Rivka Ulmer. Ayin Ha-Ra: The Evil Eye in the Bible and in Rabbinic Literature. Hoboken, N.J.: Ktav, 1994. x, 213 pp.

AJS Review ◽  
1996 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 151-153
Author(s):  
Alan J. Yuter
Keyword(s):  
Rabbinic Literature ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Evil Eye

The Question of God’s Perfection

2021 ◽  
pp. 014610792110306
Author(s):  
Cornell Collin
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Biblical Theology ◽  
The State ◽  
Rabbinic Literature ◽  
Central Question ◽  
Theological Interpretation ◽  
World Religions ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Present Essay

Is God perfect? The recent volume entitled The Question of God’s Perfection stages a conversation on that topic between mostly Jewish philosophers, theologians, and scholars of rabbinic literature. Although it is neither a work of biblical theology nor a contribution to the theological interpretation of scripture, The Question of God’s Perfection yields stimulating results for these other, intersecting projects. After briefly describing the volume’s central question and contents, the present essay situates the volume’s offerings within the state of the biblical-theological and theological-interpretive fields. In its next section, it considers—and compares— The Question of God’s Perfection with one twentieth-century theological antecedent, the Dutch theologian K.H. Miskotte. In closing, it poses questions for ongoing discussion. The Question of God’s Perfection: Jewish and Christian Essays on the God of the Bible and Talmud, edited by Yoram Hazony & Dru Johnson. Philosophy of Religion – World Religions 8. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill, 2019. ISBN 9789004387959

Goy

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adi Ophir ◽  
Ishay Rosen-Zvi
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Rabbinic Literature ◽  
Abstract Concept ◽  
Social Differences ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Second Temple Literature ◽  
Paul's Letters

The distinction between Jew and his other, the gentile, has been so central to Jewish history that the vast scholarship dedicated to Jewish-gentile relations has treated the category of the gentile as self-evident and has never questioned its history. This book shows that this category was in fact born at a particular moment, that it replaced older categories of otherness, and that it was both informed by and embedded in new modes of separation of Jews from non-Jews. The book traces the development of the term and category of the goy from the Bible—where it simply means “people,” through the plurality of others in Second Temple literature, to rabbinic literature—where it signifies any individual who is not a Jew, erasing all ethnic and social differences among different others. The book argues that the abstract concept of the gentile first appeared in Paul’s Letters, but only in rabbinic literature did this category become the center of a stable and long-standing discursive structure. It then reconstructs the specific type of other the goy came to be, and compares it to the famous other of Greek and Hellenistic antiquity—the Barbarian.

To Die For

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shmuel Shepkaru
Keyword(s):  
Hebrew Bible ◽  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
Rabbinic Literature ◽  
The Bible ◽  
Noble Death

This chapter examines the development of early Jewish martyrdom from the Bible to late antiquity. The chapter argues that martyrdom does not exist in the Hebrew Bible and that the stories of Eleazar and the mother with her seven sons from 2 Maccabees are not indicative of an existing Hellenistic tradition of martyrdom. The Jewish concept of martyrdom started to develop in Roman times, due to the influence of the popular Roman idea of noble death. The Jewish acceptance of the Roman idea created also moral and theological dilemmas. The idea of noble death needed to be reconciled with a Jewish tradition that emphasized the holiness of life. These martyrological premises and predicaments continued to be developed in rabbinic literature. The end result was the presentation of a rabbinic martyrological genre that set the Jewish lore and law of kiddush ha-Shem.

Historical Precedents and Contexts

2015 ◽  
pp. 57-79
Author(s):  
Ada Rapoport-Albert
Keyword(s):  
Rabbinic Literature ◽  
Moral Integrity ◽  
Public Activity ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Status

This chapter analyses the rabbinic traditions that were inherited from four women who were called by the title of prophetess: Miriam, Deborah, Huldah, and Noadiah. It discusses how the Bible recognizes the phenomenon of the prophetess without pondering its validity and how rabbinic literature views it as problematic. It also explores the status of the Bible's prophetesses that conflicts with the Sages' fundamental exclusion of women from public activity and from positions of ritual, spiritual, or scholarly leadership. The chapter describes the classical rabbinic sources that increased with the number of biblical prophetesses known by name and who were acknowledged by the authenticity of their prophetic powers. It explains how prophetesses tend to deprecate their character by means of an exegesis that cast aspersions on their moral integrity or put them in the shadow of their husbands.

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