Year One Bible and Rabbinics:
Tuesday Evenings In Person at Hebrew College
Year One Bible and Rabbinics: Tuesday Evenings In Person at Hebrew College
Program: Hebrew College Me’ah Classic
Instructor: Rabbi Neal Gold (Bible) and Rabbi Benjamin Samuels (Rabbinics) (Read Bios)
Dates: 11 Tuesdays, Winter/Spring 2024: 1/23, 1/30, 2/6, 2/13, 2/27, 3/5, 3/12, 3/19, 3/26, 4/2 & 4/9
Time: 7-9 p.m.
Cost: $425, financial aid is available
Location: In Person at Hebrew College: 1860 Washington Street| Newton, MA 02466
Hosted by: Hebrew College
The Me’ah Classic Year 1 Program begins with Bible in the Fall and continues with Rabbinics in the Spring. Your tuition covers the Spring semester.
Fall: Hebrew Bible
The Hebrew Bible, or Tanakh, is the central text of ancient Israel and the foundational text for Judaism through the ages. You’ll examine the various biblical genres, structures, concepts, theological and historical settings of the biblical world, and then explore selected topics, often integrated with rabbinic perspectives.
This sequence balances an overview of the Hebrew Bible with focused discussion of core texts, such as the Creation stories, the binding of Isaac, the Exodus story, the revelation at Sinai and the prophetic books. You’ll analyze the primary biblical texts and secondary scholarly materials through various lenses: literary, historical-comparative, and rabbinic commentary.
While you may be familiar with the Bible from childhood, this in-depth exposure to other texts and different modes of reading will challenge you — and may well lead you to reassess some long-held views.
Winter/Spring: Rabbinics
The Rabbinic Period — the millennium from the Second Temple to the completion of the Babylonian Talmud (500 BCE to 600 CE) — refers to a time when new Jewish leaders, sages and rabbis emerged and developed rich texts of their own. Some of those texts took the form of extensive commentary about the earlier world of biblical Israel. During this seminal period, rabbinic scholars created a legal system which led to a Jewish belief system that has informed and ordered Jewish community, culture, and behavior for the past millennia.
Your instructor will guide you through enduring questions:
What is the relationship between God and human beings?
How do we understand Jewish history and Jewish ethics?
What is the role of ritual, holy days and life-cycle events?
Readings illustrate the development of the rabbinic mindset and talmudic beliefs. As with the Hebrew Bible sequence, you’ll first cover selected historical, textual, and conceptual areas, then examine core concepts in conjunction with Bible study to illustrate how beliefs and practices evolved over time.
Please contact meah@hebrewcollege.edu for more information.