Responses to Jew-Hatred

Midrash is a special kind of Jewish biblical literature. What it tells of is not necessarily in the Bible, but is derived from the Bible or is based on the Bible—in a way, a commentary on the Bible. It is post-biblical, although there are hints of midrashic technique already in the Bible itself, as we shall soon see.

The Midrash is a huge corpus of literary creativity produced by the rabbis of Eretz Yisrael, the Land of Israel. It is held together by Scripture, to which the rabbinic mind always returned, seeking old answers to new questions raised by changing times and circumstances.

As a way of introducing Midrash and midrashic method, we will examine it briefly in one small respect—the way it dealt with and understood Jew-hatred, what we would today call anti-Semitism.

Midrashic literature, or that part of it that has been preserved in numerous collections,¹ was composed from the Hellenistic period, beginning in the late fourth century B.C.E.,^a to the Moslem conquest of Eretz Yisrael a thousand years later, in the seventh century C.E. This millennium witnessed all possible varieties and forms of Jew-hatred, many of which are reflected in the midrashic texts.