Jots & Tittles

Talmud Translated

The Schottenstein Edition of the Babylonian Talmud, a project 15 years, 80 experts and 20 million dollars in the making, is nearing its completion. A gala event celebrating the 73-volume English translation was held in New York on March 15, and a copy was donated to the Library of Congress in February.

The Schottenstein edition, named for the late benefactor Jerome Schottenstein, is the first complete English translation of the Talmud since 1952. However, the publishers, Artscroll/Mesorah Publications in Brooklyn, claim in the front of each volume, or tractate, that the Talmud cannot be translated. In other words, their edition is not meant as a substitute for the original, but as a study aid. It presents the English text side-by-side with the original Hebrew and Aramaic text.

The Talmud is the most important text of Jewish “Oral Law,” which, according to tradition, was revealed at Sinai simultaneously with the “Written Law” (the Pentateuch) but preserved exclusively in oral form until the second century A.D., when the Mishnah was compiled. The Mishnah deals with nearly every imaginable aspect of Jewish civil and ritual law. The Talmud is a sixth-century commentary on the Mishnah and is also the largest compendium of rabbinic Bible exegesis.

Unearthing Early Edom