1. See Rubenstein, Jeffrey, Talmudic Stories: Narrative Art, Composition, and Culture (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1999), 3–33CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Rubenstein, The Culture of the Babylonian Talmud (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2003), 2–13Google Scholar; and, most recently, Rubenstein, Stories of the Babylonian Talmud (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010), 7–19Google Scholar. Richard Kalmin has registered a different opinion, arguing: “The anonymous editors of the Talmud are very unlikely candidates for authorship of the Talmud's brilliantly artistic, dramatically gripping, and ethically and theologically ambiguous narratives” (Katz, Steven T., ed., The Cambridge History of Judaism [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2006], 4:846CrossRefGoogle Scholar). The most recent assessment of Rubenstein's contribution can be found in Isaiah Gafni's review of his three books on rabbinic stories: “Rethinking Talmudic History: The Challenge of Literary and Redaction Criticism,” Jewish History 25, nos. 3–4 (2011): 355–75CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2. See Friedman, Shamma, “La'aggadah ha-historit ba-talmud ha-bavli,” in Saul Lieberman Memorial Volume, ed. Friedman, Shamma, New York and Jerusalem: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 1993), 119–64Google Scholar. According to Friedman, only the material identified as the “literary kernel” of the story can be used to reconstruct historical data. More importantly, that identification can be used to dismiss elements in the story that are not part of the literary kernel and are therefore secondary and clearly nonhistorical (122). See further Friedman's article “A Good Story Deserves Retelling—The Unfolding of the Akiva Legend,” Jewish Studies Internet Journal 3 (2004): 87 n. 102Google Scholar.

3. Even when a Palestinian parallel is found, we do not always have clear criteria for dating the story—we can only surmise that the Palestinian source has some relationship to it, and usually the Palestinian source is thought to represent the earlier form of the tradition, making it easier to see which elements were added later. On the tendency in scholarship to regard the Palestinian story as original, see Efron, Joshua, Studies in the Hasmonean Period (Leiden: Brill, 1987), 145–47CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Friedman, “Historical Aggadah,” 121 n. 6; Rubenstein, Talmudic Stories, 25–26; Hezser, Catherine, Form, Function, and Historical Significance of the Rabbinic Story in Yerushalmi Neziqin, Texte und Studien zum antiken Judentum 37 (Tübingen: Mohr, 1993), 349–57Google Scholar. However, this is not always the case; see Benovitz, Moshe, Perek shevuot shetaim batra, Bavli Shevuot perek shelishi (New York: Jewish Theological Seminary of America, 2003), 456–61Google Scholar.

4. This motif is reminiscent of the story of Polemo (in B. Kiddushin 81a–b), who was shamed into inviting Satan to dine on Erev Yom Kippur. While there is no evidence of a direct relationship between the stories, that story makes clear to the contemporary reader just how objectionable a lack of hospitality on Erev Yom Kippur was considered to be. While one could argue that the story contains no internal proof concerning the behavior of “the people” of Sura, the fact that it contrasts “everyone [in the city],” who are careful to throw the udders away, with Rami, who “immediately went and collected them and ate them,” is surely meant to reflect poorly on the people of the city. The collective (כולי עלמא) of Sura is scrupulous about getting rid of the udders but not about the commandment of receiving guests, even on the eve of Yom Kippur.

5. See Kalmin, Richard, “Talmudic Portrayals of Relationships between Rabbis: Amoraic or Pseudepigraphic?” AJS Review 17 (1992): 165–97CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Kalmin theorized that this story “in which a student of Yehudah, Rami bar Tamari, demonstrates Ḥisda's inferiority to Yehudah, might be an effective means by which late Pumbeditan storytellers propagandize in favor of their city and attack contemporary Suran foes” (172–73).

6. See M. Yoma 8:9; Sifra Aḥarei Mot 5:8 (ed. Weiss, p. 83a–b); B. Yoma 87a–b; and B. Eruvin 54a (similar to B. Nedarim 55a). B. Yoma 87a describes how Rav went to appease a butcher on Erev Yom Kippur, and how the butcher's refusal to forgive Rav resulted in the butcher's premature death.

