CU4-25

 [|[Comment1]] Include material on how oral law served interests of rabbis in diminishing/eliminating power of the priests.  [|[Comment2]] Add here or in additional lesson need to bend the rules (example of sabbatical year for fields – ignored in modern Israel until recently (cucumber example)). Man’s law vs. god’s law, which cannot be repealed so must be reinterpreted or reinvented.
 * 4:25 **  **Introduction to the Talmud **
 * Goal ** Students will be introduced to the problems of interpreting rules of conduct and learn about the development of the Jerusalem and Babylonian Talmuds.
 *  1. **** Gain the attention of the learner ** Announce the rule that during any class discussion, whoever is speaking must be shown respect by the rest of the class. Ask the class whether showing respect means that you cannot disagree with the speaker’s views.
 *  2. **** Relevant past learning ** For religious Jews, the Bible contained commandments and principles that had to be studied and followed. But these required interpretation. During the Hasmonean dynasty, the Sadducees opposed the tradition of oral interpretation of the written law. Following the destruction of the Second Temple, the rabbis took over the leadership of Torah study. One center of this study was Babylonian, where Jews had remained since the Exile; the other was Judea.
 *  3. **  [|[Comment1]]   **Present new material** For a while, the interpretation of Torah could be passed on orally. But in time, the amount of material and disputes over interpretation made oral transmission inadequate. In time, it was written down through a process initiated by Rabbi Judah Ha-Nasi. Eventually, this written interpretation took a fixed form comprising two parts: the Mishnah (setting out the law) and the Gemorrah (commenting on the law). (See pages 33-39 in “The Essential Talmud.”) Show students a sample page from the Talmud and explain its parts. Note that although there was interaction between the two centers of Jewish study in Babylon and Judea, each produced its own Talmud. The more influential of the two is the Babylonian Talmud; the other is known as the Jerusalem Talmud. (See pages 40-55 in “The Essential Talmud.”)
 *  4. **** Provide for guided practice **<span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"> Return to the rule announced at the beginning of the lesson. Discuss whether the requirement of showing respect is consistent or inconsistent with disagreement about views. Relate the problems of interpreting a general rule to the problem of interpreting Torah. Also note any tendency to make the prohibition expansive in order not to violate its core: this corresponds to the Talmudic tendency to build a “fence” around the rules. (Give the example of the extension of the prohibition against cooking a kid in its mother’s milk. See p. 189 in “The Essential Talmud.”) Finally, observe that the Talmud does not merely record conclusions about the meaning and application of rules, but preserves the debates.
 * <span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Arial"> 5. ****<span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"> Provide for independent practice **<span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'"> Make up another general rule for the class. Divide the class into two groups and ask each group to interpret the rule and specify the concrete ways that it will apply to the class. Come together and compare interpretations. Finish by noting that during the early development of the Talmud, two important and competing schools arose consisting of the followers of Rabbi Hillel and the followers of Rabbi Shammai.[|[Comment2]]
 * <span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"> 6. Close the lesson **<span style="FONT-SIZE: 11pt; FONT-FAMILY: Arial; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-bidi-font-family: 'Times New Roman'; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA"> Summarize the ways discussed during the year that the Bible and the Talmud reflect competing points of view