recently-deceased member of the JewishnTheological Seminary’s faculty.nThe other relevant observationnabout Neusner’s scholarship is thatnmuch of it is impenetrable except to anTalmud student with extensive knowledgenof German social thought. Innalmost all his commentaries on Talmudicnliterature, Neusner emphasizesnthat the texts are governed by theirnown intrinsic logic, an assumption henapplies especially to the two redactionsnof the Talmud, one compiled in andnaround Jerusalem in the middle of thenfifth century and the other compiled innBabylonia by the end of the sixth.nWhereas the.Mishnaic texts (later integratedninto the Talmud) made unambiguousndeclarations about ritual, criminalnprocedures, and tort law, thenTalmudic rabbis, by contrast, spoke in ancoded fashion. They used allegoriesn(often literally interpreted by OrthodoxnJews) and a complicated system ofnciting text proofs from the Mishnahnand Pentateuch to clarify and substantiatenlegal rulings. Neusner has writtennextensively on the logic of fixed associationnfound in the Talmud. He showsnhow this logic emerges in the earliernTalmudic redaction, the Yerushalmi,nand through other rabbinic texts thatnhe has also translated, Tosefta, LeviticusnRabbah, Genesis Rabbah, andnSifre to Numbers. These texts formnthematic and methodological links betweennthe Yerushalmi and the secondnTalmudic redaction, the Bavli, whichnbecame everywhere authoritative fornJewish learning and religious practice.nThe Bavli, as viewed by Neusner,nincorporated materials and experiencesnthat were still of marginal importancento the redactions of the Yerushalmi. Itnis full of allegory and expansive textnproof; also it addresses the central crisisnin Jewish history since the destructionnof the Second Temple and the fall ofnthe Second Jewish Commonwealth —nthe conversion of pagan antiquity tonChristianity.nNeusner repeatedly states that thenChristians’ challenge was a compellingnreason for the self-enclosed system thatnhe identifies with the Babylonian Talmudnand that he also considers essentialnfor grasping the Bavli’s widespreadnauthority. Faced by a conversionarynreligion that addressed the Gentilesnfrom Hebrew texts but also abrogatednscriptural and rabbinic practices, then32/CHRONICLESnauthors of the Bavli tried to create ancordon sanitaire for their people.nNeusner describes how threatened andnpersecuted Jews eagerly accepted thenprotective device. A life devoted tonTalmud separated them from a successornreligion whose adherents sought tonfragment their community. It amusednthem to stand apart in all details ofntheir outward existence; and it providedna mode of thinking and discoursenthat was systematically rigorous butnalso distinct from the classical, largelynAristotelian, argumentation used bynthe early church.nNeusner maintains that modernnWestern expositions of the Talmudnhave usually foundered on the shoalsnof the unwelcome distinction betweennthe open logic of classical learning andnthe “closed hermeneutics” of rabbinicndiscourse. It is misleading, Neusnernargues, to point to apparent parallelsnbetween Aristotelian and Talmudic syllogisms.nUnlike the Logic, the Bavlindoes not point beyond the texts it seeksnto relate; “In forming the large worldnin which everything would be containednin some one thing, the Bavli’snauthorship relied for connection uponnthe received text, and necessarily drewnconclusions resting upon connectionnsolely within the dictates of an a priorinand imputed system of making connections.nThere [were] connectionsnsupplied, and not discovered, structuresnultimately imputed through extrinsicnprocesses of thought, not nurturednthrough the proposed testing ofnpropositions intrinsic to the matter atnhand.”nThis closed hermeneutic made itnimpossible, according to Neusner, fornthose exclusively absorbed in the Talmudnto arrive at science and philosophy.nSuch disciplines rested on changingnassociations and universallynaccessible forms of verification. Nonetheless,nTalmudic learning provided anspecifically Jewish path to redemption.nIt sustained and kept unified a humiliatednpeople, while sharpening theirndialectical skills. It did enough, that isnto say, without making claims for thenrabbis that lay outside their enterprise.nIn Neusner’s newest book, The Ecologynof Religion, he sets out to clarifynwith reference to Judaism “the interplaynbetween a religious system andnthe social worid that gave to that systemnnnits shape and meaning.” He looks atnthe “interrelated components” of Judaismnas a religious system through then”documentary method” developed innhis earlier scholarship. By determiningnthe intention of particular pieces ofnrabbinic literature, Neusner hopes tonuncover their function in what becamenthe prevalent Jewish world view afternthe destruction of the Second Temple.nHowever convoluted and apocopatednrabbinic arguments may be, Neusnerninsists on looking at them as “statements”nabout Jewish destiny. Commentariesnon Leviticus and Numbersnincorporating Mishnaic passages, allegoricalninterpretations of Scripture, andnthe works and sayings ascribed to thenSages are all shown to be interwovenninto the rabbinic canon in accordancenwith certain persistent concerns: maintainingnJewish community in the wakenof misfortune, and upholding a specificallynJewish understanding of Scripturenas a guide for ritual practice and as anpromise of Jewish national redemption.nAs for the last motif, the rabbis providednit with a noncontroversial context:nthey referred irresolvable legal quandariesnto a future messianic age andnportrayed the Messiah King as a legalnscholar. And while they held on to thendream of rebuilding the Temple ansecond time, they also equated prayernand legal study with the bringing ofnsacrifices. The rabbis also stressed thenequality of priests and nonpriests innterms of the performance of ritualnobligations and the need for atonement.nNeusner undertakes his study as anself-described Weberian, attempting tonrelate the religious view he analyzes tona system of political economy. Hennotes Max Weber’s achievement innplotting a relationship between thenworld’s religions and the organizationnof power and material resources in thensocieties subject to these patterns ofnbelief Though Neusner has writtennknowledgeably on rabbinic economics,nhe does not bring off his Weberiannproject, which in any case forms only ansubtheme in the present volume. Hisnfailure results at least in part from onenof his chief accomplishments: that is,nthe exhaustive definition of rabbinicnJudaism as one of several differentnforms of Judaism. Rabbinic Judaism isnseen to have both developed and prosperednin a situation of political power-n