In these two books, now reprinted in one volume, master Talmudist and scholar of the Greco-Roman world, the late Professor Saul Lieberman, elucidates words, texts, customs and practices in either rabbinic or classical literature, often buy reference to passages in the other. In Greek in Jewish Palestine, he demonstrates that "almost ever foreign word and phrase have their raison d'etre in rabbinic literature" and that "all Greek phrases in rabbinic literature are quotations." Hellenism in Jewish Palestine is "an inquiry into the spirit of many rabbinic observations and investigations of the facts, insicents, opinions, notions and beliefs to which the Rabbis allude in their statements."

The Dead Sea Scrolls are perhaps the most important archaeological discovery of the twentieth century. These lectures set before the public the real Dead Sea Scrolls, the most important collections of Jewish texts from the centuries before the rise of Christianity. Only through efforts to understand what the scrolls can teach us about the history of Judaism is it possible for us to learn what they have to teach us about the history of Christianity. Professor Schiffman leads the listener through the complex details of the Scrolls and their true meaning for the world.

Whether you are studying the Bible for the first time or you're simply curious about its history and contents, you will find everything you need in this "accessible, well-written handbook to Jewish belief as set forth in the Torah" (The Jerusalem Post). George Robinson, author of the acclaimed Essential Judaism, begins by recounting the various theories of the origins of the Torah and goes on to explain its importance as the core element in Jewish belief and practice. He discusses the basics of Jewish theology and Jewish history as they are derived from the Torah, and he outlines how the Dead Sea Scrolls and other archaeological discoveries have enhanced our understanding of the Bible. He introduces us to the vast literature of biblical commentary, chronicles the evolution of the Torah’s place in the synagogue service, offers an illuminating discussion of women and the Bible, and provides a study guide as a companion for individual or group Bible study. In the book’s centerpiece, Robinson summarizes all fifty-four portions that make up the Torah and gives us a brilliant distillation of two thousand years of biblical commentaries—from the rabbis of the Mishnah and the Talmud to medieval commentators such as Rashi, Maimonides, and ibn Ezra to contemporary scholars such as Nahum Sarna, Nechama Leibowitz, Robert Alter, and Everett Fox. This extraordinary volume—which includes a listing of the Torah reading cycles, a Bible time line, glossaries of terms and biblical commentators, and a bibliography—will stand as the essential sourcebook on the Torah for years to come.

The text of the Torah includes not only its words, but also various atypical scribal features. Prime among these are the dots over certain letters, various letters written either large or small, and the exceedingly odd placement of two inverted Hebrew letters surrounding one passage. What are these features doing there? How old are they? Do they carry meaning? How have they been interpreted over the years? James Diamond brings the reader on the journey through the Torah text in search of a response to these questions.

From the dramatic find in the caves of Qumran, the world's most ancient version of the Bible allows us to read the scriptures as they were in the time of Jesus.

Winner of the 2014 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature A thousand years ago, the most perfect copy of the Hebrew Bible was written. It was kept safe through one upheaval after another in the Middle East, and by the 1940s it was housed in a dark grotto in Aleppo, Syria, and had become known around the world as the Aleppo Codex. Journalist Matti Friedman’s true-life detective story traces how this precious manuscript was smuggled from its hiding place in Syria into the newly founded state of Israel and how and why many of its most sacred and valuable pages went missing. It’s a tale that involves grizzled secret agents, pious clergymen, shrewd antiquities collectors, and highly placed national figures who, as it turns out, would do anything to get their hands on an ancient, decaying book. What it reveals are uncomfortable truths about greed, state cover-ups, and the fascinating role of historical treasures in creating a national identity.

Moses Wilhelm Shapira's infamous Deuteronomy manuscripts -- long believed to be forgeries -- are of far greater significance than ever imagined. Idan Dershowitz shows that the text preserved in these manuscripts is not based on the book of Deuteronomy. On the contrary, it is a proto-biblical book, the likes of which has never before been seen.