7. In his recent book, Socrates and the Fat Rabbis (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2009)Google Scholar, Daniel Boyarin argues for the influence of what he terms “Menippean satire” on the Bavli. Boyarin defines Menippean satire as “a kind of spoofing in which the heroes of an intellectual community are the spoofed heroes, at least in formal part via a yoking together of the serious and comical genres into single texts that observe no generic decorum, as was recognized already in antiquity. Since the force of this genre is to call into question the very seriousness and authority of the practice of the intellectuals themselves, this is also, I argue, an important avenue for understanding talmudic ideology” (26). Boyarin does not mention our story as an example of “Menippean satire”; however, using his model, one might be tempted to argue that Rav Ḥisda is comically “spoofed” by the udder-eating Rami bar Tamari. While I agree that Rav Ḥisda is indeed “spoofed,” I do not think it has anything to do with Menippean satire. It is more along the traditional lines of satire defined by Boyarin in the same context as “that which makes fun of a literary tradition or sociocultural formation.” In this case the author from Pumbedita criticizes the leaders of Sura (see below). For a detailed critique of Boyarin's thesis, see Kiperwasser, Reuven, “Daniel Boyarin: Socrates and the Fat Rabbis,” Jewish History 25, nos. 3–4 (2011): 377–97CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

8. This is in accordance with MSS Hamburg 169, Vatican 121, Vatican 122, and Munich 95. In the printed editions the word kaftei/kaftuhu does not appear. This was likely an apologetic deletion based on sensitivity to the criticism of Rav Ḥisda in our story.

9. The word appears in three sugyot in the Bavli: Berakhot 38a, Pesaḥim 42b, and Avodah Zarah 34b. See Sokoloff, Michael, A Dictionary of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic (Ramat Gan and Baltimore: Bar-Ilan University Press and Johns Hopkins University Press, 2002), 893Google Scholar, who defines it as: “stone or kernel of fruit (esp. grapes […]).” In Syriac פרצנתא is defined by Smith, J. Payne as “a grape-stone, pomegranate seed; a raisin” (A Compendious Syriac Dictionary [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1903], 464)Google Scholar. For a discussion of the meaning of the word, see Moshe Benovitz, Talmud ha-’Igud, Berakhot VI, Sugya 16, n. 14 [forthcoming].

10. In MSS Hamburg 169 and Vatican 121 the order is switched; Rav Ḥisda first queries Rami about his lack of tzitzit, then about his lack of tefillin. For a discussion of this change in order, see below.

11. Here we have another hint about the collective of Sura. They—the people of Sura—bring in (אייתוה) another prisoner and thereby show their partnership and agreement with Rav Ḥisda in the search for additional “transgressors.”

12. See B. Pesaḥim 117b and B. Ketubot 55a (in the latter source the distinction is between Pumbedita and Mata Meḥasya, which bordered Sura). For a brief discussion of the talmudic evidence of divergent customs in Sura and Pumbedita and a wider discussion of the differences in customs between the two centers in the geonic period, see Asaf, Simḥah, Tekufat ha-ge'onim ve-sifrutah (Jerusalem, Mosad Harav Kook, 1967), 261–78Google Scholar; Victor Aptowitzer, Sefer ha-Ra'aviah vol. 3, Hosafot ve'Tikunim (Jerusalem, Harry Fischel Institute, 1964), 743Google Scholar. Contrast Robert Brody's critique of Asaf's conclusions, The Geonim of Babylonia and the Shaping of Medieval Jewish Culture (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1998), 149Google Scholar.

13. See, e.g., B. Megillah 18b, B. Bava Batra 142b, B. Bava Batra 152b, B. Avodah Zarah 38a, B. Avodah Zarah 75a, B. Ḥullin 37b, and B. Bekhorot 36b.

14. See Gafni, Isaiah, “Yeshivah u-metivta,” Zion 43 (1978): 12–37Google Scholar. In Gafni's discussion of the pirka (a public discourse combining the study of halakhah and aggadah) he demonstrates that the term is used by third-generation Amoraim and onward (Yehudei Bavel be-tekufat ha-Talmud [Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Center for Jewish History, 1990], 210–11Google Scholar).

15. This is certainly the case for David Goodblatt (Rabbinic Instruction in Sasanian Babylonia [Leiden: Brill, 1975]Google Scholar), who sees the academies as the product of the geonic period. For a discussion of their theories, see Rubenstein, Jeffrey, “The Rise of the Babylonian Rabbinic Academy: A Reexamination of the Talmudic Evidence,” Jewish Studies Internet Journal 1 (2002): 55–68Google Scholar.

16. I use the term “literary sources” to mean redacted sources (either in oral or written form) that were at the disposal of our storyteller at the time of the story's creation. As we shall see below, the storyteller copied and molded redacted sources in order to create this story.

17. Two traditions are attributed in the Bavli to the brilliant ones of Pumbedita: B. Kiddushin 39a and B. Menaḥot 17a. In B. Berakhot 59b the sages of Meḥoza are described as being “sharp” due to their consumption of the water of the Tigris River.

