TALMUD (talmūdh, “study”). — The great corpus of rabbinic traditions, formed by the development that the Mišnāh (q.v.) underwent in the centuries that followed. The majority of the Mishnic treatises are expanded in the discussion known as gēmārā, carried out by the teachers called amoræi (q.v.), who in the periodic sessions of the Talmudic academies discussed the various legal texts.
The Talmudic academies were called jētībhōth (jētībhāh originally signifying the “seat” of the teacher). In Palestine the most famous had its seat at Jamnia (Jabneh) and already existed long before A.D. 70; the Palestinian academies ceased to exist around A.D. 740. In Babylonia the most famous schools were Sūrā and Pumbēdītā; they included regular students, often maintained by the head of the Academy, who received offerings for this purpose. Seventy scholars constituted the “Great Sanhedrin”; behind them sat another thirty scholars, who formed the “Little Sanhedrin.” Subjects for discussion were proposed from time to time, and the president would examine through an interview whether the students had prepared the text under study. Current legal topics were also discussed, and the final decision was recorded in writing. A special month was devoted to those coming from abroad. The Talmud might be defined as the minutes of the sessions of the academies.
There are two recensions of the Talmud: the T. jērūšalmī, formerly called T. ‘ēres Jīrā’ēl, compiled in Palestine around A.D. 425; and the T. babhīl, compiled in Babylonia in the 5th century; the latter was subjected in later centuries to the revision of the Saboreans (q.v.). The Talmudic period is considered closed between the 6th and 7th centuries; the legal activity was continued by the “decisors” (q.v.). The doctors of the Talmud draw their deductions in legal matters by using hermeneutical rules of a special kind, called middōth, with which they seek to connect—often by doing violence to the text—their deductions to the biblical text. The number of middōth varies according to the periods; they are associated with the names of three doctors: Hillel (q.v.), who established 7 rules; R. Jīsmā’ēl (2nd century), who established 13;