| Abstract: | In light of the growing consensus that the rabbis of Late Antiquity were not a powerful and dominant group with roots in the time of the Temple, this article reexamines the portrayal of the rabbinic present and the rabbinic past in the Mishnah. The Mishnah, I propose, pictures the rabbis acting as jurists—modelled on Roman jurists—who issue opinions primarily on matters of Jewish ritual law. This claim for a legal-judicial role for the rabbis in post-destruction Jewish society, furthermore, shapes the rabbinic memory of the past in which the Court of Temple times is the predecessor to the rabbis and in which this Court has ultimate authority over Temple ritual. In their construction of both the present and the past, the rabbis make a powerful claim for authority over ritual law and ritual practice, an authority which it seems they did not yet have. |
