Jesus, the Sabbath and the Jewish Debate Healing on the Sabbath in the 1st and 2nd Centuries CE

by Collins, Nina L.

• ISBN13: 9780567385871
• ISBN10: 0567385876
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2014-11-20
• Publisher: Bloomsbury T&T Clark

Summary

Based on a meticulous textual analysis of the Sabbath events in the gospels and on the relevant materialin the early rabbinic texts, Collins traces the history of the process by which Jewish law accommodated such acts.Part One considers evidence preserved in the gospels that deals with the contemporary Jewish debate onhealing on the Sabbath. In contrast with traditional conclusions Collins shows that Jesus and the Pharisees were fully in agreementconcerning the necessity for such Sabbath acts. Collins also explains the reason for the apparent differences between the Pharisees and Jesus on acts ofhealing on the Sabbath. Part Two traces the continuationof the search by Jewish sages in the second century to find ways to integrate acts of Sabbath healing within Jewish law. The Jewish arguments they composedare then compared with those that exist in the gospel texts. This reveals their different features, and thus helps to date the composition of the rabbinicdirectives on healing and saving life, in relation to the first and second centuries CE.

Author Biography

Dr Nina Collins lectured on Judaism and Modern and Classical Hebrew at the University of Leeds. Her publications include The Library in Alexandria and the Bible in Greek (Brill, Netherlands, 2000)

Table of Contents

Preface\Introduction\Part 1: Evidence from the Gospels ofthe First Century Debate on the Problem of the Legal Violation of JewishLaw\Chapter 1: The Saving of Life from Starvation\Chapter 2: The cure of theMan with a Withered Hand\Chapter 3: The cure of a man with dropsy\Chapter 4:The cure of a woman with a bent back\Chapter 5: An unidentified Sabbathcure\Chapter 6: Unidentified cures for unidentified people\Chapter 7: The cureof the mother in law of Simon\Chapter 8: The removal of an evil spirit from aman\Chapter 9: The cure of a crippled man\Chapter 10: The cure of a man blindfrom birth\Chapter 11: Post-Sabbath cure for many people\Part 2: Evidence in Jewish Sources composed after the 1st Century CE\Overallview\Chapter 12: The Arguments and Special Terminology of Rabbi Akivah andRabbi Ishmael and Their Schools\Chapter 13: Further special terminology forhumanitarian acts which violate Sabbath law\Chapter 14: Biblical proof texts tojustify any action in any situation of healing and saving life\Chapter 15:Historical indications of directives composed before the 2nd Century CE\Chapter16: When were the tannaitic directives composed - in the 1st or 2nd CenturiesCE?\Chapter 17: Summary - Why were no new directives composed in the 2ndCentury CE?\Chapter 18: The meaning of the term ‘Sabbath', in contexts ofhealing and/or saving life\Final Conclusions\Bibliography