Supplements to the Journal for the Study of Judaism
2 primary works
Book 69
In this collection of articles, written over a decade of research, the author explores the fascinating worlds of Jewish literature and cultural history, mainly focussing on various aspects of Jewish hermeneutics of Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. The interpretation of the past is the main activity of the rabbinic school. Not only the old translations of the Bible, but also the Jewish approach to magic show the endeavour to conciliate the requirements of the present with the tradition and to give a new meaning to the revered texts and concepts of the past.
Book 109
The book deals with the field of decanonization of ancient traditions by the technique of deconstructing their original context; in particular: the process of canonization of the Greek Torah in Jewish-Hellenistic and Christian tradition and its decanonization in Rabbinic literature; the use and abuse of the translation(s) of Aquila in Patristic and Rabbinic literature and the substitution of Aquila by Onkelos in Babylonian academies; the decanonization of the book of Ben Sira in Rabbinic literature. On the basis of his analysis, the author concludes that, if a canon is the ability of a text to produce and authorize commentary deconstructing its original context by generalization, de-canonization is the inverse way of contextualizing a 'canonical' text by reconstructing the supposed original context.