The Talmud (book)
The Talmud is a comprehensive collection of rabbinic discussions and interpretations concerning the 613 commandments found in the Five Books of Moses, often referred to as the Oral Law. Compiled in two main parts—the Mishna, which was finalized in the second century CE, and the Gemara, developed later—the Talmud serves as a cornerstone of Jewish law and ethics. Written in Hebrew and Aramaic, it encompasses not only legal rulings but also a wide array of narratives, parables, and philosophical insights that reflect the cultural and historical contexts of Jewish life from antiquity through the medieval period.
Over the centuries, the Talmud faced significant challenges, including censorship and attempts at destruction, particularly during the rise of Christianity as a dominant faith. Despite these threats, the Talmud endured, preserved across Jewish communities worldwide. The invention of the printing press in the 15th century further facilitated its distribution and accessibility, allowing for a revival of interest among both Jewish and Christian scholars. Today, while the Talmud remains a central text for Jewish study, it is also a subject of scrutiny and misrepresentation, especially in the context of modern anti-Semitic narratives. Its rich tapestry continues to influence contemporary discussions on law, morality, and cultural identity within and beyond the Jewish community.
The Talmud (book)
Type of work: Book
Written: Second century c.e. to the present
Authors: Rabbinical scholars
Subject matter: Compilation of oral traditions of Jewish law, touching on all aspects of life
Significance: Understanding how the medieval Christian Church and modern totalitarian governments tried to destroy or censor the Talmud is essential to understanding Jewish-Gentile relationships
The Talmud is a vast compendium of rabbinic commentary on the 613 commandments set forth in the Five Books of Moses (the Pentateuch). It is known as the Oral Law because every generation took great care to attribute its contents to the original authors, avoiding putting it into writing lest it assume a status comparable to the Bible itself, the Written Law. However, during periods of bitter persecution, the rabbinic leadership took the lead in committing the Oral Law to writing, lest it be lost during the battle for survival. Thus, the oldest portion, the Mishna, written in Hebrew, was compiled late in the second century by Yehudah Ha-Nasi, during the Roman persecutions which followed the suppression of the last great Jewish revolt in 132-135 c.e.
Continued legal interpretation resulted in the growth of two great bodies of Oral Law, developed separately in Palestine and Babylonia. It was to be the Babylonian text which was ultimately set in writing, in Aramaic. This compilation is credited to Rabbi Mar Bar Ashi, (352-427). It, rather than the Jerusalem Gemara (Completion), has come to be regarded as authoritative and complete. Mishna and Gemara, together, constitute the Talmud.
This vast sea of legal commentary contains not only the definitive decisions of great rabbis over almost a millennium, but dissenting opinions, as well. In addition, this huge work contains a mass of aggada or narrative containing parables, legends, and proverbs. This material is sometimes only peripherally related to the actual legal decisions under discussion. Thus, religious considerations aside, the Talmud is a mirror reflecting contemporary Jewish opinions of the world from the time of Alexander the Great until the age of the Zoroastrian persecutions in Babylonia. These included comments about Judaism’s increasingly hostile daughter, the new Christian faith.
Censorship in Medieval Christianity
As Christianity became the state church of the Roman Empire in the fourth century the Talmud became a symbol of the risks inherent in tolerating the old mother faith. Thus European medieval history is filled with repetitive attempts to censor or to destroy what had come to be regarded as a pernicious attack on Christianity. Attempts at the censorship of talmudic writings can be numbered in the hundreds. Pope Clement IV (1265-1268), censored not only the Talmud, but all Jewish books. Most dramatically, however, the Talmud was condemned to be burned at Paris in 1242, and in Italy in 1553. Complete censorship even forced the Jews to rewrite their synagogue service, to remove any references regarded as contradicting Christian doctrine. To this day, the Olenu prayer which concludes most synagogue services displays one text in services conducted by the descendants of European Jews, and another text in the services of Asran and Israeli Jews whose ancestors never suffered the censorship of the medieval Church.
Fortunately, copies of the Talmud existed in every land where Jews lived, so that it became impossible to destroy it. The greatest danger of losing the Talmud ended when the printing press made possible mass reproduction. A printing of the Mishna was completed at Naples in 1492, and the Babylonian Gemara was printed at Venice in 1520-1523.
