Tal Ilan
Freie Universität Berlin, Institut für Judaistik, Faculty Member
The women of the New Testament were Jewish women, and for historians of the period their mention and status in the New Testament constitutes the missing link between the way women are portrayed in the Hebrew Bible and their changed status... more
The women of the New Testament were Jewish women, and for historians of the period their mention and status in the New Testament constitutes the missing link between the way women are portrayed in the Hebrew Bible and their changed status in rabbinic literature (Mishnah and Talmud). In this chapter, I examine how they fit into the Jewish concepts of womanhood. I examine various recognized categories that are relevant for gender research such as patriarchy, public and private space, law, politics, and religion. In each case I show how these affected Jewish women, and how the picture that emerges from the New Testament fits these categories.
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In this source a parallel between Josephus and a rabbinic tradition is discussed.
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This article presents the first two texts (on papyri) in Aramaic written by Jewish women. The papyri are from Egypt and date to Late Antiquity.
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An expedition of the Egypt Exploration Society in 1913–14 discovered four fragments of the Hebrew Bible (from the books of Kings and Job). This article presents the first critical edition of the fragments. With a few minor exceptions, the... more
An expedition of the Egypt Exploration Society in 1913–14 discovered four fragments of the Hebrew Bible (from the books of Kings and Job). This article presents the first critical edition of the fragments. With a few minor exceptions, the fragments conform to the Masoretic Text. The possible datings of these fragments range from the third to the early eighth centuries ce. Very little is known about the transmission of the text of the Hebrew Bible in the so-called ‘silent’ or ‘dark’ period between the Dead Sea Scrolls and the Cairo Genizah. The fragments also testify to the presence of a Jewish community in Egypt – which was virtually eradicated after the revolt of 115–17 ce. The article gives a brief overview of the extant documentary and epigraphic evidence to reconstruct the forgotten story of Jews at Antinoopolis in Late Antiquity.
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This chapter is about Jewish women, who are, always in some way, under the tutelage of a patriarch. It inquires in what way women are different from other persons under male tutelage and argues that in Jewish terms this difference derives... more
This chapter is about Jewish women, who are, always in some way, under the tutelage of a patriarch. It inquires in what way women are different from other persons under male tutelage and argues that in Jewish terms this difference derives from women's radical otherness. The rabbis, identified many groups as 'others', namely as belonging to categories that deviate from the normal. Rabbinic literature has preserved the memory of a man who once had belonged to their 'normal' world, and had somehow left their world, searching for an alternative existence. This chapter shows that the most common group of 'others' found in the vicinity of the rabbis was women. It also shows how women are compared to a wide variety of 'others': slaves, minors, gentiles, Samaritans, cripples and criminals.Keywords: gentile; Jewish women; rabbinic literature
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... IDENTIFICATION* TAL ILAN, Hebrew University, Jerusalem ABSTRACT ... 197, 201. 13 See now the final publication by Y. Yadin and J. Naveh, The Aramaic and Hebrew Ostraca and Jar Inscriptions (Jerusalem, 1989), p. 28. Naveh ...
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Women's studies, as a discipline within Jewish studies, is relatively new. It appeared in the 1970s, in the wake of a similar development within other fields of academia particularly in the United States — a move that was later to be... more
Women's studies, as a discipline within Jewish studies, is relatively new. It appeared in the 1970s, in the wake of a similar development within other fields of academia particularly in the United States — a move that was later to be designated ‘second-wave feminism’. The question of women's status within Judaism, as within any human society is not new. In Jewish sources, it is as old as the story of creation in the first chapters of Genesis, with the description of woman's secondary creation and her implication in the original sin and fall from grace. The human condition has always been one in which women are subordinated to men, and most written cultures have produced documents justifying this condition. Only over the last 200 years has this truism come under criticism, particularly in the cultures of the West, with the advent of ideas about humanism, equality, and democracy.
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This book contains a full review of Jewish marriage in antiquity, beginning with biblical injunctions, but focusing primarily on postbiblical material and specifically on rabbinic literature. It is divided into three parts: 1. Thinking... more
This book contains a full review of Jewish marriage in antiquity, beginning with biblical injunctions, but focusing primarily on postbiblical material and specifically on rabbinic literature. It is divided into three parts: 1. Thinking about Marriage, in which Satlow describes how and why Jewish marriages were planned, 2. Marrying, in which he describes the process of marriage itself, and 3. Staying Married, in which married life and its consequences are at issue. In each of these parts Satlow correctly attempts to draw a line between the ideals of marriage as portrayed in the sources and what actually went on, as far as these allow us a glimpse of reality.
