Ritual and Morality
The Ritual Purity System and its Place in Judaism

Clear explanation of non-dietary ritual purity laws of the Hebrew Bible; intelligible to non-specialist readers.

Hyam Maccoby (Author)

9780521495400, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 15 July 1999

246 pages
22.4 x 14.6 x 2 cm, 0.4 kg

Review of the hardback: 'This concise, tightly-argued volume … makes important contributions to contemporary discussions of the motivations and significance of both the biblical and the rabbinic ritual purity systems.' Christine Hayes, The Jewish Quarterly Review

The book describes in detail the ritual purity system of the Hebrew Bible, and its development into the system of the rabbis. Certain human conditions require purification before contact is made with holy foods or areas. Recent scholarly theories (Milgrom, Neusner, Douglas) are discussed, and new theories are proposed for the origin of the Red Cow and Scapegoat rites. It is argued that the impurities concerned all derive from the human cycle of generation, birth and death, from which the Sanctuary is to be guarded; not because it needs protection from demonic powers (as in other ancient purity systems), but because of the reverence due to the divine presence. While the priestly code of holiness displays traces of earlier conceptions, its ritual has lost urgent salvific force, and has become a protocol for the Temple and a dedicatory code for a priestly people; the sources distinguish it from universal morality.

Preface
1. The sources of impurity: the human corpse
2. The corpse in the tent: an excursus
3. The sources of impurity: menstruation
4. The sources of impurity: childbirth, the Zab and Zabah
5. Normal emissions
6. Animals and purity
7. Impurity and sacrifices
8. The Red Cow: part one
9. The Red Cow: part two
10. Leprosy
11. The purification of the leper
12. Corpse and leper: an excursus
13. Ritual purity in the New Testament
14. Milgrom on purity in the Bible
15. From demons to ethics
16. Ritual purity and morality
Appendices.

Subject Areas: Judaism [HRJ]