Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism: From the Temple to the Mishnah(Olamot Series in Humanities and Social Sciences)

The concern for purity was the cornerstone of the religious culture of ancient Judaism. Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism explores how this concern shaped the worldview of Jews during the Second Temple period as well as their daily practices and social relations. It examines how different groups offered competing visions and methods for living a life of purity, which embodied a promise for personal and cosmic salvation and at the same time determined the degree of sectarian separation. Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism offers a comprehensive description of the world of purity among the Jews of the Second Temple period in general and within the tradition of the Pharisees in particular. Yair Furstenberg explores the language of purity that provided Jews in antiquity a powerful tool for organizing legal, social, and ideological boundaries, and its study is therefore pertinent for understanding the powers that shaped the varieties of Second Temple Judaism and their later offshoots: Early Christianity and Rabbinic Judaism. Purity and Identity in Ancient Judaism offers new methods for carefully integrating the New Testament, Qumran literature, and early rabbinic sources into a comprehensive history of purity laws from the world of the Second Temple and the Pharisees to the later rabbinic movement, allowing the reader to trace the emergence of new religious sensibilities within changing social and cultic circumstances.

Table of Contents:
Preface Note on Translations and Editions List of Abbreviations Introduction: From Pharisees to Rabbis Part One: The Varieties of Purity 1. Biblical Foundations, New Conception 2. Exclusive Paths to Purity from Qumran to Jesus Part Two: Communal Identities 3. The Purity of the Pharisees 4. Outsider Impurity and the Forms of Judean Sectarianism 5. Inclusion and Marginalization Part Three: Tradition and Invention 6. Changing Social Contexts 7. The End of Purity Epilogue: The Rabbinic Movement within Shifting Religious Cultures Notes Bibliography Index

About the Author :
Yair Furstenberg is Associate Professor of Talmud at Hebrew University, where he serves as chair of the department. Among his publications are Jewish Martyrdom in Antiquity: From the Books of Maccabees to the Babylonian Talmud and the edited volume Jewish and Christian Communal Identities in the Roman World.

Review :
"In a masterful, erudite, and lucidly written study, Yair Furstenberg explores the development of perceptions and practices of ritual purity from the Second Temple Period to the Rabbinic era as prisms through which fundamental issues of identity and community were negotiated during this tumultuous time. The book expertly and convincingly demonstrates the value of careful textual inquiry for the construction of a social history, as it uncovers the multiple and rich layers of ideas, concerns, and cultural and religious challenges that are hidden in one of the most fascinating sets of texts from Jewish antiquity."—Mira Balberg, author of Purity, Body, and Self in Early Rabbinic Literature "This book is not for the faint- hearted. The heart of the book are rich discussions of halachah found in the Dead Sea Scrolls and tannaitic literature. The author's erudition will interest scholars of Second Temple purity, but it is unlikely to fundamentally change the way we use Rabbinic halachic literature and the Dead Sea Scrolls, at least for this reader. To his credit, Furstenberg reminds us that Jews of antiquity differ from Jews of today, especially in how they lived their Judaism. Issues of purity and impurity pervasively occupied Second Temple Jews and are essential to understanding this period."—Rabbi Matthew A. Kraus, CCAR Journal: The Reform Jewish Quarterly