Mad Rabbis: The Intersection of Bodyminds with Personal, Communal, and Non-Human Relationships in the Babylonian Talmud
Creators: name: Roussel, Hannah
Publisher: name: My University
Year: 2023
Subjects: subject: Mad Studies
subject: Disability Studies
subject: Gender Studies
subject: Babylonian Talmud
subject: Embodiment
subject: Rabbinic Literature
subject: Judaic Studies
subject: Humanities
subject: FOS: Humanities

description: This dissertation studies the Babylonian rabbinic concept of hulshat da’at—illness or weakness of mind, through the lenses of disability, mad, gender, and environmental studies. Disability and madness are socially and culturally constructed concepts that elude definition and intersect with other identities. I argue that hulshat da’at narratives portray hulshat da’at as a specific form of madness that was experienced by those of high social status when said status was lowered or threatened. I have also demonstrated that the rabbis viewed hulshat da’at as a severe and negative experience that should be avoided if possible, or immediately addressed if not. They addressed hulshat da’at by reassuring the mad person of their status, and they imagined that even nonhumans such as the rain took part in this caregiving strategy. Choosing specific hulshat da’at narratives to discuss in each chapter, I argue that each contains rabbinic conceptions that bodies and minds (human and nonhuman) are interconnected with and interdependent on each other. I further analyze how this bodily and mental interdependence allows these narratives to question the efficaciousness of various care giving practices, and what to do when these practices fail. Chapter one uses the concepts of bodymind and intersectionality to analyze the story of Rabbi Elazar and his wife, who I name Batya (bBava Metzia 83b and 84b). The concept bodymind views the body and mind as inherently connected. Reading Elazar and Batya’s story with this concept allows us to pay attention to the narrative’s interplay between body and da’at (mind), arguing that it views da’at to be interconnected with soul, self, and emotions, all of which are embodied in the flesh. I also follow the shifting relationship between Elazar and Batya, whose struggle for dominance in their relationship is informed by gender, bodyminds, and houses. I conclude that hulshat da’at is gendered masculine and experienced when one’s status is threatened. Chapter two analyzes a narrative about the relationship between Rabbi Yohanan and Reish Lakish (bBava Metzia 84a). Through tracking the shifting bodyminds and relationships of Yohanan, Reish Lakish, and Yohanan’s sister I argue that this story contains of rabbinic conceptions of bodyminds as entities that are fluid and interconnected. I use the concept of mad border body to argue that Elazar’s and Yohanan’s madness is just as fluid and relational as their bodyminds. I trace this relationality, analyzing how cultural and societal contexts inform their interpersonal relationships, and how their madness affects those around them. Informed by feminist, postcolonial, disability, and mad studies, I analyze how systems of care function in both Elazar and Batya’s and Yohanan and Reish Lakish’s stories, including rabbinic care practices for rabbis experiencing hulshat da’at. I argue that both stories contain the notion that being disconnected from one’s rabbinic colleagues ends in madness and death. Chapter three focuses on six stories in Bavli Ta’anit. All of which, I claim, question what to do when God is absent, and when systems of care fail. Reading these stories from both a disability and environmental studies perspectives, I propose that these stories imagine communities in which even nonhuman characters, such as the sky and the clouds, have bodyminds that are interconnected with each other and the humans they interact with. Such a view of community allows us (and these stories) to consider ecosystems as systems of care.