We may, in fact, be approaching a moment when historical literacy—much like philology—ought to be regarded as a basic expectation of rigorous scholarship on the Talmud. If so, the question before us is not only what the Talmud is, but also what forms of training, institutional support, and scholarly habits are required to render that question newly intelligible.
Read MoreBook Historical Bavli Questions
Pirqoi b. Baboi, Cambridge University Library Cambridge England Ms. T-S Misc. 35.97
Pirqoi b. Baboi, Cambridge University Library Cambridge England Ms. T-S Misc. 35.97
The book historical question that I will focus on here is the question of the Talmud’s initial reception, of what we may call its canonization. And I mean this not in the sense of its coalescing as a work, though that is still profoundly unclear, but in the sense of how the Talmud became the most central work for defining what Judaism is and should be—well before, even a millennium before, it became a popular book and a part of popular piety.
Read MoreA Dual Agenda for Bavli Studies: Formation and Reception
A volume of Talmud on display in the Jewish Museum of Switzerland in Basel. The volume brings together parts from the first two Talmud prints by Daniel Bomberg and Ambrosius Froben. CC BY-SA 4.0
A volume of Talmud on display in the Jewish Museum of Switzerland in Basel. The volume brings together parts from the first two Talmud prints by Daniel Bomberg and Ambrosius Froben. CC BY-SA 4.0
[O]ne major and simple contribution that Bavli Studies can make as a recognized (sub)field is to bring together scholars studying the Bavli’s formation and those studying its reception history.
Read MoreWhat is the Talmud?
In anticipation of the publication of the conference proceedings, the volume editors convened a roundtable discussion at the 2025 Association for Jewish Studies annual conference.At the roundtable, several scholars discussed the question "What is the Talmud?" and considered how diverse answers to that question have shaped and will continue to shape the field of Bavli Studies. The responses by Alyssa Gray, Simcha Gross, and Yitz Landes are presented below.
Read MoreJodi Magness: Retrospective for The Ancient Jew Review
It is my hope that scholars who specialize in the study of texts will recognize that archaeology is not only relevant but indeed vital to their own research.
Read MorePublication Preview | “Listen to the Sibyl”: The History, Poetics, and Reception of Sibylline Oracles
T. Carisius. 46 BC. AR Denarius (17mm, 4.05 g, 4h). Rome mint. Head of Sibyl Herophile and seated sphinx. From the Alan J. Harlan Collection. Ex Numismatica Ars Classica 40 (16 May 2007), lot 558 via Wiki Commons.
T. Carisius. 46 BC. AR Denarius (17mm, 4.05 g, 4h). Rome mint. Head of Sibyl Herophile and seated sphinx. From the Alan J. Harlan Collection. Ex Numismatica Ars Classica 40 (16 May 2007), lot 558 via Wiki Commons.
The endurance of Sibyl’s authoritative voice invites analysis by students and scholars interested in gender and antiquity. Throughout the collection's literary, theological, and historical complexities, the one unifying constant is the sibyl herself, an ancient and respected woman prophet.
Read MorePublication Preview: What Animals Teach Us about Families
"One difference between my first book and my most recent one is that this time I let my freak flag fly. My freak vegan flag. What Animals Teach Us about Families is, covertly, a memoir about my becoming a vegan.”
Read MoreThe Art of Introduction: Teaching Religion in High School
The Great Elm at Philips Academy Andover [Wikimedia]
The Great Elm at Philips Academy Andover [Wikimedia]
I wish I could say my move to secondary education was grounded in thoughtful reflection or a profound sense of calling that I’d known and honored my whole life. Instead, it was a kind of serendipitous accident that required a big leap of faith. Of course, so are most of the fun things that life sends our way.
Read MoreA Snow Day in the Life of a Classicist Turned High School English Teacher
The relationship between my writing and teaching is different now…. There is a bit more joy in my writing process than there used to be, and that communicates in my teaching. The time I take on a snow day to cultivate my own creative work is good for morale. Writing has always been a positive process for me, but it is especially so now that my professional future in the academy no longer hinges on my ability to quickly and unrelentingly generate monographs and articles.
