Significance of the Talmudic Study and the Promotion of the Critical Spirit in Judaism(<Special Issue>Religious Education and Transmission)

Abstract

This article examines the significance of the religious culture of Jewish law in which a critical attitude against "idolatry" was highly evaluated. So-called Rabbinic Judaism, which was shaped by the two devastating wars of Jews in Palestine with the Roman Empire in the first and second centuries, put the divine teachings as its basis and endeavored to establish the rule of divine law. The sages chose the liberty of faith in divine revelation in place of political liberty and independence based upon Messianic expectations. They compiled the oral teaching of divine revelation called the Mishnah in about 200CE, and then compiled the Babylonian Talmud around 500CE, which is renowned as the basis of the way of Jewish life throughout Jewish communities in the Diaspora in the Middle Ages and to the modern era. They regarded themselves as the legitimate heir of the Biblical prophetic tradition and promoted a distinctive way of Torah studies. Based upon the prophetic tradition of the struggle against idolatrous worship, they challenged the struggle against inner idols which were thought to prevent the true understanding of divine teaching; "idolatry" in this context includes uncritical subjection to social authority, attachment to conventional prejudices, and other intellectual laziness.