My essay in honor of the memory of my friend Alan Segal has been published

"Antiquity's Children: History and Theology in Three Surveys" in "Crossing Boundaries in Early Judaism and Christianity: Essays in Honor of Alan F. Segal" by Tzvee Zahavy

Through his publications on ancient Judaism and early Christianity Alan Segal has contributed immensely to clarifying ambiguities, unraveling complexities and recalling half-forgotten adversaries. His writing shows the way to cross many boundaries of thought and methodology. This characteristic of his research reflects the openness and ingenuousness of Alan himself, a direct and honest scholar and a treasured friend.

I here analyze a few aspects of one of Segal’s early books, Rebecca’s Children: Judaism and Christianity in the Roman World.  The book surveys how Rabbinic Judaism and Early Christianity took shape primarily during the formative age of Late Antiquity. Segal treats the Hellenistic roots of these religions, the social world of first century Israel, Jesus who is called a Jewish Revolutionary and Paul who is described as a Convert and Apostle. Segal moves on in the book to summarize the origins of rabbinic Judaism and discusses how the twin offspring of ancient Israel, the rabbinic and Christian communities went separate ways, as the matriarch Rebecca’s twin children, Jacob and Esau parted ways in the biblical account in Genesis. In comparing the theologies of these twins, Segal insists we, “… must attend to the real social matrix in which the religious thought existed.”

I compare here Segal’s Rebecca’s Children with two comparable books and I ask a few perennial and fundamental questions about religious scholars who write about their own religions. The two other introductory surveys of the Second Temple and Early Rabbinic Judaism by Jewish scholars are Shaye J.D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, and Lawrence H. Schiffman, From Text to Tradition: A History of Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism.

Thoughts on the publication of Alan F. Segal, "Sinning in the Hebrew Bible"

In an act of intentional irony we read in synagogue this morning during the reading of the Torah part of Alan Segal's book "Sinning in the Hebrew Bible: How The Worst Stories Speak for Its Truth".

We find Alan's book to be filled with erudition and common sense. That is why we admired Segal's past works and why we valued him as a friend. Segal believed in things that were mainly scholarly and he articulated them with clarity and enthusiasm.

The publisher's blurb for this book summarizes the many essences of the study:

Stories of rape, murder, adultery, and conquest raise crucial issues in the Hebrew Bible, and their interpretation helps societies form their religious and moral beliefs. From the sacrifice of Isaac to the adultery of David, narratives of sin engender vivid analysis and debate, powering the myths that form the basis of the religious covenant, or the relationship between a people and their God.

Rereading these stories in their different forms and varying contexts, Alan F. Segal demonstrates the significance of sinning throughout history and today. Drawing on literary and historical theory, as well as research in the social sciences, he explores the motivation for creating sin stories, their prevalence in the Hebrew Bible, and their possible meaning to Israelite readers and listeners. After introducing the basics of his approach and outlining several hermeneutical concepts, Segal conducts seven linked studies of specific narratives, using character and text to clarify problematic terms such as "myth," "typology," and "orality." Following the reappearance and reinterpretation of these narratives in later compositions, he proves their lasting power in the mythology of Israel and the encapsulation of universal, perennially relevant themes. Segal ultimately positions the Hebrew Bible as a foundational moral text and a history book, offering uncommon insights into the dating of biblical events and the intentions of biblical authors.

We has no idea that we would find it emotional to read a book by a dear friend who passed away in 2011. But we did feel the void of his loss even more while listening to the voice of his search for meaning and history in the texts of the Bible.

Alan was a religious man and a serious academic. Both of those traits of character and personality come through with ringing clarity in the pages of the superlative book.

We wrote this  appreciation of our friend Alan for the Jewish Standard in February 2011:

When my dear friend Alan F. Segal died at age 65 on Sunday, February 13, this earthly world lost a diligent, productive scholar of religions and a sparkling lecturer and teacher. And more than that, a great force of positive energy departed from our midst.

I knew Alan for over thirty years. During that time he served as a professor of religion at Barnard College in New York City and lived in nearby Ho-Ho-Kus. We met at first in professional circumstances as young professors of religion at conferences at Brown University and at the annual meetings of the Society of Biblical Literature and American Academy of Religion. Both of us were enthusiastically discovering new facts and making original insights in areas of ancient religions. I concentrated more on explicating problems within the Talmud and Jewish liturgy.

