And the Sages Did Not Know

And the Sages Did Not Know PDF Author: Sarra Lev
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 1512825182
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 393

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Book Description
This book explores the question: How did the rabbis of the first two centuries CE approach bodies that are born with variant genitals—bodies that they could not identify as definitely male or female? The rabbis had constructed a system in which every behavior was governed by one’s sex/gender, posing a conundrum both for people who did not fit into that model and for the rabbinic enterprise itself. Despite this, their texts contain dozens of references to intersex. And the Sages Did Not Know examines the rabbis’ legal texts and concludes that they had multiple approaches to intersex people. Sarra Lev analyzes seven different rabbinic responses to this conflict of their own making. Through their rulings on how intersex people should conduct themselves in multiple circumstances, the early rabbis treat intersex people as unidentifiable males or females, as indeterminate, as male, as non-gendered, as sui generis, as part-male/part-female, as a sustainable paradox, and, finally, as a way for them to think about gender, having nothing to do with intersex people themselves. This is the first such work that concentrates primarily on the potential effects of these rabbinic texts on intersex persons themselves rather than focusing on what the texts offer readers whose interest is rabbinic approaches to sex and gender or gender diversity. Although the rabbinic texts do not include the voices of known intersex people, these materials do offer us a window into how one small group of people approached intersex bodies, and how those approaches were both similar to and different from those we recognize today.

And the Sages Did Not Know

And the Sages Did Not Know PDF Author: Sarra Lev
Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press
ISBN: 1512825182
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 393

Get Book Here

Book Description
This book explores the question: How did the rabbis of the first two centuries CE approach bodies that are born with variant genitals—bodies that they could not identify as definitely male or female? The rabbis had constructed a system in which every behavior was governed by one’s sex/gender, posing a conundrum both for people who did not fit into that model and for the rabbinic enterprise itself. Despite this, their texts contain dozens of references to intersex. And the Sages Did Not Know examines the rabbis’ legal texts and concludes that they had multiple approaches to intersex people. Sarra Lev analyzes seven different rabbinic responses to this conflict of their own making. Through their rulings on how intersex people should conduct themselves in multiple circumstances, the early rabbis treat intersex people as unidentifiable males or females, as indeterminate, as male, as non-gendered, as sui generis, as part-male/part-female, as a sustainable paradox, and, finally, as a way for them to think about gender, having nothing to do with intersex people themselves. This is the first such work that concentrates primarily on the potential effects of these rabbinic texts on intersex persons themselves rather than focusing on what the texts offer readers whose interest is rabbinic approaches to sex and gender or gender diversity. Although the rabbinic texts do not include the voices of known intersex people, these materials do offer us a window into how one small group of people approached intersex bodies, and how those approaches were both similar to and different from those we recognize today.

God Was in This Place & I, i Did Not Know

God Was in This Place & I, i Did Not Know PDF Author: Rabbi Lawrence Kushner
Publisher: Turner Publishing Company
ISBN: 1580234887
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 178

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Book Description
Selected as a Union of American Hebrew Congregations (UAHC) “Significant Jewish Book” Jacob was running away from home. One night he lay down in the wilderness to sleep and had one of the great mystical experiences of Western religion. He dreamed there was a ladder, with angels ascending and descending, stretched between heaven and earth. For thousands of years, people have tried to overhear what the messengers came down to tell Jacob, and us. Now in a daring blend of scholarship and imagination, psychology and history, Lawrence Kushner gathers an inspiring range of interpretations of Genesis 28:16 given by sages, from Shmuel bar Nachmani in third-century Palestine to Hannah Rachel Werbermacher of Ludomir who lived in Poland two hundred years ago. Through a fascinating new literary genre and Kushner’s creative reconstruction of the teachers’ lives and times, we enter the study halls and sit at the feet of these spiritual masters to learn what each discovered about God’s Self and ourselves as they ascend and descend Jacob’s ladder. In this illuminating journey, our spiritual guides ask and answer the fundamental questions of human experience: Who am I? Who is God? What is God’s role in history? What is the nature of evil? How should I relate to God and other people? Could the universe really have a self? Rabbi Lawrence Kushner brilliantly reclaims a millennium of Jewish spirituality for contemporary seekers of all faiths and backgrounds. God Was in This Place & I, i Did Not Know is about God and about you; it is about discovering God’s place in the universe, and yours.

Making of a Godol

Making of a Godol PDF Author: Noson Kamenetsky
Publisher:
ISBN: 9789659037926
Category : Hasidim
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description


The Sense of Sight in Rabbinic Culture

The Sense of Sight in Rabbinic Culture PDF Author: Rachel Neis
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1107032512
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 333

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Book Description
This book explores the power of sight for ancient rabbis across the realms of divinity, sexuality, idolatry and rabbinic subjectivity.

An Anthology of Chinese Discourse on Translation (Version 1)

An Anthology of Chinese Discourse on Translation (Version 1) PDF Author: Martha Cheung Pui Yiu
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317639278
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 455

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Book Description
Translation has a long history in China. Down the centuries translators, interpreters, Buddhist monks, Jesuit priests, Protestant missionaries, writers, historians, linguists, and even ministers and emperors have all written about translation, and from an amazing array of perspectives. Such an exciting diversity of views, reflections and theoretical thinking about the art and business of translating is now brought together in a two-volume anthology. The first volume covers a time-frame from roughly the 5th century BCE to the twelfth century CE. It deals with translation in the civil and government context, and with the monumental project of Buddhist sutra translation. The second volume spans the 13th century CE to the Revolution of 1911, which brought an end to feudal China. It deals with the transmission of Western learning to China - a translation venture that changed the epistemological horizon and even the mindset of Chinese people. Comprising over 250 passages, most of which are translated into English for the first time here, the anthology is the first major source book to appear in English. It carries valuable primary material, allowing access into the minds of translators working in a time and space markedly different from ours, and in ways foreign or even inconceivable to us. The topics these writers discussed are familiar. But rather than a comfortable trip on well-trodden ground, the anthology invites us on an exciting journey of the imagination.

