Sanhedrin 140

15:
The third person who forfeits his share in the next world, according to Tanna Kamma, is the Epikoros. There is no doubt that the origin of this term is in the name of the Greek philosopher Epicurus [Greece, beginning of 3rd century BCE]. His original teaching was that the highest aim of man is in attaining the happiness of practicing virtue. Gradually the "practicing virtue" bit was lopped off and later Epicureans maintained that the attainment of pleasure was the greatest virtue. This eventually degenerated into the mocking dictum "eat drink and be merry for tomorrow we die", "gather ye rosebuds while ye may" etc. Later Epicureans, who would no doubt have been disowned by the philosopher himself, saw no value in anything that took life too seriously. It is perhaps this last (and admittedly dubious) characteristic that leads us to the meaning of Epikoros in the language of the sages. They use the term to describe someone who holds the sages in low esteem, mocks them, scoffs at their teaching. The Gemara [Sanhedrin 99b onwards] offers several definitions, ranging from one who ridicules a sage to one who uses Torah learning itself in order to denigrate it. Thus, it seems, that the term Epikoros gradually came to mean a scholar – possibly even a Torah scholar – who denigrated the sages and their traditions, twisting the teachings to mean something that they were never intended to mean simply in order to bring them and their teachers into ridicule. I describe just one example from the many given by the Gemara, because it amuses me to think that the sages, so long ago, often had to face the same kind of hurtful badinage as their modern, humble, counterparts.

16:
To the list of Tanna Kamma Rabbi Akiva adds the reading of heretical books and the mumbling of incantations intended to cure diseases. The "heretical books" that Rabbi Akiva would ostracize on pain of forfeiting the next world are almost certainly the books which we now call the Apocrypha. During the last couple of centuries BCE and during the first century CE many books were being written about which there was no general agreement as to whether they should be part of Israel's scriptural heritage or not. Some of these were of a very high standard and much admired by the sages: they sometimes quote, for example, from "The Wisdom of Ben-Sirah" with the same reverence accorded biblical works. However, the vast majority of these books were propaganda at best and downright mendacious as worst. For example, the Second book of the Maccabees is a work of political propaganda on behalf of the Hasmonean King Yoĥanan Hyrkenos I. Most of these works are what we call Pseudepigraphic. That means that their authors, in order to get these books a wider circulation and acceptance, would ascribe their work to some ancient sage – the "Wisdom of Solomon", for example. There were probably two reasons why, towards the end of the first century CE, the sages at Yavneh decided to canonize those books that they accepted as scripture and to outlaw all the rest. The first reason was obviously the upheaval caused by the great war against the Romans and the destruction of the Bet Mikdash in the year 70 CE. The other reason was doubtless the publication of the first of the gospels – we must remember that the earliest Christians were Jews active within the Jewish community. The main contenders for scriptural canonicity were considered one by one by the Sanhedrin under Rabban Gamli'el and voted upon. A tantalizing glimpse into these discussions can be had from reading of some of the mishnayot of Tractate Yadayyim: there was no unanimity concerning Ecclesiastes [Kohelet] and there seemed to be a majority in favour of excluding the Song of Songs [Shir ha-Shirim]; it was only because of the tireless insistence of the same Rabbi Akiva of our present mishnah that Shir ha-Shirim was eventually accepted into the canon of sacred scripture – Ecclesiastes too. The list of "authorized" sacred writings was finalized and now forms the third section of our tripartite Tanakh. All the "failed candidates" were secreted away from the eyes of the curious and only survived into modern times (in Greek translations) because the Church accepted them as Holy Writ. (A part of the Hebrew original of Ben-Sirah was discovered by Solomon Schechter in the Cairo Genizah.)

17:
Halakhah recognizes seven terms for the Deity which are so holy that they may not be erased [see Rambam, Yesodé ha-Torah 6:2]. I shall quote them in transliteration since it is only in their Hebrew format that they are considered ineradicable: El, Elo'ah, Elohim, Elohei, Shaddai, Tzeva'ot and the Tetragrammaton – the four Hebrew letters Yod-He-Vav-He, which is nowadays uttered as Adonai. Of all these seven on the last is considered so holy that using it in an imprecation constitutes sacrilege. (I would like here to point out an egregious error. The original pronunciation of the Tetragrammaton has been irretrievably lost for nearly two millennia. Whenever the term is used in the Bible or Prayer-Book we substitute for it the surrogate term Adonai [Lord]. The Massoretes, who were responsible for transmitting the Biblical text to us in its present format, added the vocalization of the word Adonai to the letters of the Tetragrammaton in order to remind the reader to read the term Adonai. When non-Jews read the Hebrew text they misunderstood, and started construing this term as if it were a real word, thus creating the nonsensical proper noun "Jehovah". This word has no basis whatsoever in Jewish tradition.) Abba Sha'ul adds to the list of Tanna Kamma "someone who pronounces the Name according to its letters".

Yiftach Shapir writes:

Let me add some comments to our discussion of Tehiyyat ha-Metim. First, most of the discussion was based on Rambam's understanding of the issue. I agree, that of all the other views I have read, Rambam's is the one that seems to our modern, westernized approach the most appropriate. But I think it would be just fair to mention that within the various streams of thought in Judaism there are other, even contradicting views: Rabbi Sa'adya Gaon discusses the issue of Tehiyat ha-Metim in detail and dwells on various questions like "would the dead be dressed or nude".

I respond:

This "contribution" of Sa'adyah Ga'on is hardly original. All he does really is to bring direct quotes from the Gemara [Sanhedrin 90b].

Rabbi Me'ir [Eretz Israel, end of 2nd century CE] here seems to sense that Cleopatra's question is based on her knowledge of the "Eleusinian mysteries".

Yiftach continues:

A third view in Judaism is that of the Kabbala. I am not an expert but it seems to me that the Kabbala believes not in resurrection but in some kind of reincarnation and Gilgul Neshamot.

I respond:

I am blissfully ignorant of the teachings of Kabbalah!