Yair Furstenberg is Associate Professor of Talmud at Hebrew University, where he serves as chair of the department. Among his publications are Jewish Martyrdom in Antiquity: From the Books of Maccabees to the Babylonian Talmud and the edited volume Jewish and Christian Communal Identities in the Roman World.
"In a masterful, erudite, and lucidly written study, Yair
Furstenberg explores the development of perceptions and practices
of ritual purity from the Second Temple Period to the Rabbinic era
as prisms through which fundamental issues of identity and
community were negotiated during this tumultuous time. The book
expertly and convincingly demonstrates the value of careful textual
inquiry for the construction of a social history, as it uncovers
the multiple and rich layers of ideas, concerns, and cultural and
religious challenges that are hidden in one of the most fascinating
sets of texts from Jewish antiquity."—Mira Balberg, author of
Purity, Body, and Self in Early Rabbinic Literature
"This book is not for the faint- hearted. The heart of the book are
rich discussions of halachah found in the Dead Sea Scrolls and
tannaitic literature. The author's erudition will interest scholars
of Second Temple purity, but it is unlikely to fundamentally change
the way we use Rabbinic halachic literature and the Dead Sea
Scrolls, at least for this reader. To his credit, Furstenberg
reminds us that Jews of antiquity differ from Jews of today,
especially in how they lived their Judaism. Issues of purity and
impurity pervasively occupied Second Temple Jews and are essential
to understanding this period."—Rabbi Matthew A. Kraus, CCAR
Journal: The Reform Jewish Quarterly
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