Essays in this volume honor Richard L. Kalmin, one of the leading scholars of rabbinic literature. Volume contributors explore a variety of topics related to Kalmin’s wide-ranging work from the development of the Talmud to rabbinic storytelling, from the transmission of tales across geographic and cultural boundaries to ancient Jewish and Iranian interactions. Many of the essays reflect current trends in how scholars use ancient Jewish literary sources to address questions of historical import. Contributors include Carol Bakhos, Beth A. Berkowitz, Noah Bickart, Robert Brody, Joshua Cahan, Shaye J. D. Cohen, Steven D. Fraade, Shamma Friedman, Alyssa M. Gray, Judith Hauptman, Christine Hayes, Catherine Hezser, Marc Hirshman, David Kraemer, Marjorie Lehman, Kristen Lindbeck, Jonathan S. Milgram, Chaim Milikowsky, Michael L. Satlow, Marcus Mordecai Schwartz, Seth Schwartz, Burton L. Visotzky, and Sarah Wolf.

Carol Bakhos is Professor of the Study of Religion and of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Los Angeles. She is the Director of the Center for the Study of Religion at UCLA. She is the author of The Family of Abraham: Jewish, Christian and Muslim Interpretations (Harvard University Press) and coeditor of The Jewish Middle Ages (SBL Press) and Emerging Judaism (Yale University Press, forthcoming).

Alyssa M. Gray is the Emily S. and Rabbi Bernard H. Mehlman Chair in Rabbinics and Professor of Codes and Responsa Literature at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in New York. Her books include Charity in Rabbinic Judaism: Atonement, Rewards, and Righteousness (Routledge) and A Talmud in Exile: The Influence of Yerushalmi Avodah Zarah on the Formation of Bavli Avodah Zarah (Brown Judaic Studies).