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The halachic interpolations and expansions in Targum Pseudo-Jonathan are derived either from the Targumist's independent reasoning, or from his use of rabbinic traditions and compilations. All the halachic material can be classified in one of three ways: l) that which is intended to clarify the meaning of the Masoretic text; 2) material which results from Midrashic and exegetical techniques; 3) material which explains how a particular law was carried out. The Targumist made significant use of Mishnah, Mechilta, Sifra, Sifrei Numbers and a text similar to Midrash Tannaim. There is also regular use of Halachic Targumic Traditions. There is no evidence of use of Pirkei d'Rabbi Eliezer. A few halachic comments were identified which cannot be attributed to any known rabbinic source, and which do not seem to have been derived independently. The number of these comments is no more than one would expect to find in a Palestinian work of this period. We suggest that when the Targumist used his independent reasoning, this was either because he did not have relevant rabbinic material available, or because lie felt that the information presented by the sources was inadequate for his purposes. Once the Targumist's techniques are understood, there remains no evidence which suggests a pre-Mishnaic origin of any of the halachic material in the Targum. We can support the results of Shinan and others who have investigated the aggadic content of the Targum and propose a date of seventh or eighth century. We have no evidence to support Shinan's claim that the author of PsY wove his own material into a single extant Palestinian Targum. The author may have had several targumic versions available in addition to his rabbinic sources, and selected material as he felt appropriate. The information that he provides concerning the application of the law is moderated by the constraints of the biblical text; whilst his frequent agreement with minority opinions suggests that his intention is not to produce an authoritative manual on religious law and practice. The probability is that the Targum was written for the school house, as a tool which allowed the student to see the relationship between the Pentateuch and practical law.

The “Holy Spirit” is a familiar concept in Christianity, but in its original Hebrew construction as Ruah ha-Kodesh, it also plays an active role in classical Rabbinic literature. This dissertation surveys uses of the term Ruah ha-Kodesh in major texts from the Tannaitic period through the Aggadic Midrash and the two Talmuds. Drawing on Scriptural roots, the Rabbis identify Ruah ha-Kodesh as the divinely given power that enables individuals to prophesy. While the term never loses this biblical meaning, the Rabbis take Ruah ha-Kodesh further by personifying it as a metonym for God, and more specifically, as “the divine voice in Scripture.” This dissertation first surveys the historical background of the term in pre-Rabbinic ancient Judaism, and then turns to a detailed textual analysis of its uses as both prophecy and personification in Rabbinic literature. The study notes and examines conventional and formulaic terms associated with Ruah ha-Kodesh. Four major Ruah ha-Kodesh traditions are analyzed in depth over the course of their diachronic development. There are numerous Rabbinic sources that claim that Ruah ha-Kodesh has ended, yet others offer advice on how to achieve it or indicate its existence in the Rabbinic present. The solution to this paradox is that Ruah ha-Kodesh has not gone, but changed. Even as Ruah ha-Kodesh is said to have departed from Israel in her role of inspiring the prophets, she continues to speak actively as part of the ongoing Midrashic dialogue with the Sages. The final chapter examines Ruah ha-Kodesh as a metonym for God, particularly as it contrasts and interacts with other divine metonyms of feminine grammatical gender: the Shekhinah and the Bat Kol. The Shekhinah and Ruah ha-Kodesh are frequently identified, but not identical. The changing role of Ruah ha-Kodesh exemplifies a shift in the locus of divine communication, from prophecy to the Midrashic study of Torah. / text

There is an ancient rabbinic apothegm which asserts that prophecy “ceased” after the last Biblical prophets, Haggai, Zachariah, and Malachi. After their deaths, a new phase of divine revelation was believed to have emerged through manifestations of a bat kol (lit. “Daughter of a voice”). This thesis examines the bat kol’s function within the contours of the Babylonian Talmud, primarily, employing philological, literary, and historical analyses. Moreover, it includes a review of parallels with Biblical and Second-Temple era, Apocalyptic works, so as to suggest possible origins. In addition, a sample of about ten stories are presented as representative of larger categories I consider best exhibit the bat kol’s purpose. The categories include: announcing an individual’s entry into the world to come, encomium and disdain towards individuals, matters related to Halacha (Jewish Law), and miscellaneous. As a result we discover how the rabbis employed the bat kol to address contemporary concerns.

