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Sympotic Rabbis, Truth, and the Glorious Uncertainty of Law
Wednesday, February 26, 2025 @ 12:30 pm - 2:00 pm
The Talmud is famous for its labyrinthine debates and dialectical subversions. By situating the Talmud in the broad tradition of the late antique symposium, we gain insights into the rabbis’ “epistemological agon” and their skeptical approach to the notion of a single legal truth. This lecture argues that the Talmud’s skepticism is grounded in a positive embrace of uncertainty as the antidote to both moral absolutism and moral nihilism, with implications for contemporary approaches to law and legal reasoning.
Christine Hayes, Sterling Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies, Yale University
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