne and the Hybrid Animal in Bikkurim 3. Sex with Androgynes 4. Transing the Eunuch: Kosher and Damaged Masculinity 5. Eunuch Temporality: The Saris and the Aylonit Conclusion: Rereading the Rabbis Again Bibliography Glossary Inde

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Book SynopsisTrade Review"[This book] shows just how much we have missed, and how valuable a fresh perspective on a seemingly well-trodden set of texts can be. . . . In its unassuming way, it urges us to reassess some of our most established habits when reading rabbinic literature, and to be much more courageous, methodologically and analytically, in reading Talmudic texts as literature." * Mira Balberg, in a review of the Hebrew edition *

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Book SynopsisRedefines the place of the Talmud and its study in the intellectual map of the West.Trade Review"What is Talmud? The Art of Disagreement is an innovative and provocative analysis of the intellectual art and practice of Talmud, exemplified by the fifteenth-century Castilian commentator, Izh.ak(DOT UNDER H) Canpanton. Embracing a sophisticated conceptual methodology, Dolgopolski sets talmudic rhetoric in contrast to the dominant Western philosophical concern for agreement. Influenced by Nietzsche and Heidegger, the author combines philology and anthropology in an attempt to provide an alternative to viewing the Talmud primarily as a traditional source or a historical object. This work of speculative juxtaposition promises to expand the horizon of philosophic hermeneutics and rabbinic dialectic, and to highlight the value of disagreement to human discourse more generally: not only is it important to agree to disagree, but it is precisely disagreement that facilitates a deeper sense of agreement." -- -Elliot R. Wolfson New York University "With the loss of the most seemingly inconsequential of words, the "the" before "Talmud," a world, Sergey Dolgopolski shows us, can be gained. Leaving behind what was previously understood as a circumscribed text or body of thought, we find a new and potent mode of thinking, different from logic, hermeneutics and philosophy, which has implications far beyond those of theological disputation. Drawing on the most advanced contemporary continental theory to revive the forgotten lessons of the 15^th -century Sephardic sage Canpanton, Dolgopolski provides stunningly original and profoundly unsettling insights into "the art of disagreement." -- -Martin Jay University of California, Berkeley "In both engagement and disengagement with post-Heideggerian traditions of thought, What Is Talmud redefines the place of the Talmud and its study in the intellectual map of the West." -Shofar "Explores Talmudic interpretation through a study of Rabbi Izhak Canpanton and his followers in 15th-century Spain." -The Chronicle of Higher Education "What is Talmud? is a provocative and strikingly original work that defies disciplinary boundaries. This intensive encounter staged between Talmud and post-structuralist thought not only gives us an illuminating new perspective on each of these traditions, it also provides a lucid and sophisticated reconceptualization of rhetoric that emerges out of their mutual confrontation. The relevance of post-structural thought to Talmud is clearly demonstrated here. However, what is most extraordinary to me is the powerful (and persuasive) claim that philosophy must itself seriously engage Talmud in order to move beyond the impasses of post-Heideggarian thought." -- -David Bates University of California, Berkeley "Dolgopolski's argument that Talmud offers an alternative to philosophy in its radical past-ness is brillant and ground-breaking." -- -Bruce Rosenstock University of Illinois, Champaign/Urbana "Dolgopolski brilliantly maps how each subtle shift in twentieth-century philosophy has established the groundwork for presenting Talmud as a third way between philosophy and rhetoric." -- -Zvi Septimus The Journal of AJS Review