Read More“Have You Thought About Teaching at a Boarding School?”: An Overview
“The Holdovers” (2023)
“The Holdovers” (2023)
Another apt turn of phrase for Boarding School Life is: “it is not a difficult job, but it is a demanding one.” But the benefits, in my mind, far outweigh the costs. If you really enjoy teaching, coaching, and mentoring excited and curious young people, this might be an avenue you should seriously consider.
Read MoreSine Qua Non: Teaching Latin in Public School
Secondary-turned academics are indispensable not merely for their banausic training and credentials. At their best, scholars of the humanities embody love of learning and wisdom over mere appearance and sophistry. Where institutions of learning tilt toward test-prep and job training, PhD-trained teachers must fight to keep alive a humanistic appreciation of learning for its own sake.
Read MoreOrigen as Political Theologian
Jan Luyken, Origen teaching students (1700) [Wikimedia].
Contra Celsum as Socratic Philosophy
Image of Ramón Llull, Karlsruhe, Badische Landesbibliothek, Cod. St. Peter perg. 92 [Image Source].
Image of Ramón Llull, Karlsruhe, Badische Landesbibliothek, Cod. St. Peter perg. 92 [Image Source].
Origen too imitated Socrates’s example, not least in his approach to rational inquiry. Origen frequently speaks of Socrates as a model philosopher, though he is not above criticism.
Read MorePlato, Politics, and Faith
O. Von Corven, Library of Alexandria, (1890) [Wikimedia].
In Defense of Celsus
Adversus Celsum libri VIII in Manuscript Grec 945 (15th century) [La Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) / Wikimedia Commons].
Adversus Celsum libri VIII in Manuscript Grec 945 (15th century) [La Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF) / Wikimedia Commons].
In this short tribute to Origen and his translators, I suggest that, among much else, Origen shows paradoxically how strong a mainstream polytheist’s case could be against Christianity in the second century, and how even a brilliant apologist could struggle to meet it.
Read MoreA New Translation of Contra Celsum
A forum in celebration of Robin Darling Young and Joseph Wilson Trigg’s The Contra Celsum of Origen: English Translation and Facing Greek text (Washington and Cambridge: Harvard University Press/Dumbarton Oaks, 2026).
Read MoreContra Celsum from Caesarea to Constantinople: The Travels of a Byzantine Book
Manuscript illumination of Origen from Schäftlarn (ca. 1160) of In numeros homilia XXVII., München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, clm 17092, fol. 130v [For full information see Wikimedia].
Manuscript illumination of Origen from Schäftlarn (ca. 1160) of In numeros homilia XXVII., München, Bayerische Staatsbibliothek, clm 17092, fol. 130v [For full information see Wikimedia].
Celsus’ views about empire and cult, whether they were pagan or Christian, were far from dead in the fourth century; they appear in Christian sermons and treatises – not just in their pagan echoes in Porphyry and Julian.
Read MoreOrigen and the Polis: A New Translation of Contra Celsum
Caesarea Maritima [Image Source].
Caesarea Maritima [Image Source].
Byzantium preserved Contra Celsum because it demonstrated that Christianity was compatible with Hellenism. Renaissance humanism welcomed it because, in doing so, Origen demonstrated that Hellenism was compatible with Christianity.
Read MoreThe Hypothesis of the Gospels
This book draws attention to one important but neglected concept from Hellenistic literary criticism that readers—including Christians—used to organize, describe, and evaluate narrative traditions.
Read MoreListening to the Static: An Author Response
![[Wikimedia]](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:American_Elm_at_Phillips_Academy,_Andover,_MA_-_May_2020.jpg){kind=link}
Image of Exodus 15, from the Leningrad Codex
Image of Exodus 15, from the Leningrad Codex
The white spaces on the page can be spaces both of death and breath. Both are texts of drowning, the Egyptian enemies, their horses and chariots, and the African slaves, who were thrown overboard the slave ship in an insurance scam. Somehow, I believe, through this unconscious visual echo, these enemies and victims meet in God’s lament to the angels, (though perhaps this lament is addressed to all of us who sing victory songs): “my creations are drowning in the sea, and you are singing song?”
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