Next Steps: Placing This Study of Jewish Meals in the Larger Picture of Meals in the Ancient World, Early Judaism, and Early Christianity

Abstract

These studies taken together provide a thicker description than previously available of the meal in early Judaism as a cultural phenomenon. They establish in great detail how Jewish meals were firmly embedded in the cultural meal model of their day. While this should be neither surprising nor controversial, unfortunately it is. Traditionally, scholars have argued that neither the Jewish nor the Christian form of meal was modeled after a hellenistic and/or Roman prototype. Rather the assumption has been that the Jewish meal was a thing apart, and the Christian meal followed suit. In the light of the studies published here, it is surely time to lay those arguments to rest and to move forward toward a richer understanding of meal practices and their importance in the formative years of early Judaism and Christianity.