The Idea of History in Rabbinic Judaism

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BRILL, 2004 - 340 pàgines
History provides one way of marking time. But there are others, and the Judaism of the dual Torah, set forth in the Rabbinic literature from the Mishnah through the Talmud of Babylonia, ca. 200-600 C.E., defines one such alternative. This book tells the story of how a historical way of thinking about past, present, and future, time and eternity, the here and now in relationship to the ages, « that is, Scripture's way of thinking » gave way to another mode of thought altogether. This other model Neusner calls a paradigm, because a pattern imposed meaning and order on things that happened. Paradigmatic modes of thought took the place of historical ones. Thinking through paradigms, with a conception of time that elides past and present and removes all barriers between them, in fact governs the reception of Scripture in Judaism until nearly our own time. Neusner here explains through the single case of Rabbinic Judaism, precisely how that other way of reading Scripture did its work, and why, for so many centuries, that reading of the heritage of ancient Israel governed. At stake are [1] a conception of time different from the historical one and [2] premises on how to take the measure of time that form a legitimate alternative to those that define the foundations of the historical way of measuring time. Fully exposed, those alternative premises may prove as logical and compelling as the historical ones. The approach follows the documentary history of ideas, and individual chapters describe the treatment of historical topics in the Mishnah, the Talmud of the Land of Israel (a.k.a., the Yerushalmi), Genesis Rabbah, that is, ca. 200, 400, and 450 CE, and Pesiqta deRab Kahana, ca. 500 CE.
 

Continguts

INTRODUCTION
1
HEBREW SCRIPTURE AND THE REQUIREMENTS OF HISTORICAL
15
II
45
From Historical Time to Time Cyclical and Time
54
An Example in Rabbinic
61
MISSING MEDIA OF HISTORICAL THINKING I THE SUSTAINING
71
Scripture RePresented in the Immediacy of
106
THE ENDURING PARADIGM
115
IS RABBINIC JUDAISM A RELIGION OF MEMORY?
193
PART
231
THE YERUSHALMIS CONCEPTION OF HISTORY
252
GENESIS RABBAH AND THE HISTORY OF ISRAEL
268
ASTRAL ISRAEL IN PESIQTA DERAB KAHANA
287
WHAT EXACTLY DO WE MEAN BY AN EVENT IN JUDAISM?
308
SUBJECT INDEX
329
INDEX OF ANCIENT SOURCES
335

THE CONDUCT OF THE CULT AND THE STORY
147
EXEMPLARY PATTERN IN PLACE OF LIVES
167

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Sobre l'autor (2004)

Jacob Neusner is Research Professor of Religion and Theology at Bard College, Member of the Institute of Advanced Study, and Life Member of Clare Hall, Cambridge University. He holds nine honorary degrees and fourteen academic medals. He is author of The Halakhah: Encyclopaedia of the Law of Judaism and chairman of the editorial board of the Review of Rabbinic Judaism).

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