Surveys Jewish visual culture in the Late Roman and Byzantine eras, including expression via figural images, biblical scenes and religious symbols.

The Exegetical Encounter between Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity is a collection of essays examining the relationship between Jewish and Christian biblical commentators. The contributions focus on analysis of interpretations of the book of Genesis, a text which has considerable importance in both Christian and Jewish tradition. The essays cover a wide range of Jewish and Christian literature, including primarily rabbinic and patristic sources, but also apocrypha, pseudepigrapha, Philo, Josephus and Gnostic texts. In bringing together the studies of a variety of eminent scholars on the topic of Exegetical Encounter , the book presents the latest research on the topic and illuminates a variety of original approaches to analysis of exegetical contacts between the two sets of religious groups. The volume is significant for the light it sheds on the history of relations between Jews and Christians in Late Antiquity.

Thirteen foremost scholars describe the views of death, life after death, resurrection, and the world-to-come set forth in the literary evidence for late antique Judaism. The volume covers the vie w of Scripture as a whole as against other Israelite writings; distinct parts of Scripture such as Psalms and the Wisdom literature; apocalyptic and the non-apocalyptic pseudepigraphic literature, Philo; Josephus; the Dead Sea Scrolls; earliest Christianity (the Gospels in particular); the Rabbinic sources; the Palestinian Targums to the Pentateuch; and, out of material culture, the inscriptional evidence. The result is both to highlight the range of available perspectives on this important issue and to illuminate a central problem in the study of Judaism in late antiquity, phrased neatly as “One Judaism or many?” Here we place on display indicative components of Judaism in their full diversity, leaving it for readers to determine whether the notion of a single, coherent religion falls under the weight of a mass of documentary contradictions or whether an inner harmony shines forth from a repertoire of largely shared and only superficially-diverse data.

Explores the influence of Roman imperialism on the development of Messianic themes in Judaism.

This volume revisits issues of empire from the perspective of Jews, Christians, and other Romans in the third to sixth centuries. Through case studies, the contributors bring Jewish perspectives to bear on longstanding debates concerning Romanization, Christianization, and late antiquity.

Scepticism has been the driving force in the development of Greco-Roman culture in the past, and the impetus for far-reaching scientific achievements and philosophical investigation. Early Jewish culture, in contrast, avoided creating consistent representations of its philosophical doctrines. Sceptical notions can nevertheless be found in some early Jewish literature such as the Book of Ecclesiastes. One encounters there expressions of doubt with respect to Divine justice or even Divine involvement in earthly affairs. During the first centuries of the common era, however, Jewish thought, as reflected in rabbinic works, was engaged in persistent intellectual activity devoted to the laws, norms, regulations, exegesis and other traditional areas of Jewish religious knowledge. An effort to detect sceptical ideas in ancient Judaism, therefore, requires a closer analysis of this literary heritage and its cultural context. This volume of collected essays seeks to tackle the question of scepticism in an Early Jewish context, including Ecclesiastes and other Jewish Second Temple works, rabbinic midrashic and talmudic literature, and reflections of Jewish thought in early Christian and patristic writings. Contributors are: Tali Artman, Geoffrey Herman, Reuven Kiperwasser, Serge Ruzer, Cana Werman, and Carsten Wilke.

A clear account of all the Jewish literature produced in Late Antiquity in either Palestine or Babylonia, aiming above all to orientate students and interested non-specialists as regards what types of literature are involved and how access can be gained to texts and translations.