18. Moreover, in the next line of B. Sanhedrin 17b the term ḥarifei (brilliant ones) appears again. The idea of brilliance is central to our story. One might ask: if this is so, why did the author of our story not use one of the “brilliant ones,” Eifa or Avimi, as the central character in the story in place of Rami? The answer to this question is clear: by using the little-known Rami, our storyteller demonstrates how even the most insignificant student of Rav Yehudah was imbued with his Torah and could defeat the greatest sage of Sura.

19. In B. Yevamot 80a there is a statement attributed to “Rami bar Dikulei in the name of Shmuel.” None of the textual witnesses in B. Yevamot 80a add the name Rami bar Tamarei. Nonetheless, it is likely that this refers to the same sage and that the uncertainty (second tradition) regarding his name was added to the amoraic tradition in B. Menaḥot 29b to emphasize his anonymity and poverty. In the printed editions of B. Berakhot 56a, Bar Hadaya, who interpreted dreams based on how much he was paid, interpreted Abaye and Rava's identical dream (they saw “a wine cask in a dikla [palm tree]”) in opposite directions. Bar Hadaya told Abaye: “your business shall flourish like the dikla [palm tree],” while he told Rava that “your business shall be sick/sweet like tamarei [dates].” Accordingly, dikla would symbolize a profitable business and tamarei, a failed business. However most of the manuscripts do not have the words dikla and tamarei in Bar Hadaya's interpretations: they read either “your business shall flourish” or “your business shall fail.”

20. This is the reading in MSS Munich 95, Vatican 118, and Vatican 120. In the printed editions we find the erroneous reading: “Rami bar Tamarei also known as the father-in-law (דהוא חמוה) of Rami bar Dikulei.” This is the result of a dittography.

21. The word in question is the Hebrew word for “slew” in the verse “the Lord slew every first-born in the land of Egypt” found in the second passage of the Tefillin (Exodus 13:15).

22. See below for the additional significance of the two names in connection with Rav Yehudah.

23. These correspond as follows (according to our division above): Part 2A: B. Ḥullin 18b; 2B: B. Avodah Zarah 34a–b; 2C: B. Bava Meẓia’ 23a. We will demonstrate how the author of our story molded the halakhic material of each sugya into the dialogue between Rav Ḥisda and Rami.

24. A type of deflected cut in which the trachea is not cut straight but at a slant. For the earliest mention of this term, see T. Ḥullin 1:10.

25. Although clearly Rabbi Zeira did not agree with this position. Later in the same sugya Rabbi Zeira brings a statement in the name of Rav Naḥman arguing that mugremet is in fact permissible.

26. דאפילו ספיקי דגברי גריס. This phrase is only mentioned in B. Ḥullin 18b in relation to Rav Yehudah.

27. For a discussion of the textual history of the amoraic material in B. Ḥullin 18b and its relationship to B. Pesaḥim 51a, see Amit, Aaron, Talmud ha-’igud, makom she-nahagu: Pesaḥim perek revi‘i min ha-Talmud ha-Bavli (Jerusalem: Society for the Interpretation of the Talmud, 2009), 85–91Google Scholar. Although parts of the sugya in B. Ḥullin 18b were transferred from B. Pesaḥim 51a, the discussion of Rabbi Zeira's position on the permissibility of eating mugremet that is parallel to our story is original in B. Ḥullin.

28. The translation that follows is based on MS JTS 44830 (Rab. 15).

29. In the JTS manuscript these words are clearly designated by the scribe as a piska from M. Avodah Zarah 2:4. So also in MS Paris 1337, where the same tannaitic piska is clearly designated מתני. In the printed editions, however, the tannaitic passage that opens the discussion is treated as a Baraita’ and introduced with the term תנו רבנן.

30. In MS New York JTS Rab. 15, Paris 1337, and Munich 95. The printed editions read here Rav Aḥa the son of Rav Ika (a fifth-generation Babylonian Amora).

31. See Cohen, Avinoam, Ravina ve-ḥokhmei doro: ‘iyunim be-seder ha-dorot shel Amoraim aḥaronim be-Bavel (Ramat Gan: Bar-Ilan University Press, 2001), 220–21Google Scholar. According to Cohen, Rav Aḥa the son of Rava was younger than Rav Ashi but died before him. Albeck, Ḥanokh, Mavo la-Talmudim (Tel Aviv: Dvir, 1987), 440Google Scholar, argues that in all likelihood Rav Aḥa the son of Rava and Rav Aḥa the son of Rav are the same sage. However, Cohen demonstrates in detail the problems with Albeck's thesis (Cohen, 221–32).