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2016 “Rav Joseph the Demon in the Rabbinic Academy in Babylonia: Another Connection between the Babylonian Talmud and the Magic Bowls,” in “Let the Wise Listen and Add to Their Learning” (Prov 1:5): Festschrift for Günter Stemberger on... more
2016 “Rav Joseph the Demon in the Rabbinic Academy in Babylonia: Another Connection between the Babylonian Talmud and the Magic Bowls,” in “Let the Wise Listen and Add to Their Learning” (Prov 1:5): Festschrift for Günter Stemberger on the Occasion of his 75th Birthday, ed. Constanza Cordoni and Gerhard Langer (Studia Judaica. Forschungen zur Wissenschaft des Judentums; Berlin: Walter de Gruyter) 381-394
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Tal Ilan and Vered Noam 2015. “Remnants of a Pharisaic Apologetic Source in Josephus and the Babylonian Talmud,” in Tradition, Transmission and Transformation from Second Temple Literature through Judaism and Christianity in Late... more
Tal Ilan and Vered Noam 2015. “Remnants of a Pharisaic Apologetic Source in Josephus and the Babylonian Talmud,” in Tradition, Transmission and Transformation from Second Temple Literature through Judaism and Christianity in Late Antiquity, ed. Menahem Kister, Hillel I. Newman, Michael Segal and Ruth Clements (Proceedings of the thirteenth International Symposium of the Orion Center for the Study of the Dead Sea Scrolls; Leiden: Brill) 112-133.
Biblische Frauen in Schrift und Tradition in jüdischer Perspektive 1 Einer der wichtigsten Erträge langjähriger Erforschung der Darstellung von Frauen und Gender in der Literatur hat mit Rezeption zu tun: Gleichgültig, ob es sich um einen... more
Biblische Frauen in Schrift und Tradition in jüdischer Perspektive 1 Einer der wichtigsten Erträge langjähriger Erforschung der Darstellung von Frauen und Gender in der Literatur hat mit Rezeption zu tun: Gleichgültig, ob es sich um einen heiligen oder profanen, einen literarischen oder einen Rechtstext handelt und ob und wann er gelesen wurde, werden spätere Generationen seine Gender-Konzepte nicht wirklich verstehen, sondern sofort versuchen, sie zu domestizieren. Jede neue Generation hat sehr genaue Vorstellungen davon, was Frauen tun können und tun sollten, und wenn sich Frauen, denen man in älteren Texten begegnet, anders verhalten, beginnt man unversehens, dieses Verhalten zu korrigieren. In einer Untersuchung mit dem Titel Silencing the Queen 2 habe ich beschrie-ben, wie diese Domestizierung ablief: Frauen wurden entweder-durch Zensur oder "Herausschreiben"-vollständig aus dem Text verdrängt, oder ihre Taten wurden kleingeredet, oder sie wurden einem männlichen Beschützer unterstellt, der die Verantwortung für ihr Handeln übernahm, oder sie wurden zu Männern gemacht. Das muss nicht heißen, dass frühere Generationen Frauen wohlwollen-der gesonnen waren als spätere. Jede Generation erzählt ihre eigenen Geschich-ten, in denen sie Frauen-oftmals reale Frauen, oder fiktive Frauen, die nach realen Vorbildern entworfen sind-Außergewöhnliches sagen oder tun lässt. Den Autoren selbst entgehen die Anomalien, die sie auf diese Weise erschaffen. Wenn sie aber in den Werken ihrer Vorgänger auf solche Anomalien stoßen, drängt es sie, das Anomale zu bändigen. Dies gilt in besonderer Weise für die Hebräische Bibel und ihre Rezeption in der späteren jüdischen Literatur. Die Bibel ist einerseits ein komplexes Gebilde aus Traditionen verschiedener Gattungen, verschiedener Zeiten und verschiede-ner Autor(inn)en und Ideologien, und anderseits zugleich ein heiliger Text, den seine (Leserinnen und) Leser als irrtumslos und unfehlbar betrachten. Zudem 1 Dieser Aufsatz wurde freundlicherweise von Professor Friedrich Avemarie ganz spontan, aber gleichzeitig sehr sorgfältig und genau übersetzt. Ich bin ihm äußerst dankbar. 2 Tal Ilan, Silencing the Queen: The Literary Histories of Shelamzion and Other Jewish Women,
2012 “Males are for God, Females are for Us: Sacred and Kosher Slaughter Rhetorics in Seder Qodashim and in Yractate Hullin,” in Introduction to Seder Qodashim: A Feminist Commentary on the Babylonian Talmud V, ed. Tal Ilan, Monika Brockhaus and Tanja Hidde (Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck 2012) 275-283.more
2001 “Rabbinic Literature and Women Studies: A Response to Shulamit Valer, Hannah Safrai and Judith Hauptman,” in “Lift Up Your Voice”: Women’s Voices and Feminist Interpretation in Jewish Studies, ed. R. Levine Melammed (Proceedings of the 1999 Conference; Tel Aviv: Yedioth), pp. 48-56 (Hebrew).more