Major Trends in Formative Judaism, Fifth Series

The main foci of this collection are the history of Judaism, with stress on its social doctrines and cultural traits, and the comparison of Judaism to its near-companion in time and intellect, Christianity. PART ONE: A summary of the three volumes of Social Teaching of Rabbinic Judaism. PART TWO: The history of religion depends for perspective and insight upon the comparative study of religions that sustain such comparison. Christianity, sharing Scriptures with Judaism, presents an obvious opportunity. PART THREE: An evaluation of the Talmud of Babylonia. PART FOUR: five book review-essays on recent, intellectually ambitious exercises in the study of ancient Judaism.