Synagogal Judaism
[3] Between Rabbinic Judaism and Christianity, there existed another entity, which undoubtedly had more legitimacy due to its antiquity and the fact that it was based more on ethnicity than belief.
This entity can be called Synagogal Judaism, which was caught between the identities of the Rabbinic and Christian movements that were forming between the 2nd and 4th centuries.
The Dura-Europos synagogue, dating back to the mid-3rd century CE, revealed a significant collection of figurative paintings depicting scenes from the narratives of the Tanakh.
The excavation of ruins from other ancient synagogues in the following decades yielded comparable iconography that contradicted the prohibitions imposed by contemporary rabbinic academies regarding the creation of images.
[2] Erwin Ramsdell Goodenough was the first to propose the hypothesis that there existed in antiquity a form of Judaism that had fallen into oblivion, influenced particularly by Greek culture.
One, through archaeology, and the other, through texts, attested to the existence of an ancient mystical tradition unknown in the history of Judaism until the emergence of Kabbalah in the 12th century.
This viewpoint is contested by Moshe Idel and Charles Mopsik, who believe that "Scholem underestimated the specifically Jewish element in the formation of Kabbalah and exaggerated the influence of Gnosticism.
[citation needed] "This Judaism", noted José Costa, "is communal, as it is founded on a common source for all its components: the broad biblical tradition.
Consisting of various communities, their mission was to establish a sanctuary and conduct worship, as well as to organize solidarity among their members through charitable practices in particular.
Both the Jews in Palestine and those in the Diaspora "slowly turned towards the rabbinic movement and its alternative of a Judaism without a sanctuary or priesthood, in other words, without cultic worship", as observed by Mimouni.
[10] However, the responsibility for this re-Judaization did not lie with the rabbis, but rather with the decline of paganism in the Roman Empire, associated with the conversion of Emperor Constantine to Christianity.
[10] Rabbinic Judaism, which generally held a hostile stance toward the rites practiced in the synagogues, changed its position by incorporating synagogal culture within itself in order to adapt to the convergence of these two streams around the 4th and 5th centuries, according to Schwartz.
[8] According to Seth Schwartz, Synagogal Jews were not significantly different from pagans (a view that has been substantially critiqued but is still current in some scholarly circles).
They did not hesitate to include images of these gods in their synagogues, as seen in Dura-Europos, where effigies of Cybele, Persephone, Helios, and others adorned the ceiling of the prayer hall.
[12] The scarcity of the term "Rabbi" in archaeological inscriptions found in the Diaspora and Palestine suggests that the rabbinic movement had limited presence and influence in synagogues (excluding Babylonia, where changes occurred earlier).
Fergus Millar was drawn to a similar conclusion when studying the inscriptions in Palestine; asking himself about the possibility of a clear distinction between Rabbinic and Synagogal Judaism.
[4][16] The figure of Elijah holds a significant place in apocalyptic literature that emerged in the 3rd century BCE in the Jewish schools of the ancient East.
The work of Philo of Alexandria, in particular, absorbed influences from Platonism, Pythagoreanism, Dionysianism, Orphism, and Persian traditions, forming a mystical repository that Goodenough found reflected in the decorations of ancient synagogues.
[21] Justin Martyr, one of the early Church Fathers, considered this understanding of the divine as one of the foundations of Christian thought, while the rabbis regarded it as heresy, notes Boyarin.
"[21] According to Steve Bélanger, most of the first Christian-Jewish polemical literature, for example, the Dialogue with Trypho, is to be considered as a result of Synagogal/Sacerdotal Judaism conflicts with Christianity, and not a representation of the Rabbinic movement.
"[22] The necessity to integrate, at least partially, the elements of synagogal mysticism into rabbinic literature to satisfy a society for whom the synagogue remained an essential place, imposed on the rabbis to break away from heresiology.
From the perspective of the rabbis, Christianity is a religion, while Judaism is not, at least until the attempt of Maimonides and especially until the time of Modernity, when the notion of 'Jewish faith' emerged.
[2] Schwartz challenged this viewpoint by denying Philo such a significant role in the creation of synagogal art, but without questioning the overall project assigned to him by Goodenough.
[2] The Judeans who appreciated this representation, disregarding the prohibitions set by the rabbis, were not seeking to assimilate into Greek culture but rather to "Judaize Hellenism," according to Goodenough.
Neusner suggests that by the third century, the convergence was already advanced enough to allow for the emergence of figurative art shared by both tendencies or at least tolerated by the rabbinic trend.
[citation needed] Gershom Scholem was convinced that the Hekhalot literature belonged to the realm of rabbinic mysticism because its content referred to Talmudic sources, primarily aggadic (non-legal) materials.
"[28] Produced over a long period of time, Targumic literature emerged from the liturgical need to translate the Hebrew Bible into Aramaic.
[16] Appearing at an uncertain date between the first and eighth centuries, the Sefer Yetzirah is still connected to the Hekhalot literature in its poetic and visionary form, but it distinguishes itself by its primarily cosmological and speculative nature.
[16] It also describes the ten dimensions of the universe in which God has spread: the high, the low, the south, the north, the east, the west, the beginning, the end, the good, and the evil.
This category encompasses a collection of mystical texts that were rejected by both the Christian and Rabbinic canons but still enjoyed prestige, leading to their unofficial preservation by members of either movement.
