Judaism I. Группа авторов

for Continuing Education at the University of Education (Pädagogische Hochschule) Karlsruhe writes on Judaism in Europe and the former Soviet Union post-World War II. She charts the after-effects of the murder and deportations of Jews that took place.

      Many survivors could scarcely imagine rebuilding Jewish life. Zionism was attractive to a large proportion of those who had been uprooted. Those who stayed in Europe faced reintegration into society depending on national contexts. The immigration of Jews from North Africa and the Soviet Union changed European Jewish communities fundamentally.

      Armborst-Weihs considers displaced persons in the years following the war. She turns to the exodus of Jews from the former Soviet Union, that unfolded in the 1960s through the 1970s. Much of the emigration was directed to settling in the State of Israel, changing its social and political complexion.

      In Poland, the effects of the Holocaust continue to stunt the small Polish Jewish population—once a community of 3.5 million Jews. Today, there is an appreciation of the legacy of Polish Jewry, with a museum, kosher restaurants, and klezmer music concerts—but not very many Jews. Hungarian Jewry was similarly annihilated. Its slow recovery has recently been checked by rising anti-Semitism and government opposition.

      Germany slowly began a resurgence of Jewish life, buttressed by a huge influx of Soviet Jews. It recently opened both liberal and orthodox rabbinical schools to provide leadership for the burgeoning Jewish population. The German government has been supportive of this renaissance.

      Great Britain’s Jewish population was not appreciably affected by the Holocaust. In the post-war decades, British Jewry was characterized by social mobility. Contrary to pessimistic forecasts of demography of British Judaism for the late 20th century, recent figures indicate a growth in population.

      Zionism found widespread approval in French Jewish society. Despite some emigration from France to Israel in recent years, the Jewish community in France is the third largest in the world. This is in part due to an influx of North African Jewish immigration, which changed the social make-up.

      Armborst-Weihs concludes with surveys of the Italian, Spanish, and Greek Jewish communities. Owing to the diversity of traditions and interests within Judaism in Europe, many different Jewish identities have developed.

      8.2 Judaism II: Literature

      13 The Jewish Bible: Traditions and Translations

      Professor Emeritus of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Emanuel Tov describes the TaNaKh, Torah (Pentateuch), Nevi’im (Prophets), Ketuvim (Writings) as Jewish Scripture that has come down from antiquity in complex ways. The traditional Jewish Bible, or Masoretic Text (MT) represents only one of the early text traditions, but is accepted by all streams of Judaism since the first century CE. The oldest source of MT is the Aleppo Codex, ca. 925 CE. All the printed editions of the Hebrew Bible and most of its modern translations present a form of MT.

      The main site of ancient biblical manuscripts is in the Judean Desert near Khirbet Qumran, south of Jericho near the Dead Sea. There, remnants of some 950 biblical and non-biblical scrolls were found in eleven caves. Twenty-five texts found in the Judean Desert at sites other than Qumran display almost complete identity with the medieval texts. The Qumran biblical texts themselves, however, depart from MT. In view of this disparity, we conclude that for the Qumran community, the various Scripture texts were equally authoritative. Most likely, the biblical text was known in different ways not only in Qumran, but throughout Israel.

      Before the discovery of the Dead Sea Scrolls, scholars were not aware that MT existed in the same consonantal form as early as the last centuries BCE. The Hebrew and translated texts used within rabbinic Judaism only reflect MT. Most scholars are now of the opinion that LXX manuscripts derive from a single translation into Greek that was repeatedly revised to conform to the proto-MT. In the first century CE, when the Christian New Testament writers quoted the earlier scripture, they used the wording of the LXX, since the NT was written in Greek.

      Skilled persons have been translating the Bible for more than two millennia. Except for the LXX translation, some version of the MT has been the basis of virtually every translation of the Hebrew Bible. Of the ancient translations, the Aramaic Targumim reflect the views of the rabbis.