Alan’s interests and energies ranged more broadly. He wrote at first about various topics such as mysticism and sectarianism in ancient Judaism that were published in his books "Two Powers in Heaven" and "The Other Judaisms of Late Antiquity." He branched out in a major work, "Rebecca's Children: Judaism and Christianity in the Roman World," to explain how Judaism and Christianity took shape as sibling religions in late antiquity. And next he tackled the images of the apostle Paul, the founder of Christianity in "Paul the Convert: The Apostasy and Apostolate of Saul of Tarsus." Some scholars have called that publication the most important recent book on the subject of Paul.

Subsequently, Alan spent a decade investigating death and the afterlife in the world’s religions and published the results in "Life After Death: The Afterlife in Western Religions." His final book, which turns to subjects of ancient Israel, is complete and at the press awaiting publication. It surely will be influential in its own right. All of his books are widely cited in the scholarly literature.

Years ago, we discovered that we also shared a passion for new technologies. We continually probed how the newest software and hardware inventions could help us investigate some of the oldest and most puzzling problems of how humankind had searched in the past for God. At our professional conferences we talked together in equal measures about the theories and texts of scholars and about the releases and versions of advanced word processors and computers.

Alan F. Segal Obituaries

We've responded to requests for comment on the death of Alan Segal from the local Bergen County paper and the Columbia student paper because it is another way to eulogize a great man. Here is the local story as reprinted in another paper.

The Republic - Alan F. Segal, leading religious scholar, dies at 65

HACKENSACK, N.J. — Alan F. Segal of Ho-Ho-Kus, N.J., a leading religious scholar whose views on the origins of Judaism and Christianity and on the afterlife were much sought after, died Sunday. He was 65.

Alan Segal's Review of "Archaeology, Stamps and Coins of the State of Israel" by Yitzhak Zahavy

Alan Segal's expansive and thoughtful review of my son's book in the current issue of the The Review of Rabbinic Judaism appeared on the Brill site yesterday. I saw it linked there after returning from Alan's funeral.

A REVIEW OF YITZHAK ZAHAVY, ARCHAEOLOGY, STAMPS, AND COINS OF THE STATE OF ISRAEL

The Review of Rabbinic Judaism
ISSN: 1568-4857, Online ISSN: 1570-0704
DOI: 10.1163/157007010X536339
Volume 13, Issue 2, pages 262-274

Update: Access to the full review here.

Professor Alan Segal wrote about the Afterlife, Heaven and Hell

Alan Segal taught religion at Barnard College. We returned just now from his funeral. It is so sad to lose such a brilliant scholar and wonderful friend. We are re-posting our brief notice of his wonderful book.

For ten years Alan worked on this book Life After Death (880 pages, Doubleday, 2004) subtitled, A History of the Afterlife in Western Religion.

This brilliant book is chock full of quality facts and insights and rightfully takes it place among those sweeping, comprehensive and analytical interdisciplinary works on great ideas in western culture.

This is a work by an accomplished scholar for others who seek humanistic understanding. Segal does not advocate for the existence of a realm called heaven or hell. He treats religious ideas in general as mirrors of cultural creativity. Each society writes its own imaginary, fictional account of what the afterlife looks like in accord with its own particular social and historical reality.

Those readers who cherish books that deal with sweeping histories of ideas will find much excitement and nuance here. If you liked the intellectual journey in The Great Chain of Being by Arthur O. Lovejoy or The Structure of Scientific Revolutions by Thomas S. Kuhn, you will find much more to like here.

Professor Alan F. Segal has passed away

My friend and colleague Alan F. Segal passed away yesterday, Sunday Feb. 13. I knew Alan for over thirty years and treasured his friendship and collegiality. He was a great intuitive scholar and thinker whose mind sailed across centuries and disciplines. He made great contributions to his fields of study in numerous books, articles, reviews and lectures.

Alan also made many friends who will miss him dearly. On December 12, 2010 Barnard College held an all day colloquium in his honor on the occasion of his retirement. It was a proud day for Alan but also a sad day for his friends and colleagues who knew that he was ill.

