Bonus Episode: Understanding 2,500 Years of Rabbinic Literature

Read the transcript below, or watch the video teaching by Samuel.

Introduction

Shalom, this is Samuel from Netivyah, recently we published our short series on what the Talmud is, about its history, and about how we as believers can approach it.

Since some sincere interest was voiced in the comments of the last episode for us to make a bonus episode about Rabbinic literature, we decided to provide you with this “bonus” session.

First of all, I would like to re-state or clarify, just in case I have not been clear enough in the last episode, that we present this information in order to help people understand these subjects, because of the many questions we are getting. It is for informative purposes only and isn’t a recommendation either for or against studying or engaging with any of the material presented.Our sincere desire is to give you, through this mini series, a helpful perspective on this whole topic and answer some of the questions we have been getting.

Rabbinic Literature

First of all, I’m going to explain some basic terms and concepts: Rabbinic writings are typically divided into two main types: Halacha, which deals with Jewish law, and Aggadah, which focuses on storytelling and narrative. The Mishnah includes both elements, though it leans more heavily on Halacha. Aggadah, on the other hand, appears in various forms such as stories, parables, tales, legends, and wisdom literature, and is especially prominent in Midrashic texts.

So, what exactly is Midrash? Midrash is a method of exploring biblical passages that goes beyond straightforward explanations of laws or morals. Rather than sticking strictly to historical or grammatical analysis, Midrash seeks to fill in the gaps in the biblical text. Its goal is to clarify difficult or ambiguous sections of Scripture by applying rabbinic interpretive techniques. In these writings, the Torah is unpacked through sermons, stories, and legends passed down by the sages. The Midrash draws out the ethical and spiritual lessons intended for its audience.Another big term to explain is ‘Targum’. Targum simply means ‘translation’ in Hebrew and is the term that is commonly used to refer to the Aramaic translations of the Bible. (They most likely started to appear after the return from the Babylonian exile but were not put together until the common era.) These Targumim generally mix translation or paraphrasing with midrashic commentary.

The History of Rabbinic Literature

Now to the overview in which I would like to present you with the main historical stages on a rough basic timeline, and to talk about a few of the most important works of that respective time:

The first stage is the pre-Mishnaic period of the Great Assembly and the subsequent period of the “Zugot,” about whom we talked in our previous episodes, from roughly the year 500 BCE until the year 70 CE.

The second stage is the Mishnaic period of the Tannaim, who were the sages of the time that the Mishnah was assembled, which lasted from about the year 70 to 220 CE.Towards the end of this time period the Targum Onkelos came about. This Targum contains the five books of the Torah and was named after its translator, Onkelos, who was a famous convert to Judaism in the times of the Tannaim.

Somewhere around this time (either before or after), the Targum Yonatan came to be, which contains the books of the prophets. In fact, both Targumim Onkelos and Yonatan are still used today liturgically by the Yemenite Jewish community.

This time is followed by the Talmudic period of the Amoraim from the year 220 to about 500 CE.About these stages we learned especially in the second episode of our series when we discovered how the Talmud came to be.But there are a few important works that I would like to mention that came to be in this time period, like the Tosefta, meaning “supplement” or “addition.” While it is not clear exactly who wrote it and when exactly, by its content, and the mentioning of the Tosefta in the Babylonian Talmud, we can safely conclude that it was written after the completion of the Mishnah and before the completion of the Babylonian Talmud. It contains traditions and comments that were not included in the Mishnah for different reasons, but rather separated and collected as a distinct work. It can be seen as a useful complement to understand the Mishnah better, though it does also contradict the Mishnah in several points.

Though the exact dates are debated, it is possible that it was also in this period of time when the Targumim Neofiti and Pseudo-Jonathan were composed. They both contain the five books of the Torah, and the latter received its name when it got confused with the actual Targum Yonatan in the Middle Ages.

These two Targumim have largely lost their religious and liturgical relevance, and yet present today a valuable resource for scholarly study.

It is also in this time period that some of the central Midrashim, like ‘Bereshit Rabbah,’ came to be and continued to develop and be written and collected over the following time periods.

An important piece of history to mention here is that when the Roman leader Gallus invaded the Land of Israel in the year 351 CE and imposed severe decrees on the Jewish population, the majority of the remaining Jewish sages escaped to Babylonia.

Next we have the period of the post-Talmudic Savoraim from about 500 to 600/650 CE.

