Rabbinic Revolution

Event at Harvard:

THE RABBINIC REVOLUTION AND THE INVENTION OF JEWISH LAW

A symposium

Tuesday March 29, 2011 4-6pm

Langdell Hall South (on the campus of the Law School)

Presentations by

Prof. Vered Noam, Goldsmith Visiting Professor of Jewish Studies, Yale University

and

Prof. Aharon Shemesh, Weinstock Visiting Professor of Jewish Studies, Harvard University

Responses by

Prof. Moshe Halbertal, Gruss Visiting Professor in Talmudic Civil Law, Harvard University

and

Prof. Shaye J.D. Cohen, Littauer Professor of Hebrew Literature and Philosophy, Harvard University

Chaired by

Prof. Noah Feldman, Bemis Professor of International Law, Harvard University

The second century CE witnessed an amazing development in the history of Judaism: the compilation of the Mishnah and the emergence of rabbinic Judaism. The rabbinic sages believed that the sum and substance of the Mishnah’s legal rulings could be traced back to the Torah (Pentateuch), if not directly, then indirectly via the medium of “the Oral Torah.” The rabbinic sages have thus left a great puzzle for modern historians of religion and law: do the Mishnah and related writings attest to something old, as the sages would have us believe, or something new? Were the sages conservators, the preservers of an ancient heritage, or were they innovators, the shapers of a new culture? Perhaps both. Join us for a multi-pronged discussion of the subject.