From the Maccabees to the Mishnah (Library of Early Christianity) [Paperback]

Shaye J. D. Cohen (Author)

Book Description

Series: Library of Early Christianity | Publication Date: November 1988

"As interesting to read as they are informative, the volumes in this important series deal in new ways with topics and materials that illuminate the life and literature of early Christianity...Taken as a whole, the series offers various new avenues of approach to an understanding of the social, intellectual, and literary environment of the early Christian movement".---Victor Paul Furnish, University Distinguished Professor of New Testament, Southern Methodist University

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About the Author

Shaye J. D. Cohen is Nathan Littauer Professor of Hebrew Literature and Philosophy at Harvard University. --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 251 pages
• Publisher: Westminster John Knox Pr (November 1988)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0664250173
• ISBN-13: 978-0664250171
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #625,063 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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37 of 40 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wraps Around Early Christianity, March 10, 2004

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Virgil Brown (White Oak, Texas USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: From the Maccabees to the Mishnah (Library of Early Christianity) (Paperback)

Early in his book, Shaye Cohen points out that Christianity is responsible for the use of the term "late Judaism." The term was disparaging and meant to suggest that 2nd Temple Judaism was in dire need of an infusion, i.e. Christianity. Moreover after Christianity came along, "late Judaism" suggested that Judaism could be altogether ignored despite the fact that Judaism has continued to flourish for the last couple of millenia.

So Cohen's book wraps around early Christianity in terms of time and thought. There are no set time parameters. Second Temple Judaism was a religion "of the book." No longer did Israel have political independence. Why did God let this happen? Part of the answer may be found in Jeremiah 25; Babylon acts as God's agent. Cohen says that basically Second Temple Judaism accepted its civil rulers. Second Temple Judaism opened its understanding of who could be a Jew. Pre-exilic Judaism recognized only the immutable condition of birth.

Second Temple Judaism belief and practice dealt with matters such as how to balance order in worship with spontaneity. The development of the synagogue shifted prayer and Torah away study from the sacrificial cult. The attempts to identify the core of Judaism are reminiscent to Christians to similar attempts found in the New Testament. The liturgical shema is as close to a credal statement as Judaism gets.

Cohen writes a chapter on community life in Judaism (mentioning guilds among other things) before turning to sectarianism. Various sources are considered for the Pharisees, Sadducees, and Essenes, before a few pages are written about the Samaritans, Zealots, Theraputae, and Christians as these existed within Judaism. The last two chapters are about the canonization of Scripture and the emergence of Rabbinic Judaism in the Second Temple and post-Second Temple periods.

This book is written by an eminent Jewish scholar who writes in a very readable style and who uses no footnotes to distract his readers. The book is very informative yet it was not meant to be comprehensive. The reader should bear this in mind. The reader should also bear in mind that if one disagrees with, e.g. Cohen's appraisal of the law-abiding nature of Second Period Judaism, one might want to consider that sup-porting evidence is outside of the scope of this book. In fact it has been pointed out elsewhere that there is an unusual amount of records for Second temple Judaism and, by contrast, a dirth from elsewhere.

The author has done an admirable job of introducing much to an audience which does not read this subject matter on a frequent basis.

41 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A good overview of Jewish history from 170 BC-200AD, January 19, 2002

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Marc Axelrod (Potter, Wi USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: From the Maccabees to the Mishnah (Library of Early Christianity) (Paperback)

Shaye Cohen has written an interesting book covering a turbulent period of Jewish history. He discusses the sects of Judaism that existed during this time, beginning with the Maccabean revolt, and working through the Pharisees, the Sadducees, the Essenes, the Christian movement, and Jewish people scattered throughout the Mediterranean world. He shows how Judaism was always a religion that emphasized practice and tradition over doctrine, while not denying that Judaism had a theology. Sometimes, the reader will want to argue strenuously with Cohen's conclusions, such as his contention that circumcision did not play an important role in the Torah, or that Job, Daniel, Esther, and many of the Psalms were written just a couple of hundred years before the common era. One may also question his conclusion that the dialogues betwen Jesus and the Pharisees reflected more of a post 70AD situation than something that really happened in the life of Jesus.

Despite these and other contentious points, the book is well written, engaging, and refreshing in the sense that you get to look at these years of Jewish history from a Jewish perspective.

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Limited but Brilliant, January 5, 2008

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David E. Blair (Columbia, PA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Second Edition (Paperback)

If a history of the Jewish polity from about 167 BCE to 70 CE is part of what you are looking for here, you will need to look elsewhere. The text is comprised of an introduction and six stand alone essays. This material concerns the socio-religious development of the proto-Judaism of 539 BCE into the Rabbinic Judaism of 600 CE with a concentration on the period from 167 BCE to 200 CE, hence the title, "From the Maccabees to the Mishnah." In an era where government and religion were co-joined to each other, this omission of political history creates an unusual attenuation of the historical record. Of course in the period beyond 70 CE, there was no Jewish polity. However, the political developments that swirled around the diaspora and Bar Kokhba revolts are but minimally covered by the author. The presentation of the military history bearing on this period and locale is scant at best in these pages. And, war and violence were constant and significant factors in this era of Judean history. I would suggest that a prior substantial knowledge of these areas of missing history would greatly enhance any reader's appreciation of the materials presented in this work.

This book is aimed at a specialist audience in my opinion. But, any literate adult with a rudimentary knowledge of the history of the period in question will be rewarded by reading this book. Almost all readers should gain an enhanced knowledge of the evolution of the Jewish religion. It is a tribute to Cohen that he could leave so much out and yet accomplish so much. The author writes with clarity and develops his arguments meticulously. In his opening chapter on "Jews and Gentiles," Cohen finds a combination of accommodation and tension among the peoples as well as between Judea and the Hellenistic and Roman Empires. The development of Jewish religion is then considered. From being a local ethnically exclusive monotheism prior to the exile, Judaism was transitioning into being a monotheistic religion with a universal God. From a closed and relatively inaccessible Temple cult, Judaism was democratizing into a religion of all the people of Judea and the Jewish diaspora and even Gentile converts. From a religion of prophecy and sacrifice, it was becoming a religion of "the book," doing Torah, and prayer. Four more essays follow on the community and its institutions, normative Judaism and Jewish sectarian groups including the Christians, the canonization of the Old Testament, and lastly one on the development of Rabbinic Judaism.

Each essay is rich in information and incisive interpretation. The author is a penetrating thinker who is considered to be one of the greatest living scholars on the subjects covered. Few footnotes are provided. The author in drawing his conclusions rarely references other scholarship. Expect no alternative interpretations. However, the opinions and conclusions Cohen draws always seem mindful of all the extant evidence and current and historic scholarly thought. This is well substantiated by a remarkably useful and extensive chapter by chapter "suggested reading list" at the end of this volume. Whether you agree with the author in all instances or not, he presents his material persuasively. And, be forewarned, there is much in these pages that may strike some as quite controversial. For example, the author sees much of the Old Testament written and concretized in the Persian and Hellenistic period. This is a very stimulating book that will make you think and rethink your own positions. However, how much you get out of this book may well depend on the knowledge of the subject you bring to the task.