SOAS Research Online

Abstract

Late antiquity saw the creation of large compilations of centuries of traditional knowledge in Jewish as well as in Roman and Byzantine Christian society. The compilations were meant to preserve knowledge that had gained specific significance in the respective communities and was deemed worthy of being applied, discussed, and studied by future generations of intellectuals and practitioners. Although rabbis may have lagged behind with regard to participating in ancient book production, in late antiquity, when the Palestinian and Babylonian Talmuds and various Midrash collections were created, rabbinic Judaism caught up with Graeco-Roman and Christian authors, editors, and compilers who used some of the same procedures to preserve the traditional knowledge of their constituencies. Late antique encyclopedic collections such as the Talmud, Justinian’s Digest, and the Apophthegmata Patrum were visible configurations of rabbinic, juristic, and ascetic group identities and remained so for centuries to come.