Pesiqta Rabbati: A Synoptic Edition of Pesiqta Rabbati Based Upon All Extant Manuscripts and the Editio Princeps

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Published here for the first time is volume two of the complete manuscript material of Pesiqta Rabbati, a major rabbinic work from 5th or 6th century Palestine. Pasiqta Rabbati is a religious text that expresses rabbinic, apocalyptic, messianic, gnostic, and mystical traditions. Based upon the annual cycle of biblical passages for the Jewish Holy Days and special sabbaths, the text demonstrates the artful form of the rabbinic homily and the midrash method of scriptural exegesis. All extant Hebrew manuscripts (located in Budapest, Cambridge, New York, Parma, Philadelphia, Rome and Vienna) as well as the 17th century editio princeps are presented here in a synoptic edition, allowing the reader to view the texts in adjacent columns without emendation. The English introduction summarizes the academic research in respect to Pesiqta Rabbati.

Reviews

Prof. Ulmer's edition of the Pesiqta Rabbati, one of the most important and beautiful witnesses to the ancient Jewish art of Bible interpretation, breaks new ground in making available to the public all key textual recessions at a glance and in full. Prof. Ulmer brings to this famous text her long-standing scholarship on Midrash, as well as her literary sensibility and philological meticulousness. The edition has been a model of clarity and usability since it first appeared. -- Professor Alexander Samely, University of Manchester, UK
Summarizes the research and explains the significance to religious studies and related fields of having access to an updated synoptic editionthe first since the 19th century: as a work of literature, for its halakhic (legal) material, and to elucidate the origins of distinct Jewish and Christian groups. * Reference and Research Book News, February 1998 *
In her extensive introduction, Prof. Ulmer discusses the work's dating and textual transmission, since it grew by accretion, other studies and suggested research, the text-witnesses, printed editions, modern scholarship, extant translations, methodology utilized in preparing her own edition, and the rationale for presenting it synoptically, namely the absence of a reliable base text. -- Professor Louis H. Feldman, Yeshiva University, New York, Old Testament Abstracts 21 (1998)

Author Bio

Rivka Ulmer is the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Chair in Judaic Studies at Bucknell University.