Until the fifteenth century, there were no Christian scholars in Europe who could translate Hebrew and Aramaic sufficiently well to understand the Talmud. Thus, the repetitive attacks were usually made possible by apostate Jews posing as talmudic authorities. Particularly serious threats to the survival of the work were posed in all Europe by Pope Gregory IX in 1239, in France a few years later, and in Spain early in the following century. Perhaps the worst example of the use of Jewish renegades to destroy the Talmud came when southern French rabbis who opposed the rationalist philosophy of Maimonides, petitioned King Louis IX of France to burn his writings. The king obliged them, and exceeded their request by ordering the burning of the Talmud.
Early Christian Defenders of the Talmud
A turning point came in 1509 when Johannes Pfefferkorn, a former kosher slaughterer who had a superficial acquaintance with the Talmud, published a booklet titled the Judenspiegel (“Jew’s Mirror”), describing the Talmud as not merely critical of Christianity, but blasphemous as well. After converting to Roman Catholicism, Pfefferkorn attempted to ingratiate himself with his new coreligionists by such accusations, absurd in themselves because they took isolated talmudic references entirely out of context. Because of the sensational circumstances of his charges, however, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I was moved to convene a council to examine the charges. It was composed of Pfefferkorn, Jakob van Hoogstraeten, the Inquisitor of Cologne, and representatives of four universities. Johannes Reuchlin, professor of Hebrew at the University of Heidelberg, did not really have any expertise in talmudic law. His primary interest was in cabalistic, mystical writings. Nevertheless, he knew enough to defend the Talmud from Pfefferkorn’s malicious charges. In the end, Reuchlin courageously declared that the Jews were subjects of the Holy Roman Empire who deserved to be protected in their independent religious rights. He added that there was much information in the Talmud which Christians interested in the history of their own religion should value.
Reuchlin’s testimony ignited explosive controversy. An impressive gallery of authorities rallied to his defense. Martin Luther, not yet having begun the Protestant Reformation, achieved his first notoriety by supporting Reuchlin. Others who leaped into the fray as Reuchlin’s advocates were Desiderius Erasmus, Ulrich von Hutten, England’s Bishop Fisher of Rochester, Philip Schwarzerd (Melanchton), and fifty-three cities and sovereign German princes. Europe was convulsed with laughter at an anonymous published work titled Letters of Obscure Men, deliberately written in ungrammatical Latin, mocking the pretensions of Pfefferkorn and the Inquisition. The affair died as the Reformation caught the attention of Christendom. For the Jews, however, the Talmud had been spared, and even more significantly, a prominent Christian had defended their rights as citizens of the empire. The case dragged out until 1520 and ultimately ended with a rebuke and a small fine imposed upon Reuchlin.
The seventeenth century witnessed a widespread vogue for the study of the Hebrew language by scholarly Christians, such that King James I of England became personally involved in the Bible translation that bears his name. Once Jewish texts of all sorts were open to the examination of learned Christian scholars, it became more difficult for ignorant bigots to demand the censorship or suppression of the Talmud.
“Talmud” as a Generic Term
Over the past two centuries, as racial anti-Semitism has replaced religious anti-Semitism, bigots of all sorts have tended to use the word “talmudic” as a generic term for alleged Jewish plots to dominate the world. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, the most infamous of those fictions, has been promoted by so varied a group of sponsors as automobile magnate Henry Ford, Nazi propagandists, and Israel’s Arab opponents. In the Soviet Union, not merely the Talmud, but all Jewish religion was rigorously suppressed to the point wherein even the study of the Hebrew language was almost impossible for ordinary Jews. Only politically dependable students might study it at the university level.
Bibliography
Salo W. Baron’s A Social and Religious History of the Jews (in 16 volumes; New York: Columbia University Press, 1937) is the most thorough examination of the role of the Talmud in Jewish life, and the frequent effort to censor or threaten its existence. Eli Kedourie edited The Jewish World: History and Culture of the Jewish People (New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1979), which contains a vast collection of essays by outstanding authorities dealing with this subject. Hermann L. Strack’s Introduction to the Talmud and Midrash (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1931) is an essential description of the contents of the Talmud, with extensive notes on the history of printings of the work, as well as references to attempts to censor it. Max L. Margolis and Alexander Marx’s A History of the Jewish People (Philadelphia: Jewish Publication Society of America, 1927) contains frequent references to this subject, and offers a fine chronology at the end. Almost all of the numerous textbooks covering Jewish history deal with this subject.