Papers by Jane Kanarek
Jewish Culture and Creativity: Essays in Honor of Michael Fishbane on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday, 2023
Jewish Law Association Studies XXXII, 2023
Journal of Jewish Education, 2019
Learning to Read Talmud: What It Looks Like and How It Happens is a work that emerged from a rese... more Learning to Read Talmud: What It Looks Like and How It Happens is a work that emerged from a research initiative supported by the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education at Brandeis University. We are deeply grateful to the Mandel Center and its director, Jon A. Levisohn, for sponsoring and supporting this project. Dr. Levisohn's wise guidance, his challenging and insightful questions, and his enthusiasm for our work helped make this project a richer and more meaningful process. We also thank Susanne Shavelson,
Studies in Rabbinic Narrative, Volume 1, 2021
Although Talmud study is central to rabbinical school curriculums, rabbinical students' experienc... more Although Talmud study is central to rabbinical school curriculums, rabbinical students' experiences with Talmud study remain understudied. This article draws on interviews with students from five seminaries to argue that students describe Talmud study as a process of acquiring both knowledge and authenticity. These two goals intersect with a particular tension: a desire to cover large amounts of Talmudic material quickly and a desire to study smaller amounts more slowly. Rather than viewing the latter two as a binary, Talmud teachers should recognize the complex ways in which coverage and comprehension interact with one another, cultivating student and teacher metacognition.
Learning to Read Talmud: What It Looks Like and How It Happens, 2016
During the class, I kept a teaching journal and made audio recordings of many of the sessions. In... more During the class, I kept a teaching journal and made audio recordings of many of the sessions. In addition, I kept copies of all written student work. This article relies on reflection guided by investigating those records, written and spoken.
Learning to Read Talmud: What It Looks Like and How It Happens is a work that emerged from a rese... more Learning to Read Talmud: What It Looks Like and How It Happens is a work that emerged from a research initiative supported by the Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Center for Studies in Jewish Education at Brandeis University. We are deeply grateful to the Mandel Center and its director, Jon A. Levisohn, for sponsoring and supporting this project. Dr. Levisohn's wise guidance, his challenging and insightful questions, and his enthusiasm for our work helped make this project a richer and more meaningful process. We also thank Susanne Shavelson,
Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues, 2015
Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues, 2015
Why Study Talmud in the 21st Century? The Relevance of Ancient Text to our World, 2010
Righteous Indignation, 2007
Journal of Jewish Education, 2010
has written a wonderful piece developing a list of 10 orientations for the teaching of rabbinic l... more has written a wonderful piece developing a list of 10 orientations for the teaching of rabbinic literature. His categories will be invaluable in aiding and encouraging teachers of rabbinics to better articulate both what they choose to teach and why they choose to teach as they do. In my response, I want to address the issue of the genres of rabbinic literature and the ways in which attention to genre can help us in the project of developing more, ". .. nuanced ways of thinking and talking about the teaching of rabbinic literature" (p. 56). As Levisohn observes, the category of rabbinic literature is ambiguous. It encompasses a vast variety of texts that span chronological and literary distances: from biblical re-readings anonymously redacted in the 3rd-century C.E. to legal responsa composed by 21st-century rabbinic committees. In his article, Levisohn thus fittingly mentions texts that cover a similar distance, including halakhic midrashim, the Bavli, medieval Talmudic commentators, and contemporary responsa. However, in discussing orientations, I want to step back for a moment and ask whether we should so easily accept this large definition of rabbinic literature. What do we stand to gain by grouping all of these texts together and what do we stand to lose? What are the pedagogical implications of, on the one hand, more precisely defining what we mean by "rabbinic literature" or, on the other hand, of maintaining such an open definition? Rabbinic literature can be defined in a multiplicity of ways. It can be divided by historical era, where texts from the classical rabbinic period are placed in one group and texts from the medieval period in another. In this model, Genesis Rabbah and the Bavli might be studied together but Genesis Rabbah and the medieval Yalkut Shimoni would not be. It can also be divided by genre, where texts of similar literary styles are taught together. Here, Genesis Rabbah and Yalkut Shimoni, as forms of midrash, might be taught together. It can also be divided by geographical location. Medieval North African Talmudic commentaries would be studied in one class while
