The Rabbis’ King-Parables: Midrash From the Third-Century Roman Empire, shows the ancient Rabbis at work in different ways and with different purposes, but always with the same tools, parables of kings. As it attends in detail to the king-parables’ form, structure, functions, settings and characters, it emphasizes the Rabbis’ distinctive ideas about the relationship of humanity to God, and it engages with studies by scholars such as David Stern, Daniel Boyarin, Martin Goodman and Clemens Thoma and with the method of dating rabbinic material advocated by Jacob Neusner. It considers the parables as resistance literature in light of the work of theorists of dominated groups, and it is the first systematic attempt to read the parables as sources for Roman history in over 100 years.

Alan Appelbaum, Research Affiliate in the Yale Department of Religious Studies and Program in Judaic Studies for the past three years, holds a Ph.D. from Yale and an M. A. J. S. degree from Hebrew Union College—Jewish Institute of Religion. He is Senior Counsel to the international law firm of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton LLP. His published work includes articles on Roman imperial history, the first-century Jewish historian Josephus, and the applicability of contemporary theory to rabbinic literature.