Talmudo-Mīmāṃsā: Towards a Science of Sacrifice

Abstract A distinctive kind of theoretical and analytical discourse on ritual sacrifice evolved within the Indian and Jewish traditions, in Mīmāṃsā and in Talmudic literatures, respectively, introducing special modes of analyzing ritual sacrifice, and elaborate methods of conceptualizing the relations between text and practice. Despite the significant role that comparative studies of Vedic/Brahmanical and biblical/Jewish sacrifice played in the development of the modern study of religion, a detailed comparative study of these emic “sciences of sacrifice” has not yet been carried out. This study examines two pericopes addressing a similar dilemma—the treatment of ritual byproducts—from the Jaimini-Mīmāṃsā-Sūtra and from the Babylonian Talmud, each discussed within its commentarial tradition. The texts reveal a significant degree of convergence (major differences notwithstanding) in terms of dialectic discourse, terminology, thought-structures, hermeneutic assumptions, and more. Factors that may have contributed to this convergence are discussed, as are the broader implications of this comparative experiment.