Textual Reasonings: Jewish Philosophy and Text Study at the End of the Twentieth Century

"Textual reasoning" is the name that a group of contemporary Jewish thinkers has given to its overlapping practices of Jewish philosophy and theology. This volume represents the most public expression to date of the shared work, over a period of twelve years, of this society of "textual reasoners." Although the movement of textual reasoning is diverse and multiform, it is characterized at bottom by the pursuit of the claim that there are significant affinities between Jewish forms of reading and reasoning and postmodern thought. These affinities are presently being pursued by scholars throughout Jewish studies, in fields such as the Bible, Talmud, Midrash, medieval philosophy, Kabbalah, and the Jewish phenomenology of Rosenzweig and Levinas, among others. As the essays in this book amply convey, their work has stimulated a lively and creative reengagement with the philosophical dimensions of Jewish texts and, even more, with the textual dimensions of Jewish reasoning. In large part, this new energy has come from conceiving of the postmodern as a place where some of the most distinctive features of Jewish reasoning can be elucidated as well as challenged. A fine addition to the Radical Traditions series, provides a superb review of contemporary Jewish thought. Eugene B. Borowitz, Tikva Frymer- Kensy, George Lindbeck, Zachary Braiterman, Robert Gibbs, Shaul Magid, Virginia Burrus, David Weiss Halivni, Jacob Meskin, Aryeh Cohen, Daniel W. Hardy, Peter Ochs, Michael Fishbane, Martin Kavka, Randi Rashover, David F. Ford, Steven Kepnes, Michael Zank, Steven D. Fraade, Nancy Levene, Laurie Zoloth,