<p>This study examines how rabbinic texts from the land of Israel explain and respond to poverty. Through this investigation, I also analyze images of the poor in this literature, asking whether the rabbis considered poor persons to be full participants in communal religious life. Within the context of rabbinic almsgiving, this study describes how Palestinian rabbis negotiated both the biblical commands to care for the poor and Greco-Roman notions of hierarchy, benefaction and patronage. </p><p> The sources at the heart of this study are Tannaitic texts: the Mishnah, the Tosefta and Tannaitic midrashim; and Amoraic texts: the Yerushalmi (Palestinian Talmud) and the classical Amoraic Midrashim - Genesis Rabbah, Leviticus Rabbah and Pesiqta de Rab Kahana. Other texts such as Babylonian Talmud, non-rabbinic and non-Jewish texts are included in this study only when they are able to shed light on the texts mentioned above. In reading rabbinic texts, I pay close attention to several textual features: distinctions between Tannaitic and Amoraic compositions, as well as between rabbinic texts from the land of Israel and the Babylonian Talmud, and evidence of texts that were influenced by the Babylonian Talmud. This method of careful assessment of texts according to their time of composition and geographic origin forms the basis of this investigation. </p><p>The investigation yields several key findings: </p><p>I suggest various factors that shaped Palestinian rabbinic approaches to poverty and almsgiving, including: the biblical heritage, the Greco-Roman and Byzantine environments, the diverse socio-economic status of the rabbis, and their adherence to "measure for measure" as a key hermeneutic principle. </p><p>The study also portrays how the rabbinic charitable system evolved as an expansion of the biblical framework and through engagement with Greco-Roman notions and practices. This unique system for supporting the poor shows evidence of the adoption of select Greco-Roman customs and views, as well as the rejection of other aspects of its hegemonic patterns. We have seen that the language of patronage is absent from the Mishnah's articulation of the rabbinic charitable model. </p><p>Several of the texts analyzed in this study indicate that, for the rabbis, the poor were not necessarily outsiders. Following the main stream of biblical thinking, where the ordinary poor are rarely considered sinners who bear responsibility for their abject situation, Palestinian rabbinic texts seldom link ordinary poverty to sinful behavior. In these texts, the poor are not presented as passive recipients of gifts and support, but as independent agents who are responsible for their conduct. Moreover, rabbinic teachings about support for the poor reveal not only provisions for basic needs such as food, clothing and shelter but also attention to the dignity and the feelings of the poor, as well as their physical safety and the value of their time.</p> / Dissertation

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Esta pesquisa visa evidenciar as semelhanças existentes entre a proposta de Giambattista Vico sobre o começo das civilizações gentílicas e as argumentações rabínicas relativas ao episódio do Dilúvio Universal, narrado em Gênesis 6 e considerado um documento conservado pelas tradições orais e verbais judaicas. Buscamos os fundamentos da literatura grego-romana e judaica que levaram Vico a intuir um método para a verificação das ciências humanas. Tal método difere do método dedutivo, aclamado pelos intelectuais de sua época, pois o filósofo italiano acredita que a religião está presente na base do processo civilizatório e coloca a linguagem como o fenômeno que organiza o mundo. Levantamos - nos postulados viquianos e nas argumentações rabínicas relativas aos primeiros capítulos de Gênesis - as observações que apresentam as características intrínsecas que condicionam os homens a instituir os três princípios eternos (religião, casamentos e sepulturas), identificáveis na formação de todos os povos; situamos as três fases viquianas (divina, heróica e humana) nos textos judaicos e evidenciamos, na visão rabínica de mundo, os fundamentos usados como base para a formação do conceito viquiano sobre a graça; tal conceito é responsável pela divisão da humanidade entre hebreus e gentios e dá margem às conjecturas relativas à existência de gigantes no tempo do dilúvio / This research aims to evidence the existing similarities between the proposal of Giambattista Vico about the beginning of the heathen civilization and rabbinic arguments about the episode of the Flood, in Genesis 6, considered a document conserved for Jewish oral and verbal traditions. We searched for the beddings of literature Jewish and Greek-Roman that allowed Vico to intuit a method for the verification of human beings sciences. Such method differs from the deductive method, acclaimed for the intellectuals of its time: the Italian philosopher believes that the religion is present in the base of the civilization process and places the language as the phenomenon that organizes the world. We showed - in the vichian postulates and the rabbinic arguments about the first chapters of Genesis - the comments that focus the intrinsic characteristics which induce the men to institute the three perpetual principles (religion, marriages and sepultures), identifiable in the formation of the nations everywhere; we pointed the three vichian phases (divine, heroic and human being) in the Jewish texts and we evidence, in the rabbinic view of world, the beddings used as base for the elaboration of the vichian concept about the favour; such concept is responsible for the division of the humanity between heathen and Hebrews allowing conjectures about the existence of giants in the time of the Flood

