Shammai Apparently a conservative. No discernible legal philosophy. The institutional character of these schools is unclear, as are their chronology and numbers. Confusion created by heretical and foreign influences. The students did not attend their teachers sufficiently.
Debate is a healthy phenomenon that enriches the process of scholarship.
The discussions at Yavneh are described in considerable detail, including the citation of prooftexts and logical arguments. Interplay or tension between received tradition and logical argumentation. Most of the material has parallels elsewhere in the Mishnah. According to H. Albeck, this was the first tractate of the Mishnah. The rest of the Mishnah evolved as an expansion of the material in Eduyyot .