Rabbinic Discourse as a System of Knowledge: "The Study of Torah is Equal to them All"

✍ Scribed by Hannah E Hashkes

• Publisher: Brill
• Year: 2015
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 294
• Series: Philosophy of Religion - World Religions
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

In Rabbinic Discourse as a System of Knowledge Hannah Hashkes employs contemporary philosophy in describing rabbinic reasoning as a rational response to experience. Hashkes combines insights from the philosophy of Quine and Davidson with the semiotics of Peirce to construe knowledge as systematic reasoning occurring within a community of inquiry. Her reading of the works of Emmanuel Levinas and Jean-Luc Marion allows her to create a philosophical bridge between a discourse of God and a discourse of reason. This synthesis of pragmatism, hermeneutics and theology provides Hashkes with a sophisticated tool to understand Rabbinic Judaism. It also makes this study both unique and pathbreaking in contemporary Jewish philosophy and Rabbinic thought.

✦ Table of Contents

Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
1 Preface
2 A Cohesive Concept of Rabbinic Judaism: A Philosophical Theology
3 Approaches in Jewish Thought since Modernity
4 An Epistemological Model for Torah Study
5 Components of an Epistemological Model of Religious Reasoning
5.1 The Linguistic Turn and Hermeneutics
5.2 The Communal Nature of Knowledge
5.3 Rejection of Dualism
6 Subject Matter and Methods: Torah Study and Textual Reasoning
Chapter 1 God Transcendent and Immanent Rabbinic Discourse and the Conceptualization of God
1.1 Introduction
1.2 Peirce’s Pragmatism: An Epistemological Background
1.3 God in the Bible
1.4 God without Being
1.5 Jean-Luc Marion: God, Self and Love
1.6 Emmanuel Levinas: God, Self, and Moral Command
1.7 God in Rabbinic World
1.7.1 God as a Commanding Other
1.7.2 Midrash
1.7.3 Midrash and Court of Law
1.8 Destruction and Prayer: The House of Assembly
1.9 Conclusion
Chapter 2 Torah Study The Logical Space of Bet Hamidrash
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Torah Study as a Field of Meaning: The Postliberal and Aftermodern Theological Contexts
2.3 Belief and Knowledge in Contemporary Epistemology
2.3.1 Holism
2.3.2 Interpretation
2.3.3 Objectivity
2.4 Belief and Knowledge in Rational Discourse
2.5 Belief and Knowledge in Rabbinic Discourse
2.6 The Torah as a Communal System of Meaning
2.7 Torah Study in Rabbinic Tradition
2.8 Conclusion
Chapter 3 Autonomy, Community, and the Jewish Self
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Heteronomy, Autonomy and Thought
3.3 Personal Freedom
3.4 Eugene Borowitz: A Covenantal Notion of Judaism
3.5 Freedom and Religious Communities
Chapter 4 Torah’s Seventy Faces Authority and Hermeneutics in Rabbinic Discourse
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Torah’s Seventy Faces: Three Models
4.2.1 The Referential Model
4.2.2 The Self-Referential Model
4.2.3 An Interactive Model of Torah’s Formation
4.3 Conclusion: Rabbinic Authority and Hermeneutics
Conclusion
Bibliography
Index