i.
Rabbi Blau criticizes the overuse of the literary method and I agree with him. Yet his critique applies to all methodologies in textual study and, in my opinion is even more fitting in relation to how Gemarra is taught. There are many more ways, other than lomdut, to explain textual anomalies and sometimes these solutions are preferable yet the vast majority of Gemarra classes are taught using "the methodology" - perhaps even more than Tanach is taught using the literary method.
I also disagree that the only thing distinguishing enjoyable Tanach classes is the way the teacher utilises his/her resources. Of course the study of the classical commentators can be enjoyable and interesting, if presented in the right way and the reverse is true with any other subject matter, modern or otherwise. However, something does have to be said for subjects which are more closely aligned to how our students think and how we appreciate texts. The literary method is perhaps more interesting precisely because it is a product of how we experience things and how we think - for better and worse. I am not suggesting that the classical commentators thought completely differently from ourselves but there is are gaps and perhaps presenting the Rishonim in a way that is more modern or as though they asked the same questions we naturally ask helps make them relevant in the eyes of our students - but we must recognise that this is what we are essentially doing. Or alternatively, we must recognise that we are attempting to change how our students think towards a different mind set a change which I am not certain is always helpful.
ii.
If I understood Dr. Hendel's critique of Jeremy Unterman correctly, and I am not certain that I did, his basic premise is that the complete literary approach with all that has been developed over the past 30 years was all known to the Rishonim and used as comprehensively. Perhaps that implies that where they did not utilise such methodology that it is not relevant?
In any case, I do not think that Jeremy Unterman expressed the view that the Rishonim and others had no sense of literariness of texts or nuanced analysis and that the Messianic period arrived when Weiss showed us what it all meant. Rather, I am sure that Jeremy Unterman, would agree that that the classical commentators and the Midrash read in a nuanced fashion and were aware, as conscientious readers, of various layers in texts and of course of SOME of what the literary method has to offer. Indeed many developers of the literary method do not claim that ALL of what they suggest is completely new. However to my mind, it is difficult to argue that literary analysis has not added anything to our understanding of the text over and above what the Rishonim have to offer. Indeed your post, if anything, proves this point. The works of Weiss, Greenberg and a myriad of others differ in that they do apply new methods and more importantly alter our sense of where our emphasis should lie in approaching a text. Even where the Rishonim were aware of structures and other devices it did not play nearly as central a role as it does in some modern analyses - analyses which illuminate the text. What's more very few Rishonim or earlier exegetes (although there are a couple of exceptions) manage to articulate and classify in a more scientific fashion such methodology. Something which in and of itself is beneficial and highlights some of the differences between the modern and ancient contributions to textual study.
I sense that part of what he is addressing is the question of whether the modern world has something to give us in terms of textual study that was not already known in its entirety to the Rishonim? Or rather, in absence of any proof for my assertions, CAN there ever be something that adds to such study from the tents of Yefet? I accept that such things can and do exist (within reason) and I think R' Blau agrees. The question is rather, how do we teach it without cheapening, in the eyes of our students, the insights of traditional commentators? And for that R' Blau's comments, here and elsewhere, are very valuable indeed.
Ari Silbermann