I had the honor of driving a few miles up the road to Ho-ho-kus to bring him a bagel and talk with him on numerous occasions on Mondays over the past year. He finished writing a new book and continued to think and talk seriously about ideas and about political matters.

At the dinner in his honor in December I offered a toast to Alan that I formulated from the six archetypes of the perfect synagogue out of my most recent writing.

And now I repeat the conclusion of those words as a memory for my friend who in his most sincere and holy way was the ideal davener and a great Jew.

To Alan זכר צדיק לברכה

a scholar of proper priestly demeanor,
a writer with a mystical imagination,
a researcher with immense scribal erudition,
a lecturer with a great performer’s talents,
a defender of his people with a celebrity’s prominence,
and a true friend with meditative graces and compassion.

Three Postmodern Jewish historians: Alan F. Segal, Shaye J.D. Cohen and Lawrence H. Schiffman

Some time ago I reviewed three new and solid works of Jewish historians. I argued that each wrote out of his own experience in life.

That's simple postmodern analysis. My colleagues approved.

Here is the essay called "Three Noble Surveys: A Post-Modern Reading of Shaye J.D. Cohen, From the Maccabees to the Mishnah, Lawrence H. Schiffman, From Text to Tradition: A History of Second Temple and Rabbinic Judaism, Alan F. Segal, Rebecca's Children."

The first points:

Books like these first, may make a contribution to research in a discipline if they are more than mere summaries and show some innovative conceptualization. Second, they may have value for teachers if they serve as particularly complete, creative and accurate statements of the data and scholarship that they represent. Third, they may serve theological purposes if they provide some justification of a contemporary form of Judaism [or Christianity] in a prior formative age, or support some implicit claim of greater authenticity for a current world view or way of life.

Let us expand on this last point. An Orthodox Jewish analysis will search for “Torah-true” ideals, emphasize ritual [e.g., prayer], focus on a textual canon, on elite rabbinic leadership, highlight internal sectarian debate and differentiation, downplay interfaith relations, ignore populist involvements in religious decision, deny the prominence of changes and adaptations based on social and historical circumstance, consider acculturation an evil, and emphasize particularism.

A Conservative Jewish investigation will emphasize the analysis of family structures, democratic ideals, evolutionary change, institutional development [e.g., synagogues], communal leadership patterns, the interface of scholarship and rabbinic learning, rites of passage as opposed to other rituals, and treat acculturation as a struggle fraught with contradiction and ambivalence.

A Reform Jewish approach will seek to differentiate Jews from Christians and highlight the opportunities for interfaith understanding and cooperation. It will emphasize theology in a Protestant model, acculturation as a positive force and universalism.

Just how much do these three introductory surveys of the Second Temple and Early Rabbinic Judaism by three well-known Jewish scholars reflect their respective religious affiliations?

More of the essay...

Barnard Professor Speaks out against shabby anti-Israel scholarship

It takes guts these days for a professor to go on the record about anything, certainly about anything controversial.

My colleague Alan Segal has stood up for what he knows to be true and has been cited in the NY Times.

The case is a bitter contest over tenure at Barnard for a pseudo-scholar who obviously hates Israel. Here is what the Times reports that Segal said,

Dr. Abu El-Haj has some opponents at her own college. “There is every reason in the world to want her to have tenure, and only one reason against it — her work,” said Alan F. Segal, a professor of religion and Jewish studies at Barnard. “I believe it is not good enough.”

He said he was particularly troubled by her suggestion that ancient Israelites had not inhabited the land where Israel now stands, and he said that she had either misunderstood or ignored evidence to the contrary. “She completely misunderstands what the biblical tradition is saying,” he added. “She is not even close. She is so bizarrely off.”

He also said that a Barnard official, whom he declined to name, had asked him to suggest people who were not Jewish to comment on Dr. Abu El-Haj’s work for the tenure review, and that he had refused.

Elizabeth Gildersleeve, a Barnard spokeswoman, said that a high official of the college had met with Professor Segal on the tenure case and asked him to submit names for letters of reference. But Ms. Gildersleeve said that “the charge that restrictions were put on that request is absolutely untrue.”

Bravo to you, brave Alan, for speaking truth to tenure. You have been I fear too kind. And P.S. I have learned that a person who uses the denial, "absolutely untrue," is most often themselves in fact the one who is lying.