The Savoraim were the leading rabbis of that time period. This was a transitional phase during which the Talmud was largely complete but still required clarification, structure, and final refinements.

Moving on to the next period, the period of the Geonim that lasted for about 450 years:

Following the completion of the Talmud, Babylonia continued to be the primary center of Jewish life and scholarship, and was treated as such even by Jewish communities outside of Babylonia.

‘Gaon’ was the title of the heads of the two great Babylonian Talmudic academies.While the Talmud was finished, many questions regarding legal rulings remained unclear or unanswered, so the Geonim wrote plenty of material answering and clarifying these final legal rulings.

During the time of the Geonim the first Siddurim, the prayer books, were produced.

The most important literary works from this period are the collections of the responses to the questions that the Geonim received from Jewish communities from all over.

The Geonim and their academies in Babylon lost importance towards the end of this time period and gradually started to disappear as Jews had begun to migrate to Europe and North Africa, and in these distant communities they started to turn to their local rabbis for halachic guidance.

This marked the beginning of the time of the Rishonim, which means ‘the first ones’ or ‘the early ones,’ who lived roughly from the 11th to the 15th/16th century before the writing of the Shulchan Aruch.

During this extremely eventful time a vast ocean of literature came to be, from commentaries on the Bible, the Talmud, and works on Jewish law. There were also many works on philosophy as well as mysticism.

Because there were different centers of learning during this period, differing customs started to develop in those respective regions, from which we have the two main groups of Jews emerging: the Sephardic Jews, who follow the customs of the center of learning in Spain from that time period, and the Ashkenazi Jews, who followed the customs of the center of learning in France, Germany, and Italy.

Now, because of the multitude of significant works and personalities during this time, it is impossible to talk about even a fraction of them in this format, but I would like to just highlight four of the most well-known and significant works that emerged.

First, the famous Bible and Talmud commentaries of Rashi, who was an 11th-century French Talmudist.

Second, ‘Mishneh Torah’ by the Rambam, who was a 12th-century Spanish Talmudist, astronomer, and physician. ‘Mishneh Torah’ is a comprehensive codification of Jewish law that holds great significance up to this day.

Thirdly, I would like to mention the Tosafot, which were additional notes, interpretations, sources, questions, and rulings on the Talmud that were penned by rabbis from the 12th to the 15th centuries known as the Tosafists.

And lastly, I would like to mention the Zohar, which is the foundation of Kabbalistic literature. This form of mysticism that was put together by Moses de Leon in the 13th century is, because of the heavy evidence by modern scholarship, universally regarded as a forgery, contrary to the claims of Moses de Leon himself that this work is copied out of an ancient manuscript by the famous second-century Rabbi Shimon Bar Yochai.

Now, as I mentioned earlier, the composing of the Shulchan Aruch marked a shift and ushered in the last era of Jewish scholarship that lasts until the present day. This is the period of the Acharonim, or “the last ones.”But what is the Shulchan Aruch?

The Shulchan Aruch, meaning “the set table,” is the standard code of Jewish law that was compiled in the city of Tzfat in northern Israel by Yosef Caro.

This period is marked with rapid change, from the spreading of the printing press, the “Enlightenment,” to the industrial revolution and the advent of modernity. All of these events have left their mark on the Jewish people and Jewish scholarship in one way or another.

The work of Azriel, who is considered the father of contemporary Kabbalah in the 16th century, vastly spread out, and Hasidic Judaism slowly began to develop in subsequent centuries. Today Hasidic Judaism is categorized as a subgroup of Haredi Judaism, which is a subgroup of Orthodox Judaism. In the mid-19th century Reform Judaism developed in the age of emancipation, and by the mid-20th century Conservative Judaism had fully developed.

The literary works of this period are endless, and it is at this stage hard to define the most important works of this time period, as we are faced with such a plurality of streams that what is most significant has become quite subjective and highly depends on the individual’s interpretation and religious orientation.

But some of the most influential and most widely studied works are several commentaries on the Shulchan Aruch as well as works on Jewish thought and ethics, like those by Samson Raphael Hirsch, who together with the work of Azriel Hildesheimer has had considerable influence on Orthodox Judaism and influenced the development of modern Orthodoxy.

Now, I know that this was a loooot of information. If you would like to go over this overview again later, feel free to download the graphic of the timeline as a PDF in the description below. I hope that this very compact overview was helpful to you to get a better understanding of Rabbinic literature itself as well as the development of Rabbinic literature throughout history until today.

If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to ask!