Esta pesquisa visa evidenciar as semelhanças existentes entre a proposta de Giambattista Vico sobre o começo das civilizações gentílicas e as argumentações rabínicas relativas ao episódio do Dilúvio Universal, narrado em Gênesis 6 e considerado um documento conservado pelas tradições orais e verbais judaicas. Buscamos os fundamentos da literatura grego-romana e judaica que levaram Vico a intuir um método para a verificação das ciências humanas. Tal método difere do método dedutivo, aclamado pelos intelectuais de sua época, pois o filósofo italiano acredita que a religião está presente na base do processo civilizatório e coloca a linguagem como o fenômeno que organiza o mundo. Levantamos - nos postulados viquianos e nas argumentações rabínicas relativas aos primeiros capítulos de Gênesis - as observações que apresentam as características intrínsecas que condicionam os homens a instituir os três princípios eternos (religião, casamentos e sepulturas), identificáveis na formação de todos os povos; situamos as três fases viquianas (divina, heróica e humana) nos textos judaicos e evidenciamos, na visão rabínica de mundo, os fundamentos usados como base para a formação do conceito viquiano sobre a graça; tal conceito é responsável pela divisão da humanidade entre hebreus e gentios e dá margem às conjecturas relativas à existência de gigantes no tempo do dilúvio / This research aims to evidence the existing similarities between the proposal of Giambattista Vico about the beginning of the heathen civilization and rabbinic arguments about the episode of the Flood, in Genesis 6, considered a document conserved for Jewish oral and verbal traditions. We searched for the beddings of literature Jewish and Greek-Roman that allowed Vico to intuit a method for the verification of human beings sciences. Such method differs from the deductive method, acclaimed for the intellectuals of its time: the Italian philosopher believes that the religion is present in the base of the civilization process and places the language as the phenomenon that organizes the world. We showed - in the vichian postulates and the rabbinic arguments about the first chapters of Genesis - the comments that focus the intrinsic characteristics which induce the men to institute the three perpetual principles (religion, marriages and sepultures), identifiable in the formation of the nations everywhere; we pointed the three vichian phases (divine, heroic and human being) in the Jewish texts and we evidence, in the rabbinic view of world, the beddings used as base for the elaboration of the vichian concept about the favour; such concept is responsible for the division of the humanity between heathen and Hebrews allowing conjectures about the existence of giants in the time of the Flood

This study investigates the shofar and it´s relation to classical music in modern and contemporary time, and examine the cause of this interest in the western world among composers and musicians, namely the unique sound. The origins of the shofar stems from the Tanakh as a sacred ritual instrument and as a marketer of time up until today. Through rabbinic efforts of interpreting and preserving the authentic doctrines it has survived throughout millennia. With this newfounded interest conflicts and discussions of whether the shofar should be contained within its jewish sacred context of frame or whether it should be allowed to be used in profane music jewish or otherwise. With this paper I want to bring attention to the complex situation of the use of shofar and it´s motives in a profane world. Is it possible to take the shofar out of its traditional jewish context and maintain its reverence and authentic status of dignity. Through hermeneutic method these issues will be highlighted.