Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon bar Yo (Edward E. Elson Classic)

Introduction

xi Introduction The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai1 is an anthology of early Rabbinic traditions of interpretation (midrash) of the biblical Book of Exodus. The majority of the traditions it preserves were created during the tannaitic period of early Rabbinic Judaism (approximately 70–200 C.E.), although a portion of its material dates to the beginning of the subsequent amoraic period (approximately 200–500 C.E.). The date of editorial redaction of these traditions into anthological form is uncertain; however, the scholarly consensus is that the text was edited sometime during the amoraic period. The interpretive materials are editorially organized as a running commentary on the biblical Book of Exodus, but the entirety of the Book of Exodus is not commented upon in the manuscript traditions of the text that have been identified to date. The origin of the name of the text is uncertain and of unknown provenance. Classical Rabbinic sources from antiquity do not allude to the text either by name or as an independent entity. Its authorship, and thus its title, is attributed erroneously to Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai, a second-century C.E. disciple of Rabbi Akiva. This association is most likely due to the fact that the text begins with a quotation in his name. In addition to its current name, the text is referred to in medieval Jewish sources as the Mekhilta deRabbi Akiva, Sifre d’Vei Rav, and Mekhilta d’Sanya (Mekhilta of the Burning Bush2 ). The Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai belongs to the corpus of Rabbinic texts routinely designated as either the halakhic or tannaitic midrashim. The exegetical material it contains is presented as a sequentially structured commentary on the verses of the biblical Book of Exodus. The text often focuses its interpretation on a single word, phrase, or element within a given biblical verse, although the connection between the subject of the biblical verse and the text’s interpretive comment is frequently difficult, if not impossible, to discern. The thematic nature of the text’s interpretation is most often motivated by the biblical text upon which the text is XII MEKHILTA DE-RABBI SHIMON BAR YOḤAI commenting. That is, if the biblical text discusses a matter of religious praxis, then the interpretation associated with that verse, word, or phrase is most often legalistic (halakhic)innature;otherwise,theinterpretationis most oftenthematically oriented toward rabbinic homily or lore (aggadic). However, it is important to stress that this is not an absolute phenomenon; legal biblical texts are often interpreted in aggadic fashion and vice versa. Thus, the overall thematic nature of the interpretation in the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai is variegated, and it is inappropriate to label the text as primarily aggadic or halakhic. The exegetical content in the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai displays all of the general characteristics common to the texts of the halakhic/tannaitic midrashic corpus. The text is structured as an ongoing commentary on the verses of a biblical book. It is composed almost exclusively in Rabbinic Hebrew, augmented by a small, but considerable, amount of Western/Palestinian Aramaic and Greek loanwords. The vast majority of the named sages date to the tannaitic period, although the majority of the interpretive content of the text is presented anonymously. The text often incorporates interpolations from the Mishnah and Tosefta into its interpretive endeavors. The types of hermeneutical methods employed in the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimonb.Yoḥaiareconsistentwiththoseattestedintheotherhalakhicmidrashim;and thespecific,technicalterminologyituses,eithertosignifyhermeneuticalassumptions or to introduce specific exegetical ploys, is consistent with the terminology that is employed in other tannaitic, midrashic texts. As mentioned above, the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai belongs to the corpus of Rabbinic texts routinely designated as either the halakhic or tannaitic midrashim. Scholarly interpretation of the mass of evidence for this corpus has resulted in the long-standing and widely held hypothesis that for each of the first five books of the Hebrew Bible, excluding the book of Genesis, there once existed at least two such tannaitic, Rabbinic anthological collections of midrashic traditions. Thus, the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai is commonly considered to be the halakhic/tannaitic midrashic parallel counterpart in this corpus to the substantially more well-known and well-studied Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael to the Book of Exodus. The fact that the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Shimon b. Yoḥai has received considerably less scholarly consideration than its counterpart is due primarily to the text’s...