Introduction of Seder Qodashin: A Feminist Commentary on the Babylonian Talmud V, 2012
The opening pages of Tractate Arakhin, bAr 2a to 3b, present a series of twentyfive questions tha... more The opening pages of Tractate Arakhin, bAr 2a to 3b, present a series of twentyfive questions that follow the formula הכל ... מאי לאתויי ("ha-kol"... le-'atoyei mai)-"the word 'everyone' whom does it come to include?" This particularly stammaitic (or perhaps even late-amoraic) Babylonian terminology 1 functions to transform what may appear as an exhaustive mishnaic list into a more expansive one. Of course, this is not simply a Babylonian reading game. For, as the Bavli includes certain categories of people, it also excludes others. In the process, it reveals much about its own ideological concerns. However, in order to unde rstand the Bavli's ideology it is insufficient to simply take note of who the Bavli includes and who it excludes. Of equal significance is the exegetical methodo logy that the Bavli utilizes for inclusion and exclusion. This article focuses on one commandment in particular-,ראייה commonly translated as pilgrimageand an interpretive divergence between the Bavli and Yerushalmi, a divergence that is, as we will see, gendered. Of the twenty-five questions about inclusion in bAr 2a-3b, only four raise the potential of women's participation. 2 They are תמורה (substituting another animal for one already dedicated as a sacrificial offering), 3 reading megillat esther on the festival of Purim, זימון (the invitation to grace-aftermeals), and mixing water with the ashes of the red heifer. 4 None of these four are the focus of this discussion. Instead, I focus on a query about the word הכל that does not explicitly mention womenat least not in bArakhin. That question is about the commandment of re'iyah. bAr 2b asks " ' בראייה חייבין הכל ' מאי לאתויי ? " ([the phrase] "everyone is obligated in re'iyah"whom does it come to include?) and proposes three different possibilities: a man who is half-slave and half-free, a man who is lame but heals, or a man who is blind-in-one-eye. The sugya turns to women only indirectly when it discusses the case of the half-slave, half-free man. While the sage Ravina argues that the half-slave is exempt from re'iyah, 5 the anonymous gemara pro-1 See GRAY, "A Bavli Sugya and its Two Yerushalmi Parallels," 64-65 and n. 54. 2 Of these twenty-five questions, the first four stem directly from mAr 1:1. The remaining twenty-one stem from other mishnayot and
The International Handbook of Jewish Education, 2011
AJS Review, 2016
The Levitical laws of 'arakhin name only males as those who can actively donate the monetary valu... more The Levitical laws of 'arakhin name only males as those who can actively donate the monetary value of another person to the sanctuary or temple. In contrast, tannaitic texts about 'arakhin explicitly name females among those who can donate the monetary value of another to the temple. However, this legislation of females as valuers should not be attributed to a rabbinic desire to ameliorate the status of women, but rather should be viewed as part of the larger rabbinic project of rewriting Scripture. In this case, tannaitic literature recategorizes 'arakhin with votive legislation instead of sanctuary/temple legislation. Close attention to gender enables us to notice the tannaitic rewriting of 'arakhin and thus investigate the rabbinic reconfiguration of its biblical inheritance, not only for the ways in which rabbinic texts rewrite biblical law concerning gender but also for a richer understanding of the scholastic process itself.
Ajs Review-the Journal of The Association for Jewish Studies, 2009
Ajs Review-the Journal of The Association for Jewish Studies, 2010
Teaching Theology and Religion, 2010
This article explores a set of practices in the teaching of Talmud called “the pedagogy of slowin... more This article explores a set of practices in the teaching of Talmud called “the pedagogy of slowing down.” Through the author's analysis of her own teaching in an intensive Talmud class, “the pedagogy of slowing down” emerges as a pedagogical and cultural model in which the students learn to read more closely and to investigate the multiplicity of meanings inherent in the Talmudic text, thus bridging the gap between an ancient text and its contemporary students. This article describes the specific techniques in the pedagogy of slowing down, and the ways in which this teaching practice contributes both to students' becoming more attentive readers and to the ongoing development of their religious voices.
Book Reviews by Jane Kanarek
Uploads
Papers by Jane Kanarek
Book Reviews by Jane Kanarek