Word: talmudic
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...Jews. His concern is a basic, agonizing one for any believer: How do you preserve faith in the Bible in a world that seems increasingly faithless? For Protestants it is an especially poignant question. Besides the Scriptures, Roman Catholics have the authority of tradition, Jews the guidance of the Talmud. But Protestantism bases its faith on the Bible alone. Its truth is essential; if the Bible falls, faith topples...
...world in itself-the Chabad Lubavitch Hasidim, who practice their mystical, joyous brand of Jewish Orthodoxy in a close-knit community in Brooklyn. The bearded, black-frocked Lubavitchers are followed on their way through their daily life-pausing to pray in a delicatessen, arguing fine points of the Talmud in a yeshiva, gathering for a discourse from their revered leader, Rebbe Menachem Schneerson, in the synagogue. But there are also splendid celebrations. A bris-the ceremony of circumcision-is majestic and moving. And a rollicking, dancing wedding party, the beards flying as the festive crowd reels to Hasidic tunes...
...Syrian village of Maloula, most of whose 1,000 inhabitants are Christian. The roots of their everyday speech go back at least to the 10th century B.C.; Aramaic was the language of parts of the Old Testament books of Daniel and Ezra, much of the Jerusalem Talmud and of the common people at the time of Christ, when Hebrew was used principally by the upper classes. Maloula, isolated in the hills, held out for centuries against both the Moslem religion and the Arabic tongue. The isolation has now been broken by a nearby superhighway, but the village still evokes...
Some of Kotlowitz's set pieces are fine. Great-Great-Grandfather Eliezar, 104 years old, flatulent, pedantic, almost abstractly randy, argues minutiae of the Talmud with his 75-year-old son and dies one Friday night when he falls asleep and sets fire to himself. Kotlowitz's best creations are the Pilchik sisters, a pair of earthy, lively, possibly stupid originals from Odessa who try to convert Mendel to socialism. They disappear into the larger historical drama of the October Revolution with an over-the-shoulder verdict that Mendel "is not a serious...
...rules defining admissible trial evidence have been built piecemeal over the years until they now resemble a cross between the Talmud and the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Each rule was usually added for a specific reason, but they vary from state to state, from one of the 93 federal districts to another, even, according to the judge's discretion, from courtroom to courtroom. All too often, the complexity actually impedes a court's efforts to dispense justice. Last week, exercising its administrative authority over the federal judicial system, the Supreme Court issued a 45-page set of uniform rules...