How did the Mishnah become the canonical rabbinic work of such influence? To what degree was it, in fact, accepted as canonical, and to what degree did the supplementary and even contrary teachings of earlier rabbis gain traction in the burgeoning rabbinic communities of the Galilee and Babylonia? Before answering these questions, we focus on methodological problems that make confident answers difficult. We begin with the fact that rabbinic “Torah” was, at least to a significant extent, oral, and ask how this reality impacts the nature of the tradition we preserve. We then study the words of the rabbis of the Mishnah’s successor generations, known as Amoraim, and seek to determine how their attentions shaped the text and status of the Mishnah and other earlier rabbinic teachings. In what ways do Amoraim, in their commentaries on earlier teachings, pay respect to the authority of those teachings, and in what ways do they forge their own, new directions? From the laws and commentaries of the Amoraim emerged a new style of rabbinic study that would give birth to two Talmuds and thus shape Jewish culture for generations to come. In this chapter, we learn something about its beginnings.

The first major rabbinic composition – the Mishnah, which would ultimately form the foundation and shank of both of the Talmudim – emerged in an age of great upheaval for Jews. Losing two wars with the Romans, seeing their magnificent Temple in Jerusalem rendered rubble, Jews cannot long have held onto the hope that the world they had known would quickly be rebuilt. Had God abandoned them? – many must have wondered. If not, then how, in the absence of the Temple, could their relationship with God be maintained? Were its functions to be replaced? How were other Jewish institutions, practices, and holy days, many of which were deeply tied to the Temple, to be shaped for the new world? Against this background, and in response to the conditions just described, a new religious fellowship – the rabbi – began to forge new approaches and teachings, going a long way toward redefining Judaism for the post-Temple era. In this chapter, we will consider the early history of Jews under Roman rule in Palestine, which served as the stage for the development of the rabbis and their writings.