Judaism in Late Antiquity

What, in Judaism - a religion so concerned with social norms and public policy - can we possibly mean by law? That is the thoroughly fresh perspective with which this work commences. It proceeds with two chapters on Second Temple Judaism, and two on the special subject of the Dead Sea library. Learning withers when criticism is substituted by political consensus, and when other than broadly accepted viewpoints find a hearing only with difficulty, if at all. The editors, therefore, invited colleagues fromthe USA, Europe, and the State of Israel to systematically outline their views in one account and set it alongside contrary ones.