Jewish Literature in New Testament Times

The Palestinian Talmud

What is the Palestinian Talmud?

The Palestinian Talmud. Another name, Talmudh Yerushalmi ("Jerusalem Talmud"), is also old, but not accurate. The Palestinian Talmud gives the discussions of the Palestinian Amoraim, teaching from the 3rd century AD until the beginning of the 5th, especially in the schools or academies of Tiberias, Caesarea and Sepphoris. The editions and the Leyden manuscript (in the other manuscripts there are but few treatises) contain only the four cedharim i-iv and a part of Niddah. We do not know whether the other treatises had at any time a Palestinian Gemara. "The Mishna on which the Palestinian Talmud rests" is said to be found in the manuscript Add. 470,1 of the University Library, Cambridge, England (ed W.H. Lowe, 1883). The treatises `Edhuyoth and 'Abhoth have no Gemara in the Palestinian Talmud or in the Babylonian.

Some of the most famous Palestinian Amoraim may be mentioned here:

1st generation: Chanina bar Chama, Jannai, Jonathan, Osha'ya, the Haggadist Joshua ben Leviticus;

2nd generation: Jochnnan bar Nappacha, Simeon ben Lackish;

3rd generation: Samuel bar Nachman, Levi, Eliezer ben Pedath, Abbahu, Ze`ira (i);

4th generation: Jeremiah, Acha', Abin (i), Judah, Huna;

5th generation: Jonah, Phinehas, Berechiah, Jose bar Abin, Mani (ii), Tanhuma'.

Also see The Talmud