Demons in the Details: Demonic Discourse and Rabbinic Culture in Late Antique Babylonia

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Sara Ronis

Demons in the Details

Demonic Discourse and Rabbinic Culture in Late Antique Babylonia

Sara Ronis

$57.95

Paperback

Forthcoming
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English

University of California Press
19 June 2025

History; Ancient history: to c 500 CE; Social & cultural history; Judaism: sacred texts; Ancient religions & mythologies; Jewish studies

The Babylonian Talmud is full of stories of demonic encounters, and it also includes many laws that attempt to regulate such encounters. In this book, Sara Ronis takes the reader on a journey across the rabbinic canon, exploring how late antique rabbis imagined, feared, and controlled demons. Ronis contextualizes the Talmud's thought within the rich cultural matrix of Sasanian Babylonia, placing rabbinic thinking in conversation with Sumerian, Akkadian, Ugaritic, Syriac Christian, Zoroastrian, and Second Temple Jewish texts about demons to delve into the interactive communal context in which the rabbis created boundaries between the human and the supernatural, and between themselves and other religious communities. Demons in the Details explores the wide range of ways that the rabbis participated in broader discussions about beliefs and practices with their neighbors, out of which they created a profoundly Jewish demonology.

By: Sara Ronis
Imprint: University of California Press
Country of Publication: United States
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm, Spine: 15mm
Weight: 408g
ISBN: 9780520418363
ISBN 10: 0520418360
Pages: 316
Publication Date: 19 June 2025
Audience: Professional and scholarly , Undergraduate
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Forthcoming

Sara Ronis is Associate Professor of Theology at St. Mary’s University in San Antonio, Texas.