      14 Jewish Literature in the Hellenistic-Roman Period (350 B.C.E. –150 C.E.)

      Dr. Michael Tilly of Eberhard Karls University of Tübingen surveys Jewish literature from the close of the Hebrew Bible up to rabbinic literature. Koine Greek was the lingua franca throughout the eastern Mediterranean. Jewish writings from Hellenistic-Roman times comprise different genres, styles, and linguistic levels. These texts were composed primarily in the three centers of ancient Judaism: the Land of Israel, Egypt, and Babylonia (Iraq). The rabbis did not hand down Hellenistic-Jewish literature. Rather, Greek Jewish literature was handed down, translated, revised, and supplemented exclusively by Christianity.

      Historical and legendary texts are considered, such as: 3 Ezra, 1–3 Maccabees, Judith, Greek Esther, the Greek Daniel traditions: Susanna; Bel and the Dragon; Prayer of Azariah; the three men in the fiery furnace. Dr. Tilly also surveys: the Paraleipomena Jeremiou and Vitae Prophetarum, Hellenistic-Jewish historians, whose work is often fragmentary including Eupolemus, Artapanos, and the works in Hecataeus of Abdera.

      Dr. Tilly turns next to teachings in narrative form such as: Tobit, the Letter of Aristeas, which recounts the legend of the commission and translation of the LXX, the Book of Jubilees, Ascensio Isaiae, as well as a Life of Adam and Eve (in Latin) or Apocalypse of Moses (Greek). The Liber Antiquitatum Biblicarum was falsely attributed to Philo in the Middle Ages. The Hellenistic novel Joseph and Asenath is also reviewed.

      Other works such as the Teachings of Ben Sirach, the Wisdom of Solomon, Book of Baruch, Epistle of Jeremiah, 4 Maccabees, the Testament of the Twelve Patriarchs, and the Testament of Job are included. The thoroughness of the survey is indicated by Dr. Tilly’s inclusion of the Hellenistic-Jewish exegetes Demetrios, Aristobulus, and another exegete called Aristeas (not the one already mentioned).

      A section follows on poetry: Psalm 151, the Psalms of Solomon, Pseudo-Phocylides, and Ezekiel the Tragedian’s Exagogé. The chapter continues with Greek Apocalyptic works such as the Greek and the Syriac Apocalypses of Baruch, the Ascension of Moses, 4 Ezra, the Apocalypse of Abraham, 1–2 Enoch, and the Sibylline Oracles. Dr. Tilly briefly surveys the various non-biblical Dead Sea Scrolls, before concluding with the works of Philo and Josephus.

      15 Tannaitic Literature

      Professor Emeritus at the University of Vienna, Günter Stemberger writes that the first generations of the rabbis, from 70 CE to the early third century, are called tannaim (plural), derived from Aramaic tanna, ›to repeat, learn.‹ Traditionally, these masters begin with Hillel and Shammai in the first century CE, and their ›houses‹ or schools. They were followed by masters of Yavneh after 70 CE: Yoḥanan ben Zakkai, Rabban Gamaliel, Rabbis Yishmael and Aqiva. The Tannaim continued through the rabbis of Usha, after the Bar Kokhbah-revolt (132–135): Simeon ben Gamaliel, and R. Meir, culminating with Yehudah ha-Nasi, called Rabbi (ca. 200 CE).

      Rabbi edited the Mishnah, the most important literary product of the rabbis. It consists of six ›orders‹ (seder, plural: sedarim), each divided into tractates. The work used pre-existing sources and traditions and was ›published‹ in oral form. Some of mishnaic halakhah is from the Bible, but the relationship of the Mishnah to Scripture does not imply a direct line of development from biblical times. Many tractates of the Mishnah depict rituals of the Temple. R. Yehudah and his co-workers reformulated the traditions they received. Repetitions and contradictions within the book and the inclusion of opinions with which Rabbi does not agree, led scholars to consider the Mishnah as a collection or a teaching manual.

      The Tosefta (Aramaic) means ›supplement.‹ It denotes additional teachings supplementing the Mishnah, having the same six orders and tractates. The Tannaitic halakhic midrashim are on Exodus through Deuteronomy, interpreting