Acknowledgements
The idea for this book came from Stuart Proffitt at Penguin. When I
proposed to Stuart that I might write a book encapsulating new ideas
which have emerged while giving lectures in Oxford over many years on
varieties of Judaism in the late Second Temple period and on the form-
ation of rabbinic Judaism, he persuaded me that the volume should
extend both before and after the periods that are at the centre of my
expertise. I have enjoyed the challenge and the wider perspective it has
brought.
Attempting to cover the whole history of Judaism has been daunting
and has been possible only with a great deal of help. For the shape of
the history in its initial planning I owe much to the expert advice of my
colleagues Joanna Weinberg and Miri Freud- Kandel. Many ideas to be
found throughout the volume arose in discussions in 2009– 10 within
the project on ‘Toleration within Judaism’ funded by the Leverhulme
Trust, and I am very grateful to Joseph David, Corinna R. Kaiser and
Simon Levis Sullam, the three research fellows who worked with me on
the project during that year. The book has also benefited over the past
eight years from the expertise of exceptional research assistants: Char-
lotte Goodman, Daniel Herskowitz, Judah Levine, Micha Perry,
Deborah Rooke, Joshua Teplitsky, Benjamin Williams and Milena
Zeidler. Sarah Stroumsa and Hugh Williamson both gave me invaluable
advice on large sections of an early draft. Philip Alexander, Norman
Solomon and Adam Ferziger read and commented on the whole text and
saved me from many errors. Those that remain are my responsibility
alone: I have been acutely aware of the danger of over- simplification
inherent in seeking to include so much in so small a compass.
I acknowledge with gratitude the munificent grant from the Lever-
hulme Trust for the project on ‘Toleration within Judaism’ and generous
grants for assistance in preparing the book for publication from the
Faculty of Oriental Studies in Oxford and the Oxford Centre for Heb-
rew and Jewish Studies. Publication was undoubtedly delayed by my
duties since 2013 as president of the Centre, which involved abandon-
ing work on the book altogether for a while, but the final text may well
have been improved by the opportunity to reconsider and recast the