I Heinemann

Question 1

purpose

Answer 1

interested in seeing how chazal managed the struggle between objectivity and subjectivity.
They do so by their own versions of ‘organic thinking’ and the combination of emotion and intellect, rather than just the intellect of halakha

Question 2

insight

Answer 2

aggada is somewhere between artful game and serious analysis.
just because the outcome may sometimes be ‘silly’ doesn’t mean the mechanisms are

Question 3

two ideas of midrash

Answer 3

ahistorical historiography and aphilological philology

Question 4

pluses

Answer 4

first systematic explanation that didn’t really focus on the false dichotomy of ‘true’ or ‘false’, and goes far beyond Rambam in his understanding of ‘poetics’

shows that important cultural work can be done in ways that are not serious, and shows how that even emerges from the non-logocentrism that midrash provides.

Question 5

3 groups

Answer 5

Midrash as “pshat”
Midrash as “nonsense”
Midrash as “poetics”

Question 6

Heinemann stands in relation to 3 groups

Answer 6

somewhere between 1 and 3

Question 7

Boyarin’s critique?

Answer 7

at no point is context taken into account. Cannot understand the work outside of its cultural codes