Intermediary Beings in Late Antique Judaism: A History of Scholarship

Abstract

Recent years have seen a steady rise in the scholarly interest in intermediary beings in Late Antique Judaism. The present article traces developments in the academic study of intermediary beings, and surveys scholarly approaches to angels, demons, and other intermediary beings in (1) rabbinic literature, (2) Late Antique Jewish liturgy, (3) Hekhalot literature, and (4) material artifacts such as metal amulets and clay bowls. It traces a shift from a nineteenth-century discomfort with intermediary beings and a concomitant suggestion that such beings are a foreign import and corruption, to a more recent interest in examining how intermediary beings functioned within a dynamic and transcultural Late Antique Jewish world. The article concludes by proposing new and continued areas of interest for scholars of Late Antique Judaism.