The authors seek to identify the recurrent tensions, the blatant points of emphasis, the recurring indications of conflict and polemic. Framing the issue of the disposition of the Scriptural heritage in broad terms, they describe what characterizes the Gospels and the Mishnah, the letters of Paul and the Tosefta. In other words, if they take whole and complete the writings of first and second century people claiming to form the contemporary embodiment of Scripture's Israel and ask what they all stress as a single point of insistence, the answer is self-evident. Nearly every Christianity and nearly all known Judaisms appeal for validation to the Scriptures of ancient Israel, their laws and narratives, their prophecies and visions. To Scripture all parties appeal - but not to the same verses of Scripture. In Scripture, all participants to the common Israelite culture propose to find validation - but not to a common theological program subject to diverse interpretation. From Scripture, every community of Judaism and Christianity takes away what it will, but not with the assent of all the others.
Jacob Neusner is a leading figure in the American academic study of religion. He revolutionized the study of Judaism and brought it into the field of religion, and he built intellectual bridges between Judaism and other religions, thereby laying the groundwork for durable understanding and respect among religions. He has advanced the careers of younger scholars and teachers through his teaching and publication programs. Neusner's influence on the study of Judaism and religion is broad, powerful, distinctive, and enduring.
Bruce Chilton, New Testament and Judaic scholar, is Bernard Iddings Bell Professor of Religion at Bard College, Annandale-on-Hudson, NY. He is a co-author of The Body of Faith (Trinity), God in the World (Trinity), and Comparing Spiritualities (Trinity).
Baruch Levine is the Skirball Professor Emeritus of Bible and Ancient
Near Eastern Studies at New York University . He has written
extensively in the field of biblical and ancient Near Eastern studies.
Among his publications are commentaries on Numbers 1-20 and Numbers 21-36 in The Anchor Bible Commentary , the commentary on Leviticus in Torah Commentary (1999), and In the Presence of the Lord
(1974). He is past president of the American Oriental Society, the
Association for Jewish Studies, and the Biblical Colloquium, and is a
former board member of the Society of Biblical Literature and Exegesis.
He holds a Ph.D. in Mediterranean Studies from Brandeis University and
earned a B.A. in comparative literature from Case Western Reserve
University.
