Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 exptools 1/6/84; site ihuxq.UUCP Path: utzoo!watmath!clyde!floyd!harpo!ihnp4!ihuxq!amigo2 From: amigo2@ihuxq.UUCP (John Hobson) Newsgroups: net.religion.jewish Subject: Re: A BOOK ABOUT TALMUD Message-ID: <776@ihuxq.UUCP> Date: Wed, 14-Mar-84 10:29:37 EST Article-I.D.: ihuxq.776 Posted: Wed Mar 14 10:29:37 1984 Date-Received: Thu, 15-Mar-84 00:54:49 EST References: <1192@mhuxi.UUCP> Organization: AT&T Bell Labs, Naperville, IL Lines: 22 David Green kindly lent me his copy of THE ESSENTIAL TALMUD (thanks, David, I am returning it today). I can also heartily recommend it to anyone who wants a good introduction to the subject. It goes into history, Talmudic reasoning, summarizes each order (and often individual tractates), mentions the major commentators (I hadn't known that Rashbam and Rabbenu Tam were Rashi's grandsons), and is well written and well reasoned. One thing annoyed me. In the chapter on "Strange and Bizarre Problems," there is the sentence: "A somewhat later text takes up the mythical *golem* and asks whether such a being is entitled to participate in a *minyan*." And then, the question having been raised, we are given no answer. Someone, please tell me. After all, as Steinsaltz points out, this touches on the wider "problem of defining man and his limitations". If a golem is to be admitted to a minyan, then I think that any being having artificial intelligence could be. But what if the golem has a non-Jewish creator. Could such a goyishe golem convert? I can think of all sorts of things that this raises. John Hobson AT&T Bell Labs--Naperville, IL ihnp4!ihuxq!amigo2