32. One could try to make the argument that the sugya in B. Avodah Zarah 34a–b borrowed the פורצני from our story, attributing the use of the word to Rav Aḥa the son of Rava. However this is extremely unlikely for a number of reasons:

1. 1.

   1. Why, in a halakhic discussion with other Amoraim, would an editor deliberately attribute to Rav Aḥa the son of Rava a fictitious opinion that is based on our story? If indeed that were the case, the opinion ought to have been attributed to Rami bar Dikulei in B. Avodah Zarah!

2. 2.

   2. The question of the status of grape pits makes abundant sense in the sugya in B. Avodah Zarah; however the use of grape pits as a fuel source for cooking udders seems quite problematic.

3. 3.

   3. The author of our story actually combines the words of Rav Yehudah and Rav Aḥa the son of Rava in the statement he attributes to Rami, which strengthens the case for the direction of borrowing being B. Avodah Zarah to B. Ḥullin.

33. Although Rav Yehudah is mentioned immediately afterward in B. Bava Meẓia.

34. In MSS Madrid Escorial G-I-3, Hamburg 165, and Vatican 115.

35. In MS Florence 8 “Rabbah” and in MS Munich 95 “Rava.”

36. See Michael Sokoloff, Babylonian Aramaic, s.v. “חילפא,” definition no. 3, 456.

37. It is important to identify the source of the statement about יאוש because it makes a significant difference in dating our storyteller's use of the statement. If the statement in the name of Rabbi Abba in B. Bava Meẓia 23a is deemed original and authentic, our storyteller could have used this material, created by third-generation Babylonian Amoraim. However, as we shall see, the statement was in fact transferred from B. Bava Batra 87a–b and then augmented with an Aramaic gloss by the editor of the sugya in B. Bava Meẓia’. The statement is also clearly secondary in B. Mo‘ed Katan 5b, where it is used to refer metaphorically to the abandonment of family “ownership” of body parts fallen off a corpse.

38. This is a piska from M. Bava Batra 5:8. The halakhah is that a seller who uses a measuring cup to transfer oil or wine to the buyer's vessel is required to let the liquid drip three times into the buyer's vessel. This line states that once the vessel has been tilted again and more liquid drains—that liquid belongs to the seller. This contradicts a similar ruling in M. Terumah 11:8—which describes the exact same case with regard to measuring out terumah oil or wine being given to a priest and rules that the remaining liquid is considered terumah and belongs to the priest and not to the Israelite; this suggests that, according to the same logic, in M. Bava Batra the liquid should belong to the buyer and not the seller.

39. M. Bava Batra 5:8.

40. M. Terumot 11:8.

41. In MS Leiden this question comes after Rabbi Yoḥanan's statement—but it clearly belongs before it. See the Israel Academy of Sciences edition of the Talmud Yerushalmi (Jerusalem, The Academy of the Hebrew Language, 2001), 260Google Scholar.

42. In the Yerushalmi an alternative explanation is cited in the name of Rabbi Yoḥanan. According to Rabbi Yoḥanan, M. Bava Batra should be emended to accord with M. Terumah 11:8. See Moscovitz, Leib, Haterminologia shel hayerushalmi: hamunaḥim ha'ikari'im, Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2009), 354, example 1 and n. 378Google Scholar.

43. Note, however, that in Y. Terumah it is Rabbi Yiẓḥak the son of Elazar and in B. Bava Batra it is Rabbi Yiẓḥak the son of Avdimi, with the added difference that in B. Bava Batra Rabbi Yiẓḥak attributes the statement to Rabbi Abahu. Despite these differences, the similarity of the names is additional proof that these sugyot stem from one source.

44. See Halivni, David, introduction to Mekorot u-mesorot, masekhet Bava Batra (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2007), 127–32Google Scholar.

45. As noted above (see n. 10), there is a split in the textual witnesses regarding the order. According to the printed editions of the Bavli, as well as MS Munich 95 and MS Vatican 122, Rav Ḥisda first notes Rami's lack of tefillin then his lack of tzitzit, while in MSS Hamburg 169 and Vatican 121 the order is reversed.

46. Further support for B. Menaḥot 44a being the original location of Rav Yehudah's statement is the fact that all the textual witnesses there preserve the same internal order: “a borrowed garment is exempt from tzitzit for the first thirty days.” However, in our sugya the textual witnesses are split; the printed editions and MS Hamburg 169 read “a borrowed garment for the first thirty days is exempt from tzitzit,” while MS Vatican 121 reads like B. Menaḥot 44a, with the temporal clause at the end of the sentence. In MSS Munich 95 and Vatican 122 we find corruptions of the original reading: MS Vatican 122 reads “a borrowed garment is פסולה [disqualified] from the tzitzit for the first thirty days”; and Munich 95 reads “a borrowed garment is פטור [exempt] for thirty days.” Clearly the scribe of Munich 95 copied from a text that had the original order but accidently skipped over the middle section. Subsequently the same scribe or another scribe added the word “פטור.”

