MIDRASH AND AGGADAH [FURTHER CONSIDERATONS]. Scholarship on midrash and aggadah grew exponentially during the last two decades of the twentieth century. As a result, many of the areas covered by Judah Goldin in the first edition of this Encyclopedia have been subjected to further academic scrutiny and changed consensus. New avenues of inquiry have opened and are discussed here. This essay primarily covers the ideas and works of authors who have been active since the 1980s. The updated bibliography briefly annotates the works cited here.

Origins of Midrash

Goldin's assumptions regarding the biblical origins of midrash have been buttressed in a number of works. This insistence on biblical antecedents has been exhaustively demonstrated by Michael Fishbane (1985) and also linked to the scribal and wisdom circles of the late Second Temple era by James Kugel (1986, 2001). It should be noted that this...