This from Sigrid Peterson on the PSCO list, in response to an announcement of lecture by Professor Martha Himmelfarb last week (22 April) at the University of Pennsylvania, to which I wish I could have gone. This is the abstract:
“Revelation after the Rabbis: Sefer Zerubbabel and Sefer Eliyyahu”
Abstract: /Sefer Zerubbabel /and /Sefer Eliyyahu/, often described as medieval Hebrew apocalypses, were composed in the first part of the seventh century. They thus faced the challenge of offering their revelations to a world that was not only post-biblical but also post-talmudic. I will discuss the implications of this situation for the content of their revelations and the quite different ways they present them, suggesting that /Sefer Eliyyahu /shows a much greater affinity for rabbinic values and rabbinic literary style than /Sefer Zerubbabel /and considering the implications of /Sefer Zerubbabel/’s distance from rabbinic culture.
Bibliography - Please read the texts if possible. Probably the most convenient place to get the translations of the two works is John Reeves, /Trajectories in Near Eastern Apocalyptic: A Postrabbinic Jewish Apocalypse Reader /(2005). I translated /Sefer Zerubbabel /in /Rabbinic Fantasies/, ed. David Stern and Mark Jay Mirsky (1990). The originals of both works await real editions. The most convenient source for the Hebrew of both works is probably Yehudah Even-Shmuel, /Midreshei Ge'ulah/, but be warned that these are "improved" version. Reeves refers you to other editions of the two works.