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Book SynopsisA feminist project that privileges the Babylonian Talmudic tractate as culturally significant. While the use of feminist analysis as a methodological lens is not new to the study of Talmudic literature or to the study of individual tractates, this book demonstrates that such an intervention with the Babylonian Talmud reveals new perspectives on the rabbis’ relationship with the temple and its priesthood. More specifically, through the relationships most commonly associated with home, such as those of husband-wife, father-son, mother-son, and brother-brother, the rabbis destabilize the temple bayit (or temple house). Moving beyond the view that the temple was replaced by the rabbinic home, and that rabbinic rites reappropriate temple practices, a feminist approach highlights the inextricable link between kinship, gender, and the body, calling attention to the ways the rabbis deconstruct the priesthood so as to reconstruct themselves. Trade Review“Happy families may all be alike, but the priestly family is unhappy in its own ways, shows Marjorie Lehman in her fine-grained readings of Babylonian Talmud Tractate Yoma. Lehman’s story is one of patriarchy and hierarchy, but also of vulnerability and reflection, as the tractate turns towards the practices of self-affliction that, until today, characterize the day of atonement. Tractate Yoma reads, if not quite like a novel or poem, then like a series of meditations on the shifting meanings of home and the anxieties about continuity and control. You will leave Bringing Down the Temple House never thinking the same way again about ‘the house’ as a Jewish cultural topos.” -- Beth Berkowitz, Barnard College, author of Animals and Animality in the Babylonian Talmud“Strikingly original. Lehman brings to bear a feminist lens to demonstrate how one group of men (the rabbis) critiques and wrestles with the legacy of another group of men (the priests). Feminist attention to the constitutive relationships of the household (husband-wife, father-son, mother-son) illuminates the anxieties and tensions that play out as the rabbis claim the mantel of religious leadership from their priestly rivals.” -- Elizabeth Shanks Alexander, author of Gender and Timebound Commandments in Judaism“Lehman persuasively demonstrates that the theme ‘house’ runs uniquely and distinctively through Bavli Tractate Yoma, read holistically as a self-contained literary unit. With an erudite combination of academic Talmud criticism and feminist and gender analysis, Lehman shows the many gendered paths Bavli Yoma takes to disconnect the rabbinic ‘house’ from a Temple ‘house’ for which she perceptively detects a lack of rabbinic nostalgia.” -- Alyssa Gray, Professor of Rabbinics, Hebrew Union College-JIR“Through insightful analyses, compelling argumentation, and beautiful prose, Lehman mines Tractate Yoma’s structure, content, and imagery to reveal the intricate connections that the rabbis drew between gender, the home, and the temple. A model of what can be learned when we read the Talmud as literature and bring feminist analysis to ancient texts, and an absolute pleasure to read.” -- Sarit Kattan Gribetz, Fordham UniversityTable of ContentsIntroductionChapter 1: Unsettling the Temple BayitChapter 2: Violence in the Temple: Father Priests and Their SonsChapter 3: Mothers and Sons: Broken HousesChapter 4: From Inside Out: Kimhit’s HouseChapter 5: Intergenerational Transmission and the Problem of MothersChapter 6: Sexuality Inside and Outside the Temple HouseChapter 7: Sustaining the Rabbinic HouseholdChapter 8: Vulnerable Bodies in Vulnerable HousesChapter 9: Purity and Impurity: From Priest to RabbiAfterwordAcknowledgementsNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisA feminist project that privileges the Babylonian Talmudic tractate as culturally significant. While the use of feminist analysis as a methodological lens is not new to the study of Talmudic literature or to the study of individual tractates, this book demonstrates that such an intervention with the Babylonian Talmud reveals new perspectives on the rabbis’ relationship with the temple and its priesthood. More specifically, through the relationships most commonly associated with home, such as those of husband-wife, father-son, mother-son, and brother-brother, the rabbis destabilize the temple bayit (or temple house). Moving beyond the view that the temple was replaced by the rabbinic home, and that rabbinic rites reappropriate temple practices, a feminist approach highlights the inextricable link between kinship, gender, and the body, calling attention to the ways the rabbis deconstruct the priesthood so as to reconstruct themselves. Trade Review“Happy families may all be alike, but the priestly family is unhappy in its own ways, shows Marjorie Lehman in her fine-grained readings of Babylonian Talmud Tractate Yoma. Lehman’s story is one of patriarchy and hierarchy, but also of vulnerability and reflection, as the tractate turns towards the practices of self-affliction that, until today, characterize the day of atonement. Tractate Yoma reads, if not quite like a novel or poem, then like a series of meditations on the shifting meanings of home and the anxieties about continuity and control. You will leave Bringing Down the Temple House never thinking the same way again about ‘the house’ as a Jewish cultural topos.” -- Beth Berkowitz, Barnard College, author of Animals and Animality in the Babylonian Talmud“Strikingly original. Lehman brings to bear a feminist lens to demonstrate how one group of men (the rabbis) critiques and wrestles with the legacy of another group of men (the priests). Feminist attention to the constitutive relationships of the household (husband-wife, father-son, mother-son) illuminates the anxieties and tensions that play out as the rabbis claim the mantel of religious leadership from their priestly rivals.” -- Elizabeth Shanks Alexander, author of Gender and Timebound Commandments in Judaism“Lehman persuasively demonstrates that the theme ‘house’ runs uniquely and distinctively through Bavli Tractate Yoma, read holistically as a self-contained literary unit. With an erudite combination of academic Talmud criticism and feminist and gender analysis, Lehman shows the many gendered paths Bavli Yoma takes to disconnect the rabbinic ‘house’ from a Temple ‘house’ for which she perceptively detects a lack of rabbinic nostalgia.” -- Alyssa Gray, Professor of Rabbinics, Hebrew Union College-JIR“Through insightful analyses, compelling argumentation, and beautiful prose, Lehman mines Tractate Yoma’s structure, content, and imagery to reveal the intricate connections that the rabbis drew between gender, the home, and the temple. A model of what can be learned when we read the Talmud as literature and bring feminist analysis to ancient texts, and an absolute pleasure to read.” -- Sarit Kattan Gribetz, Fordham UniversityTable of ContentsIntroductionChapter 1: Unsettling the Temple BayitChapter 2: Violence in the Temple: Father Priests and Their SonsChapter 3: Mothers and Sons: Broken HousesChapter 4: From Inside Out: Kimhit’s HouseChapter 5: Intergenerational Transmission and the Problem of MothersChapter 6: Sexuality Inside and Outside the Temple HouseChapter 7: Sustaining the Rabbinic HouseholdChapter 8: Vulnerable Bodies in Vulnerable HousesChapter 9: Purity and Impurity: From Priest to RabbiAfterwordAcknowledgementsNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book Synopsis

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