For many years, the exegesis of the parables of Jesus was determined by assump­ tions that were largely purported by Adolf Jülicher and subsequently underwent only insignificant modification. The Kompendium der Gleichnisse Jesu (ed. R. Zimmermann, Gütersloh 2007), whose methodology and hermeneutics are explained in this article, takes a new route, as can be illustrated in four steps. From a his...

Abstract The late antique rabbis of Roman Palestine were seasoned jurists, experts on exegesis and legal interpretation. Yet rabbinic literature does not theorize. A positive account conceptions language therefore remains a desideratum. I choose an alternative approach. Legal reasoning relies to ground the determinacy law. Jurists must thus confront when it threatens undermine latter. Conversel...

The exegesis of sacred rites in the Talmud is subject to a restriction on the iteration and composition of inference rules. In order to determine the scope and limits of that restriction, the sages of the Talmud deploy those very same inference rules. We present the remarkable features of this early use of self-reference to navigate logical constraints and uncover the hidden complexity behind t...

Abū Isḥāq Tha‘labī Nayshābūrī is an outstanding Iranian exegete of the fourth and fifth centuries LH. Tha‘labī has been so skillful in various Islamic sciences such as Arabic linguistics (including morphology, syntax (grammatical inflection), vocabulary, and rhetoric), Ḥadīth, exegesis, and qur’ānic sciences that numerous students from many near and far places attended his classes. Tha‘labī’s c...