Correspondence

CORRESPONDENCE Professor Jacob Neusner suggests several important ways in which my book, The Redaction of the Babylonian Talmud: Amoraic or Saboraic? (Hebrew Union College, 1989), could be improved from a formal standpoint (HS 31 [1990]: 182-188). Neusner correctly points out that the book should have contained a preface, that several passages should have been translated, and so on. Should the book have a second edition, I will certainly incorporate these helpful suggestions. Neusner is completely wrong, however, regarding the few substantive issues discussed in his review. My research on the dating of Amoraic sources and the relationship between the Amoraic and anonymous sections of the Talmud builds on the theories of modem Talmudic scholars (Hyman Klein, Avraham Weiss, David Halivni, Shamma Friedman, and others). I offer no apology for accepting this scholarship, just as Neusner offers no apology for ignoring it. Most scholars now agree that it is possible to state with reasonable certainty that the Talmud supplies accurate information about generations or periods, a view to which Neusner himself once subscribed . Linguistic and terminological shifts, institutional developments, and a variety of other diverse evidence, all ignored by Neusner, make it possible to separate early from late in the Talmudic corpus. My book builds on these methods and confirms these conclusions, demonstrating that statements attributed to early and late Amoraim conform to clearly definable rhetorical patterns, and that these patterns change and develop during the course of the Amoraic period. My discovery of ways in which the unattributed sections of the Talmud (the starn) are formally and functionally distinct from the attributed sections likewise builds on the conclusions of modem scholarship. This discovery depends not on a few isolated stories which might be suspect as late editorial inventions, but on patterns evident in the statements made by entire generations of Amoraim, and on distinctions between Amoraic and unattributed discourse. Discovery of these distinct patterns contradicts Neusner's claim that the Talmud speaks with one voice, and supports the view of most scholars that the Talmud is comprised of diverse sources. Neusner's review is seriously flawed in other ways as well, raising doubts that he read substantial sections of my book. Neusner takes me to task, for example (pp. 185-186), for analyzing only five sugyot, noting correctly that firm conclusions must be based on a much larger body of Hebrew Studies 33 (1992) 192 Correspondence evidence. Neusner arrives at this figure, however, by reading only Appendix I while skipping over pp. 70-94, 147-149, and 184-193, which consist almost exclusively of detailed analyses of sugyol and contain summaries and citations of numerous sources examined elsewhere. Neusner also misstates my argument. According to Neusner, I argue as follows: (1) There is no reason to assume that the Amoraic statements on Ketubot 69a respond to the starn. (2) In four other cases, there is no reason to assume that the Amoraic statements respond to the slam. (3) Consequently, the Slam post-dates the Amoraic portions of the sugya throughout the Talmud. Neusner rightly dismisses this argument as ludicrous , but the argument is a figment of Neusner's imagination. Instead, as I state in the introduction, my argument is as follows: (1) By detaching the starn from the Amoraic sections of the Talmud we usually arrive at a smoother, more easily comprehensible Amoraic substratum. (2) Having established this, it is possible to state in other instances that even when the sugya is fully comprehensible as it stands, the starn is easily detachable from the Amoraic core. (3) Both of these considerations, but especially the first, argue in favor of the starn's character as later commentary . Only by completely ignoring these facts can Neusner claim (p. 187) that the examples upon which the argument of the book rests are nothing more than "exercises in begging the question." The real issue here is a substantive one: alone of all contemporary scholars, Neusner sees the Bavli as a single, organic whole. He can sustain his view only by ignoring redaction criticism, source criticism, and philology . I, however, like other contemporary students of the Bavli, see the document as stratified or multi-layered, polyphonic rather than monophonic . I am grateful to the...