Books published by Brown Judaic Studies

Essays in this book honor Professor Shaye J. D. Cohen. Contributors address a range of topics focusing especially on issues of identity, cultural interchange, and Jewish literature and history in antiquity.

Essays in this book honor Professor Shaye J. D. Cohen. Contributors address a range of topics focusing especially on issues of identity, cultural interchange, and Jewish literature and history in antiquity.

The Babylonian Talmud (Bavli), the great compilation of Jewish law edited in the late Sasanian era (sixth-seventh century CE), also incorporates a great deal of aggada, that is, nonlegal material, including interpretations of the Bible, stories, folk sayings, and prayers. The Talmud's aggadic traditions often echo conversations with the surrounding cultures of the Persians, Eastern Christians, Manichaeans, Mandaeans, and the ancient Babylonians, and others. The essays in this volume analyze Bavli aggada to reveal this rich engagement of the Talmud with its cultural world.

The Babylonian Talmud (Bavli), the great compilation of Jewish law edited in the late Sasanian era (sixth-seventh century CE), also incorporates a great deal of aggada, that is, nonlegal material, including interpretations of the Bible, stories, folk sayings, and prayers. The Talmud's aggadic traditions often echo conversations with the surrounding cultures of the Persians, Eastern Christians, Manichaeans, Mandaeans, and the ancient Babylonians, and others. The essays in this volume analyze Bavli aggada to reveal this rich engagement of the Talmud with its cultural world.

This volume identifies many rabbinic rhetorical strategies applied to issues of sexuality, which is a societal and cultural construct. Satlow examines rabbinic discussions of incest, sex between Jews and Gentiles, non-marital sex, homoeroticism, non-procreative sex, and marital sexuality illustrating that there was no monolithic rabbinic view of sexuality.

In the twelfth century CE, Rabbi Samuel ben Meir (Rashbam), a pious and learned rabbi, wrote a biblical commentary that broke radically with the way that rabbis generally interpreted the Bible. His method emphasized the "plain" meaning of the text; it avoided the use of legends or far-fetched interpretations--even those that had been hallowed by tradition--and sought to explain the biblical text, rather than to edify. This book makes Rabbi Samuel's work on Exodus available to the English reader for the first time in a readable translation, with helpful notes and illustrations. Primarily of interest to students of biblical exegesis, this work will also be useful for students of rabbinics, medieval Jewish intellectual history, history of Hebrew language, and Jewish-Christian polemics.¿