Jesus in the Talmud

164 Notes to Chapter 520. QohR and Bavli: “that he is to be permitted.”21. Bavli: “before his soul departed and he died.”22. Bavli: “for your body [remained] pure and your soul left you in purity.”23. A play on words with gezerah (decree, prohibition) and geder(hedge/fence).24. b Ber 56b; b Men 99b.25. t Shevu 3:4.26. b Ber 56b; b Shab 116a.27. b Men 99b.28. Same answer in QohR.29. b AZ 27b.30. This last sentence with the quotation from Leviticus appears also in theYerushalmi version.31. Hence it seems that the Bavli, in contrast to the Yerushalmi, identifies theflesh-and-blood snake by which Eleazar b. Dama was bitten with the rabbis.According to the Yerushalmi, Eleazar b. Dama was not bitten by the metaphoricalsnake of the rabbis (which punishes the transgression of their commandments),but according to the Bavli the real snake that bit him is the metaphoricalsnake of the rabbis (because they prevented him from being cured).32. And probably also the Yerushalmi’s.33. That in a next step another (or even the same) Bavli editor harmonizesthis conclusion with R. Ishmael’s strict approach (Ishmael would have allowedthe heretic’s healing only in private but not in public) does not detract from theboldness of his argument.34. Maier, Jesus von Nazareth, pp. 188, 191.35. Origen, Contra Celsum I:28; see above, p. 19.36. PGM VIII, 35–50, in Betz, Greek Magical Papyri, p. 146.37. “Iao” is the Greek form of Hebrew “Yaho.” On the name see R. Ganschinietz,“Iao,” in Paulys Real-Encyclopädie der Classischen Altertumswissenschaft,Neue Bearbeitung, begonnen von Georg Wissowa, ...hrsg. v. WilhelmKroll, Siebzehnter Halbband, Stuttgart: Metzler, 1914, cols. 698–721.38. See Hugo Odeberg, 3 Enoch; or, The Hebrew Book of Enoch, Cambridge:Cambridge University Press, 1928 (reprint, New York: Ktav, 1973), pp. 188–192(with parallels from the gnostic literature).39. PGM XIII, 795–800, in Betz, Greek Magical Papyri, p. 191.40. Peter Schäfer, ed., Synopse zur Hekhalot-Literatur, Tübingen: J.C.B.Mohr (Paul Siebeck), 1981, § 15 and parallels; also in b Sanh 38b.