Confronting Creation: How Judaism Reads Genesis: An Anthology of Genesis Rabbah
Overview
By setting forth the book of Genesis as it is represented in the rabbinic statement Genesis Rabbah, renowned scholar Jacob Neusner demonstrates how Judaism confronted creation and the Genesis story. This event was crucial in the life of Israel and the Jewish people because it helped shape the entire history of Western civilization—the rise of Christianity to the status of the official religion of the Roman Empire. The Judaic sages’ rereading of the Torah’s accounts of the beginning of the world and of Israel took place during a time of significant change in Western civilization. That fact explains the importance of this reading of Genesis to Western civilization because Genesis Rabbah illuminates the Judaic tradition in contemplating God’s creation of the world.
Top Highlights
“That he adorns bride? As it is written, ‘And the Lord God built the rib … into a woman’ (Gen. 2:22).” (Page 64)
“Our task as Israel is to accept, endure, submit, and celebrate” (Page 2)
“We see chaos and disorder. God worked with chaos and disorder. We see formlessness, void, emptiness. These traits of human existence served God in making the wonder of wonders, the world itself. And we, like God, can make use of what is empty and formless and void—a lesson yet to be learned.” (Page 27)
“F. ‘ ‘Upon the face of the deep’ (Gen. 1:2) refers to the generation of the flood: ‘On the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up’ (Gen. 7:11).” (Page 35)
“have selected from my translation of Genesis Rabbah passages I believe especially striking and compelling for Jews today” (Page xii)
- Title: Confronting Creation: How Judaism Reads Genesis: An Anthology of Genesis Rabbah
- Author: Jacob Neusner
- Publisher: Wipf and Stock
- Print Publication Date: 2004
- Logos Release Date: 2018
- Language: English
- Resources: 1
- Format: Digital › Logos Research Edition
- Subjects: Midrash rabbah › Genesis--Commentaries; Bible. O.T. Genesis › Commentaries
- ISBNs: 9781592447251, 1592447252
- Resource ID: LLS:CNFRNTNGCRTN
- Resource Type: Monograph
- Metadata Last Updated: 2022-09-29T22:51:35Z
Jacob Neusner (1932–2016) was a preeminent scholar of ancient Judaism and one of the most published authors ever, with more than 900 original volumes to his name. He was educated at Harvard University, the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, the University of Oxford, and Yale University. He was research professor of theology and senior fellow of the Institute of Advanced Theology at Bard College. Neusner’s work has been highly influential, if sometimes controversial. He pioneered applying “form criticism” to Rabbinic texts, and aimed at a humanistic and academic reading of ancient Jewish literature.
Neusner’s works include the Jacob Neusner Jewish Studies Bundle (99 vols.).