Text and Artifact in the Religions of Mediterranean Antiquity: Essays in Honour of Peter Richardson

27. Mishnah's Rhetoric, Other Material Artifacts of Late-Roman Galilee and the Social Formation of the Early Rabbinic Guild

27 MISHNAH'S RHETORIC, OTHER MATERIAL ARTIFACTS OF LATE­ROMAN GALILEE AND THE SOCIAL FORMATION OF THE EARLY RABBINIC GUILD JACK N. LIGHTSTONE Attempts to bring to bear the material evidence forlate­Roman Palestine upon the study of the social formation of the early rabbinic guild, also a development of late­Roman Palestinian society, have been fraught with difficulty and have been, largely, disappointing. Archaeology continues to shed light upon the material culture, social organization, economics and religion of the region in late antiquity. Much found in early rabbinic literature is thereby elucidated. This is particularly so when texts make reference to realia and technological processes, for example; and despite the dangers ofcircularity, the inverse isalso the case. Palestinian rabbinic literarysources serve to clarify materialartifacts. After all, these texts and the material objects unearthed by the archaeologists are artifacts of the same society. Notwithstanding, forstudents ofancient Rabbinism interested in the social formation of the early rabbinic guild of masters, the hope that archaeological evidence might significantly and directly contribute to our analysis of the literary evidence has largely gone unfulfilled. In this essay, I suggest how and why that has been the case. In addition, I propose another way,albeit indirect, in which the material evidence for late­Roman Galilee mayhelp us understand the social formation (or re­formation) of the early rabbinic movement at the end of the second and beginning of the third centuriesCE. 1 Perhaps the "classic" works written since World War II that can be seen to move freely between literary and materialevidence must be those ofAlon and Avi­Yonah. The works of both are available in English translations (Alon 1989; Avi­Yonah 1984; see also Avi­ Yonah 1966). 1 MISHNAH'S RHETORIC 475 Section 1of this essay rehearses the resultsof my socio­rhetorical studyof Mishnah, insofar as these resultsbear upon understanding the social formation of the early rabbinic movement. In addition, I relate the latter to the consolidation of the power and authority of the Palestinian JewishPatriarchy. Section 2reviewsthe principalresultsofthose scholars who have plumbed the archaeological evidence in an attempt to shed light on the development of the early rabbinic guild of masters. I side with those among them, notably Shaye Cohen (1981­82: 1­17), who argue that there is little in the material evidence that serves directly to elucidate the rise and role of the rabbinic class in late­Roman Galilee. Finally, again in section 2,1 suggest another approach entirely to the problem. 1.Rhetoric of Mishnah and Social (Re)Formation of the Early Rabbinic Guild 1.1 Rhetoric and Social Role In myresearch these last severalyearsI have undertaken a comparative socio­ rhetorical study of Mishnah and related rabbinic documents, notably Tosefta. My aim has been to shed light upon the social (re)formation of the rabbinic guild in late second­ and earlythird­century Galilee. Mishnah (ca. 200 CE) was the first document authored by the rabbinic movement and was immediately promulgated within the movement astheauthoritative text (ofcourse, after the Hebrew Bible itself)­ Mishnah retained that pre­eminence until it was effectively displaced by the Babylonian Talmud in the sixth century CE. The pre­eminent role of Mishnah study within the earlyrabbinic movement in the several centuries following its promulgationiswell attested. The ongoing study and mastery of Mishnah, above all, marked one as a rabbinic master or a would­be rabbinic master. That mastery wasover content, to be sure, and the antecedent body of legal knowledge assumed to be possessed by the rabbinic master. Much of that antecedent body of knowledge was to be found in the Hebrew Bible; some significantportion was not, and must have constituted a corpus of tradition for which the rabbinic novice was dependent upon the instruction of "his" master. It is not, however, the legal content of Mishnah, or the body of knowledge assumed to be possessed by its readers, that has been the focus of my study. Rather, I have worked largely within the conceptual, theoretical and 476 TEXT AND ARTIFACT methodological framework of socio­rhetorical analysis. That is, I have concentrated on Mishnah's "authoritative modes of speech" in presenting its materials—its dominant rhetorical traits. Socio­rhetorical analysis, as indicated by the hyphen, marries two things. One is attending to formal patterns of rhetoric. The other is a conceptual and theoretical framework which understands that formal rules of rhetoric are social­context specific; rhetoric achieves the desired ends because of shared social...