Piyyuṭ and Midrash

The Jewish community of late antique Palestine produced two great corpora, rabbinic literature and piyyuṭ (liturgical poetry). Tzvi Novick explores the relationship between rabbinic midrash and classical piyyuṭ in two different but complementary ways. The first focuses on features of piyyuṭ that distinguish it, or appear to distinguish it, from rabbinic midrash. The second part considers midrash and piyyuṭ together through the vehicle of the »serial narrative«, a narrative form that binds biblical history together by stringing together instance of the “same” event across multiple time periods.

(Liturgical) poetry in motion and performance: late antique piyyuṭNovick studies the relationship between rabbinic midrash and classical (and to a lesser extent pre-classical) piyyut?. The first focuses on features of piyyut? that distinguish it, at least prima facie, from rabbinic midrash: its performative character, its formal constraints, and its character as prayer. The second part considers midrash and piyyut? together via an analysis of a narrative form that looms large in both corpora. The “serial narrative” is a narrative that binds biblical history together by stringing together instance of the “same” event across multiple time periods. Thereby, Novick surveys basic features of serial narratives in midrash and piyyut?. Subsequent chapters take up instance of specific serial narrative forms from Second Temple literature to piyyut: the kingdom series, the salvation history, and the serial confession. Together, the two parts yield a nuanced account of the continuities and discontinuities between the two great corpora produced by rabbinic and para-rabbinic circles in Roman Palestine.