Date of Redaction

Date of Redaction.

The statements already made concerning the continuous redaction of the Babylonian Talmud apply with equal force to the Yerushalmi, this fact being expressed by Lewy (l.c. pp. 14-15) in the following words: "In Palestine, as in Babylon, there may have been different Talmudim in the various schools at different periods. . . . Similarly in the Palestinian Talmud different versions of amoraic sayings are quoted in the names of different authors, from which it may be inferred that these authors learned and taught different Talmudim." Lewy speaks also (l.c. p. 20) of several redactions which preceded the final casting of the Palestinian Talmud into its present form. The actual condition of affairs can scarcely be formulated in these terms, however, since the divergencies consist, for the most part, of mere variants in certain sentences, or in the fact that there were different authors and transmitters of them; and although many of these deviations are cited by R. Jonah and R. Jose, who lived and taught contemporaneously at Tiberias, this fact scarcely justifies the assumption that there were two different Talmudim, one taught by Jonah and the other by Jose; it will nevertheless be evident, from the statements cited above, that the Talmud existed in some definite form throughout the amoraic period, and that, furthermore, its final redaction was preceded by other revisions. It may likewise be assumed that the contemporaneous schools of Tiberias, Sepphoris, and Cæsarea in Palestine taught the Talmud in different redactions in the fourth century. Lewy assumes, probably with correctness, that in the case of Yerushalmi the treatise NeziKin (the three treatises Baba Kamma, Baba Mezi'a, and Baba Batra) was taken from a redaction differing from that of the other treatises. (Allusion has already been made to a difference of content between the first two and the last two orders of the Yerushalmi.) With regard to Babli. Frankel has shown ("Monatsschrift," x. 194) that the treatise Tamid, in which only three chapters out of seven are accompanied by a Talmud, belongs to a different redaction from that of the other treatises; and he endeavors to show, in like manner (ib. p. 259), both "that the redactor of the treatise Kiddushin is not identical with that of Baba Batra and Nedarim," and "that the redactor of the treatise Gittin is not the same as that of Keritot and Baba Batra." However, as these remarks refer to the final redaction of the Talmud, they do not touch upon the abstract unity of the work as emphasized above. It is sufficient to assume, therefore, that the final redaction of the several treatises was based on the versions used in the different academies. It may be postulated, on the whole, that the Palestinian Talmud received its present form at Tiberias, and the Babylonian Talmud at Sura (comp. the passages in Yerushalmi in which [= "here"] refers to Tiberias, and those in Babli in which the same word denotes Sura [Lewy, l.c. p. 4]).
(see image) Page from the First Complete Edition of the Babylonian Talmud, Printed by Bomberg, Venice, 1520-23.(From the Sulzberger collection in the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, New York.)The chief data regarding the academies of Palestine and Babylon, whose activity resulted in the Talmud, have been set forth elsewhere (see Jew. Encyc. i. 145-148, s.v. Academies), so that here stress need be laid only on those events in the history of the two schools and of their teachers which are especially noteworthy in connection with the origin and the final redaction of the two Talmudim. It may be said, by way of preface, that the academies of Palestine and Babylon were in constant intercommunication, notwithstanding their geographical position. Many prominent Babylonian scholars settled permanently in Palestine, and many eminent Palestinians sojourned in Babylon for some time, or even for a considerable portion of their lives. In the second half of the third century Babylonian students sought the Palestinian schools with especial frequency, while many pupils of Johanan went during the same period to Babylon; and in the troublous days of the fourth century many Palestinian scholars sought refuge in the more quiet regions along the Euphrates. This uninterrupted association of scholars resulted in an active interchange of ideas between the schools, especially as the activity of both was devoted in the main to the study of the Mishnah. The Jerusalem Talmud accordingly contains a large number of sayings by Babylonian authorities, and Babli quotes a still larger number of sayings by Palestinian scholars in addition to the proceedings of the Palestinian academies, while it likewise devotes a very considerable space to the halakic and haggadic teachings of such Palestinian masters as Johanan, Simeon b. LaKish, and Abbahu. Anonymous Palestinian sentences are quoted in Babli with the statement, "They say in the West"; and similar maxims of Babylonian origin are quoted in Yerushalmi in the name of "the scholars there." Both the Talmudim thus acquired more traits in common than they had formerly possessed despite their common foundation, while owing to the mass of material which Babli received from the schools of the Holy Land it was destined in a measure to supplant the Palestinian Talmud even in Palestine.