From Mesopotamia to the Mishnah (PDF)

In this study, Jonathan S. Milgram demonstrates that the transformation of inheritance law from the biblical to the tannaitic period is best explained against the backdrop of the legal and social contexts in which the tannaitic laws were formulated. Employing text and source critical methods, he argues that, in the absence of the hermeneutic underpinnings for tannaitic innovations, the laws were not the result of the rabbinic imagination and its penchant for inventive interpretation of Scripture. Turning to the rich repositories in biblical, ancient near eastern, Second Temple, Greek, Elephantine, Judean desert, and Roman sources, the author searches for conceptual parallels and antecedents as well as formulae and terminology adopted and adapted by the tannaim. Since the tannaitic traditions reflect the social and economic contexts of the tannaitic period - the nuclear family on privatized landholdings in urban centers - the author also considers the degree to which tannaitic inheritance laws may have emerged out of these contexts.

Born 1971; 1995 BA, Columbia University; 1995 BA, The Jewish Theological Seminary; 1997 MA, Yeshiva University; 2002 Rabbinic Ordination, Yeshiva University; 2007 PhD, Bar Ilan University; formerly Sam and Vivienne Cohen Lecturer in Jewish Studies, The School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London (UK) and Fellow, London School of Jewish Studies; currently Associate Professor of Talmud and Rabbinics, The Jewish Theological Seminary.