The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud »

Jeffrey L. Rubenstein is a professor in the Skirball Department of Hebrew and Judaic Studies at New York University. He is the author of The History of Sukkot in the Second Temple and Rabbinic Periods, Rabbinic Stories, and Talmudic Stories: Narrative Art, Composition, and Culture, the last available from Johns Hopkins.

Building on his Talmudic Stories, Rubenstein (Hebrew and Judaic studies, New York U.) compares Talmudic versions to support his case that rabbinic academy scholars (Stammaim) of the Babylonian Talmud contributed significantly to redacting earlier Palestinian Talmud narratives. He elucidates aspects of their culture, such as tensions between Torah study and family life and learned and non-learned Jews, and the legacy of their dialectical methods. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Brown University - Michael Satlow

Rubenstein's reconstruction of the social setting of the Bavli, building on the work of his previous book, Talmudic Stories, is remarkable because there is no direct evidence for the existence of such an Academy, or the anonymous scholars who labored in it. Recovering the distinctive culture that produced the Bavli is much like recovering the setting for the redaction of the Hebrew Bible. The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud fills a critical scholarly gap and should begin a healthy and overdue discussion of the role, culture, and underestimated contributions of the redactors of the Bavli.