Lynn Kaye

Associate Professor of Rabbinic Literature and Thought

Departments/Programs

Near Eastern and Judaic Studies

Degrees

New York University, Ph.D.
University of Cambridge, M.Phil.
University of Cambridge, B.A.

Expertise

Rabbinic literature and thought, theories of time, Judaism in late antiquity, Jewish law, literary, critical and legal theories.

Profile

I am a scholar of rabbinic literature and thought. I study Jewish texts from the Middle East and the Mediterranean in late antiquity and their cultural, religious and legal afterlives through the modern period. I examine the conceptual, emotional and aesthetic features of this literature and connect them to contemporary concerns in the humanities and legal studies. My first book, Time in the Babylonian Talmud: Natural and Imagined Times in Jewish Law and Narrative (Cambridge University Press, 2018), won the Association for Jewish Studies Jordan Schnitzer Book Award in the category of Biblical Studies, Rabbinics, and Jewish History and Culture in Antiquity. it was also a finalist for the National Jewish Book Award for Scholarship. I have published articles about the portrayal of interpersonal dynamics among teachers and students and between judges and litigants, about the meaning and style of narratives in rabbinic literature, and about time concepts in ancient Judaism. I am co-editing an interdisciplinary anthology of essays about time with Sarit Kattan Gribetz. My current research includes a book about time wasting in classical and modern rabbinic literature, and a book about lay people's advocacy in rabbinic court narratives.

Courses Taught

NEJS	10a	Biblical Hebrew Grammar and Texts
NEJS	10b	Biblical Hebrew Practicum
NEJS	123b	Crossing Boundaries and Being Human in Rabbinic Literature
NEJS	125a	Just Communities and Neighborhoods in Talmudic Literature

Awards and Honors

Association for Jewish Studies Jordan Schnitzer Book Award (2020)

Harry Starr Fellowship in Judaica, Harvard University (2020 - 2021)

National Jewish Book Award Finalist for Scholarship (2019)

Scholarship

Kaye, Lynn and Gribetz, Sarit Kattan. "Noon: Rabbinic, Medieval and Early Modern Periods." Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception Volume 21. 2023. (forthcoming)

Kaye, Lynn and Sarit Kattan Gribetz, ed. Time: A Multidisciplinary Introduction. De Gruyter, 2023. (forthcoming)

Kaye, Lynn. "Arguments and Actions: Lay People’s Advocacy and Resistance in Talmudic Adjudication Narratives." Yale Journal of Law and the Humanities 32. (2021).

Kaye, Lynn. "Sacred Time and Rabbinic Literature: New Directions for an Old Problem." Journal of the American Academy of Religion 88. 4 (2020): 1154–1177.

Kaye, Lynn and Gribetz, Sarit Kattan. "The Temporal Turn in Ancient Judaism and Jewish Studies." Currents of Biblical Research 17. 3 (2019): 332-395.

Kaye, Lynn. "Protesting Women: A Literary Analysis of Bavli Adjudicatory Narratives." Nashim: A Journal of Jewish Women's Studies & Gender Issues 32. Spring 2018 (2019): 131-157.

Kaye, Lynn. "Terumah (Exodus 25:1-27:19)." From Forbidden Fruit to Milk and Honey: A Commentary on Food in the Torah. Ed. Diana Lipton. (Urim Publications, 2018. 129-130.

Kaye, Lynn. Time in the Babylonian Talmud: Natural and Imagined Times in Jewish Law and Narrative. 1st ed. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2018.

Kaye, Lynn. "Sheltering under the Wings." Wisdom Bible Commentary: Ruth. Ed. Alice Laffey and Mahri Leonard-Fleckman. Liturgical Press, 2017. 82-83.

Kaye, Lynn. "“Talmud" (Talmud and the Intersection of Narrative, Law and Religion)." Narrating Religion. Ed. Sarah Iles Johnston. MacMillan, 2017. 289-302.

Kaye, Lynn. "A ‘Great Man’ Said That? The Representation and Significance of Scholastic Failure in the Babylonian Talmud." Association for Jewish Studies Review 40. 2 (2016): 305-334.

Kaye, Lynn. "Fixity and Time in Jewish Law and Legal Language." Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 23. 2 (2015): 127-160.