47. All the textual witnesses in B. Ḥullin 136a read like the textual witnesses in B. Menaḥot 44a, except for MS Vatican 121, which reads: “a borrowed garment for the first thirty days is exempt from tzitzit.”

48. This would also explain nicely the reversal of the order in some of the manuscripts as mentioned above (nn. 10 and 45). The original version of the story most likely opened with the authentic statement of Rav Yehudah regarding tzitzit from B. Menaḥot 44a and was followed by the statement about tefillin. Another possible explanation could be that the differing order reflects two ways that tzitzit and tefillin tend to be listed in rabbinic literature; e.g., in the Yerushalmi some lists have tzitzit before tefillin (Y. Peah 1:1 [15b]; see also Vayikra Rabba, Aḥarei Mot, par. 22, to Leviticus 17:3 [ed. Margaliot, 2:296] and others have tefillin before tzitzit (Y. Peah 1:1 [15d] = Y. Kiddushin 1:7 [61b]). In B. Kiddushin 33b–34a the textual witnesses are split on this very point; the printed editions have tzitzit before tefillin while MS Oxford 367 has tefillin before tzitzit (in MS Vatican 111 the word “tzitzit” was added in a second hand in the margin, and in MS Munich 95 tzitzit are not on the list at all).

49. Y. Bava Batra 5:9 (15a) has an almost exact parallel, which will be discussed below.

50. B. Kiddushin 39b in a Baraita’ attributed to the Tanna Rabbi Ya‘akov, addresses two commandments that promise longevity upon their fulfillment: honoring parents and sending forth the mother bird. However, there the point of the homily is not that the earthly beit din has no jurisdiction, but that these two commandments both refer to a portion in the World to Come (compare parallel source in T. Ḥullin 10:16, ed. Zuckermandel, 512).

51. Mesekhta de-ba-ḥodesh, piska 8, ed. Rabin-Horowitz, 232.

52. On the term “מכאן אמרו” in the Mekhilta de-Rabbi Ishmael, see Epstein, J. N., Mavo la'nusaḥ hamishnah, (Jerusalem: Magnes Press, 2000, reprint), 736–38Google Scholar; Melamed, E. Z., Pirkei mavo la'sifrut hatalmudit, (Jerusalem, Galor Press, 1973), 249–53Google Scholar. Kahana, Menaḥem, The Literature of the Sages, part 2, ed. Safrai, Shmuel, Safrai, Ze'ev, Schwartz, Joshua, Tomson, Peter (The Netherlands: Royal Van Gorcum and Fortress Press, 2006), 56Google Scholar, adopts Epstein's thesis (introduction, 733), writing: “In MekRY and SifNum (Yishmaelian) on the other hand, מיכן אמרו, ‘Hence they said,’ is not so common, and when the Mishna is cited, this is not done in its actual language but rather by way of paraphrase and abbreviation. Nor do these works contain many quotations of baraitot and of Tosefta passages introduced with ‘Hence they said.’”

53. There are two minor differences. First, the version in our story reads “every positive commandment” instead of the Mekhilta's “every commandment” and the version in our story adds “earthly” (של מטה).

54. This point is identical with the one made by Rami in our sugya, unlike the similar tradition of Rabbi Ya‘akov in B. Kiddushin 39b, which does not expressly rule out trial in an earthly court (see n. 48).

55. See Deuteronomy 25:15, where the commandment is connected with longevity: “You must have completely honest weights and completely honest measures, if you are to endure long on the soil that the Lord your God is giving you.”

56. The storyteller is surely aware of two possible understandings of “sharpness;” one positive, in the sense of brilliance, and one negative, in the sense of one who uses forced arguments. It could be that Rav Ḥisda is being sarcastic and means to say that all Rami has done is to use forced arguments. See immediately below the reference to B. Bava Meẓia’ 38b. As we mentioned above (see n. 17), the sages of Meḥoza were also described as being “sharp” in B. Berakhot 59b due to their drinking the water of the Tigris River.

57. Here the textual witnesses read “חורפאי” or “חורפיי.” Some translations understand this to mean “my sharpness/brilliance.” However, in my opinion, more likely we have a plural noun form of “חורפא.”