When Rabbi Eliezer Was Arrested for Heresy

This study is part of a larger project the ultimate aim of which is to write a shared, twin or intertwined history of Jews and Christians in the first and second centuries CE. The first stage of the project will be to select relevant sources, to describe their literary and historical characteristics, and to read and reread them in view of their significance vis-à-vis other sources. The second stage will encompass the writing of a historical synthesis of the shared history. The tradition we have chosen to examine – the arrest of Rabbi Eliezer – has been much studied. Nevertheless, rereading these Rabbi Eliezer traditions in light of the close connection between Judaism and early Christianity will shed fresh light on the shared history of both religions in a period when some rabbinic literature appears to be interested in separating them. In other words, this historical episode can be seen as contributing to that separation. (מתוך המאמר)