New Edition of the Babylonian Talmud

New Edition of the Babylonian Talmud PDF Author: Michael Levi Rodkinson
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Talmud
Languages : en
Pages : 446

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Book Description


A Sage’s Fruit: letters of Baal HaSulam

A Sage’s Fruit: letters of Baal HaSulam PDF Author: Yehuda Leib HaLevi Ashlag
Publisher: Laitman Kabbalah Publishers
ISBN: 1897448902
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 320

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Book Description
The greatest Kabbalist of the 20th century, Rav Yehuda Leib Halevi Ashlag, who wrote the Sulam (Ladder) commentary on The Book of Zohar, had very few students. A prolific writer, he spent almost all of his time at his desk, so the students that he did have were precious. When spending time away from home and from his students, Rav Yehuda Ashlag would write elaborate letters to provide them with guidance and encouragement. Today these letters offer a window into the special relationships cultivated between the great teacher and his devoted students. A Sage’s Fruit: letters of Baal HaSulam is a compilation of those letters, which are now being presented to English speaking readership for the first time. The unique style and tone that Rav Ashlag uses in his letters offer inspiration and guidance to any seeker of spiritual advancement. The nature of this book is such that it changes a person. Regardless of how many times one may read the text, it constantly takes on new forms, as if reading it for the very first time. Now that these letters have been revealed, it is unclear how we could perceive spiritual advancement without them.

Sages and Kings - II

Sages and Kings - II PDF Author: SA Krishnan
Publisher: SA Krishnan
ISBN:
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 72

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Book Description
The epics of Ramayana and Mahabharatha and the Hindu Puranas are a rich source of information about the kings and the sages of the ancient times. Here are a collection of stories of these kings and the sages: Ganga Kartavirya Arjuna and Ravana Jalandhara and Vrindha The Birth of Hanuman The Story of the Upa Pandavas Parikshit

The Early Modern Yiddish Bible

The Early Modern Yiddish Bible PDF Author: Morris M. Faierstein
Publisher: Hebrew Union College Press
ISBN: 0878207066
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 417

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Book Description
The translation of the Bible into the vernacular is a venerable Jewish tradition, more than two thousand years old. Ashkenazi Jewish culture was a latecomer to the vernacular Bible, and it was only in the sixteenth century that the Yiddish Bible made its appearance in print. Almost one hundred years ago, Wilhelm Staerk and Albert Leitzmann's survey of Early Modern Yiddish Bible translations was the first attempt to define this genre of Early Modern Yiddish literature. In the intervening century there has been relatively little scholarly interest in these texts. The purpose of the present study is to survey the present state of research in this field and place these works in the context of the popular religious culture of Ashkenazi Jewry, which is defined by its use of Yiddish as a means of both oral communication and literary production. The subject of this study is every Yiddish work from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries that is directly or indirectly related to the Bible. The survey begins with the Mirkevet ha-Mishneh, the first published Yiddish book, which is a biblical concordance, published in Cracow, 1534-36, and concludes with the two competing translations of the entire Bible into Yiddish by Yekutiel Blitz and Joseph Witzenhausen, published in Amsterdam, 1676-86. (These were translations without any accompanying commentaries, and were modeled on Protestant Bibles, like the English King James, or the German Luther Bible.) The study includes not only translations of biblical books, but also adaptations, reworkings, and paraphrases of biblical texts, appearing in diverse literary styles, by a wide variety of authors. King David, for example, is presented in the Shmuel Bukh as a combination of medieval chivalric hero and rabbinic scholar who is careful to observe the strictures of Halakhah. The story of Jonah is retold through a midrashic lens, and concludes with a kabbalistic parable that analogizes Jonah's journey to that of the soul from conception through life, death, and return to its heavenly source. Some authors take great liberties with the biblical text. The author of the paraphrase of Isaiah only includes what he considers to be prophetic utterances and disregards the rest of the book. Another author decides that the second half of the Torah is too legalistic and not worth retelling, so he ends his commentary after the giving of the Torah on Mount Sinai. As for the Five Scrolls, Lamentations is too depressing so he ignores it. There are also surprising inclusions in these volumes, such as the books of Judith and Susanna from the Apocrypha, and the very colorful medieval version of the Book of Ben Sira, which is considered by modern scholars to be a parody.

Sources of Japanese Tradition, Abridged

Sources of Japanese Tradition, Abridged PDF Author: de Theodore
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231518147
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 652

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Book Description
For almost fifty years, Sources of Japanese Tradition has been the single most valuable collection of English-language readings on Japan. Unrivalled in its wide selection of source materials on history, society, politics, education, philosophy, and religion, the two-volume textbook is a crucial resource for students, scholars, and readers seeking an introduction to Japanese civilization. Originally published in a single hardcover book, Volume 2 is now available as an abridged, two-part paperback. Part 1 covers the Tokugawa period to 1868, including texts that address the spread of neo-Confucianism and Buddhism and the initial encounters of Japan and the West. Part 2 begins with the Meiji period and ends at the new millennium, shedding light on such major movements as the Enlightenment, constitutionalism, nationalism, socialism, and feminism, and the impact of the postwar occupation. Commentary by major scholars and comprehensive bibliographies and indexes are included. Together, these readings map out the development of modern Japanese civilization and illuminate the thought and teachings of its intellectual, political, and religious leaders.