Review of Cohn, The Memory of the Temple and the Making of the Rabbis

NEW REVIEW SERIES IN TABLET MAGAZINE: Rabbi Wolpe’s Picks: Unraveling a Mishnah Mystery: Introducing Rabbi David Wolpe’s new series on Jewish scholarship.

Rabbi David Wolpe is the rabbi of Sinai Temple in Los Angeles and the author, most recently, of Why Faith Matters. In a new Scroll series, Wolpe will examine a work of Jewish scholarship, either contemporary or classic, which has relevance for modern Jewish life.

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The Memory of the Temple and the Making of the Rabbis, published in October 2012, contains within its title author Naftali S. Cohn’s thesis. Cohn writes that the rabbis created the Temple’s memory in a way that would serve their own authority. They forged links with the ancient court and rabbinic tradition not because it was exactly as the Temple had been, but because it was as they needed the Temple to be in order to claim continuity with the past and, therefore, sway over the present.

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Sounds about right to me.

UPDATE: Bad link now fixed! Sorry about that.