Book Review: Learning to Read Midrash

The Biblical text is sparse. Read literally, straight through, you'd get the impression that P.G. Wodehouse wouldn't do well among the nomads. Even the strictly narrative portions leave out most of the story, and leave room for all sorts of questions. The Rabbis thought so, too. Enter the Midrash. The Midrash — stories recorded in the Talmud and in collections — are the rabbinic attempt to fill in the gaps.

Some of these stories are exceedingly well-known; better-known, in fact, than parts of Tanach itself. Nechama Leibowitz tells of asking a class to turn to the part of Bereishit where Abraham smashes the idols. The class flips back and forth in frustration, unable to find the text. It's a Midrash, of course.

Remember that Star Trek:TNG where the crew encounters a culture that communicated entirely in metaphor? That's kind of how Midrash works, rendering proper reading of them no simple task. They're not only metaphorical, they're poetic and literary, often treating the Biblical figures as literary as much as historical. They draw on diverse source texts, the original context of which is often key to getting it right.

Inasmuch as the Midrashic interpretation is the dispositive one for traditional Judaism, understanding these texts is fundamental to understanding all successive rabbinic Biblical exposition. Simi Peters, of Nishmat in Jerusalem, has stepped into the breach with Learning to Read Midrash. She provides a solid methodology to follow, but not a recipe. She takes you step-by-step, laying out the interpretive process.

Beginning with simple mashal/nimshal forms - basically extended metaphors - Peters builds up to complex, extended midrashim, composed by many authors, often using different styles and format. What if part of the mashal (the comparison) are missing or unclear? For multi-part midrashim which offer competing interpretations, what does the ordering tell us?

From there, Peters ventures into narrative expansion. These are the trickiest, their connection with the text can be the most difficult to tease out. They also contain the most fantastic stories in rabbinic literature. The proper treatment of these stories has been the source of great controversy, but I find myself siding with the relentlessly logical approach of Maimonides.

Article Author: Joshua Sharf

Joshua Sharf blogs here primarily as a book reviewer. He has his own site at jsharf.com, and is a founding member of the Rocky Mountain Alliance of Blogs. He is also a contributing editor at Newsbusters. Joshua blogs from Denver, CO.

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