Responses to Suffering in Classical Rabbinic Literature (review)

Hebrew Studies 36 (1995) 221 Reviews believes it to be, it seems to consist of a heterogeneous, compilation of different ideological positions. It is superfluous to detail any more specifically the difference that this distinction makes. Kalmin's work thus demonstrates the value of Neusner's project precisely in having asked the right questions-no small matter. I expect that Sages. Stories. Authors, and Editors will enter the small ranks of classic works on the origins of the Babylonian Tahnud. No one who works on the history of Judaism in late antiquity will be able to continue to work without absorbing its conclusions. Daniel Boyarin University of California-Berkeley Berkeley, CA 94720 RESPONSES TO SUFFERING IN CLASSICAL RABBINIC LITERATURE . By David Kraemer. Pp. xiii + 261. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995. Cloth, $49.95. This study, which is the first book-length treatment of rabbinic responses to suffering, follows Jacob Neusner's approach to rabbinic literature and the history of religious ideas in contrast to the alternative model represented by Ephraim Urbach (The Sages: Their Concepts and Beliefs [Jerusalem: Magnes, 1975]). Kraemer rejects Urbach's approach as both uncritical and ahistorical. By selecting individual opinions and organizing them according to his own categories, Urbach allegedly neglected the literary and redactional as well as the historical context of rabbinic views. He considered attributions of statements to particular sages reliable and disregarded reworkings of traditions by the editors of the later documents . Neusner, on the other hand, focusses on the final documents and views individual expressions as paradigms of the ideological outlook and historical context of these later edited works. Following Neusner, Kraemer organizes his study according to documents rather than according to ideas. Starting with responses to suffering in biblical and post-biblical Jewish literature which may have been known to and adapted by the later rabbis, the major part of the book deals with views on suffering in rabbinic works. An examination of these views proceeds from early Palestinian (Mishnah, Tosefta, halakhic midrasbim) to later Palestinian (Yerusbalmi, aggadic Hebrew Studies 36 (1995) 222 Reviews midrashim) and Babylonian (Bavli) documents. Almost all of these works are dominated by the idea that suffering is a punishment for sin. They differ from each other with regard to the range of "alternative" views which they present. While the Mishnah is ahistorical and highly traditional in its presentation of a perfect system of divine justice, the Palestinian documents which follow it are more and more willing to admit imperfection, to allow for the possibility that there is no direct connection between suffering and sin. They also adapt some of the "alternative" biblical models, such as the view that suffering has a redemptive value or that righteous sufferers will receive a future reward. Yet all of the Palestinian documents are basically conservative and tradition-bound in contrast to the Bavli, which transmits a much greater variety of views. Kraemer's focus on final documents rather than on individual traditions has both advantages and disadvantages. By focussing on the documents, he can avoid tradition-historical analyses which are both difficult and hypothetical . He is able to detennine the characteristics of one document in contrast to another and to locate these characteristics in a specific historical context. On the other hand, he misses out on the historical development of traditions. By not distinguishing between individual traditions and (their various levels of) redaction, he is unable to detennine how the editors changed and adapted earlier views and which views they added themselves. Not all of the-often contradictory-opinions on suffering preserved in rabbinic documents are likely to represent the document editors' views. Some of these views may have been recorded because they were held by other circles of rabbis or rabbis of earlier times. Kraemer draws a sharp distinction between the little variety of views on suffering found in Palestinian documents and the much greater plurality of views preserved in the Bavli. He explains this difference with reference to the differing social organization of the Palestinian and Babylonian rabbinate . While the Palestinian rabbinate was a closely knit group concentrated in and around Tiberias with an internal hierarchy and official power, the Babylonian rabbinic community was scattered all over...