Rabbinic Fantasies

Victoria Clark

• Publisher: Yale University Press
• Year: 1998
• ISBN:
  9780300143645
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Literature
• Subtopic: Jewish Literary Criticism
• Index: Literature

This remarkable anthology of sixteen narratives from ancient and medieval Hebrew texts opens a new window onto the Jewish imagination. Presenting the captivating world of rabbinic storytelling, it reveals facets of the Jewish experience and tradition that would otherwise have remained unknown and examines the surprisingly deep connection between the values of classical Judaism and the art of imaginative narrative writing.

Virtually all the narratives appear here in English for the first time. Sometimes pious, sometimes playful, and sometimes almost scandalous, they are each accompanied by an introduction and notes. The selections are framed by essays by David Stern and Mark Jay Mirsky that examine the various moods and forms in which the rabbinic imagination found expression and explore the impact that this unique form of narrative has had on modern fiction. The translations are by Norman Bronznick, Yaakov Elman, Michal Govrin, Arthur Green, Martha Himmelfarb, Ivan Marcus, Mark Jay Mirsky, Joel Rosenberg, David Ruderman, Raymond Scheindlin, David Stern, and Avi Weinstein.

Yale Judaica Series

David Stern is professor of post-biblical and medieval Hebrew literature at the University of Pennsylvania. Mark Jay Mirsky, professor of English at City University of New York, is the editor of Fiction magazine.

Table of contents

• Contents
• Acknowledgments
• Introduction
• A Note On the Selections and the Translations
• 1. Rabbinic Parables
• 2. Two Narratives about God
• 3. Jonah and the Sailors from Pirkei de-Rabbi Eliezer
• 4. Sefer Zerubbabel
• 5. Midrash On the Ten Commandments
• 6. The Tale of the Jerusalemite
• 7. Midrash Eleh Ezkerah or The Legend of the Ten Martyrs
• 8. The Alphabet of Ben Sira
• 9. Parables from Sefer Ha-Bahir
• 10. Narrative Fantasies from Sefer Hasidim
• 11. Love in the Afterlife: A Selection from the Zohar
• 12. Asher in the Harem By Solomon Ibn Saqbel
• 13. The Misogynist By Judah Ibn Shabbetai
• 14. The Sorcerer from Meshal Ha-Kadmom by Isaac Ibn Sahula
• 15. Job’s Novella from A Valley of Vision by Abraham ben Hananiah Yagel
• 16. The “Dream-Talks” of Nahman of Bratslav
• In a Turn of the Scroll: An Afterword