Common Era

Common Era (CE) is the dating convention that anchors the temporal framework of the Evolutionary Judaism (EJ) congregation's weekly Sabbath services and its seminar-style examination of the Torah. In the novel, CE is not merely a neutral calendar label but a marker of the EJ movement's commitment to modern scholarship and historical source criticism. The term surfaces in the congregation's analysis of the Bible, where the interpretive commentary that arose in the three hundred years before and a hundred years into the Common Era is shown to have shaped the scriptures as they are read today. This usage positions CE as a conceptual hinge between ancient textual origins and contemporary rationalist faith, underscoring the EJ project's effort to hold tradition up to modern scrutiny.

The Common Era in the EJ Congregation's Biblical Analysis

The EJ congregation's weekly Sabbath service, held on Friday evening with a Saturday morning replay, devotes its middle section to a rabbinically directed seminar discussion rather than a sermon. Over several weeks, the group examines the documentary hypothesis of biblical authorship, which posits that the first five books of the Bible, the Torah, are the collected texts of different historical sources designated J, E, P, and D. A doctoral candidate from Harvard discusses the work of his eminent teacher J. L. Kugel, who has attended in detail to the distinction between the original texts and the interpretive commentary that sprang up in the three hundred years before and a hundred years into the Common Era. This commentary, Kugel's work suggests, created the Bible that is read today under the illusion that it is the original Scripture. The biblical texts, written in a language without vowels or punctuation, were seen from the beginning as enigmatic, and because they were supposed to be divine in source and therefore of supernatural perfection, ancient scholars, priests, and sages felt called upon to explain contradictions, un-God-like sentiments, unsavory passages, and less than noble acts of noble personages. They did so by interpreting them metaphorically, symbolically, or allegorically, by changing meaning through added punctuation, by applying syntactical emphases opportunistically, or by otherwise reimagining whatever needed improvement to be truly theologically correct. The Common Era thus marks the historical window in which this interpretive tradition took shape, transforming the original texts into the scripture that modern readers encounter.

The Common Era as a Marker of the EJ Approach

The EJ approach, as described in the novel, is to take the various aspects of Jewish teaching and practice, consider their historic sources or origins and their theological rationale, and, insofar as possible, hold them up to modern scholarship, separating what appears inessential, intellectually untenable, or blindly customary from what is truly crucial and defining. The use of CE as the dating system fits this method: it is a secular, scholarly convention that avoids the theological implications of BC and AD, aligning with the EJ commitment to rational inquiry. The congregation's library, though small, is growing, and the rabbi provides reading lists, making the radical EJ, ironically, a kind of continuing-education yeshiva. The Common Era, in this context, is not just a chronological reference but a symbol of the EJ movement's willingness to question even the most basic frameworks of religious time.

The Common Era and the Limits of Rationalism

The Common Era's association with modern scholarship and rationalism is tested in a scene where an elderly man challenges the rabbi's approach. He acknowledges that he is mostly on the rabbi's side, but objects to the characterization of tradition as "epic," insisting that "epic is for the Greeks." This brings laughter and applause, and the old man, emboldened, explains that he discovered the synagogue on a walk a few months ago, liked the modern young rabbi who is not afraid to ask questions, and appreciated the intellectual discussion, though he was not happy with a co-ed minyan. He then asks whether there are some things that must not be questioned, such as the belief that the Torah was given by the Creator, blessed be His name, and that the yoke of the Kingdom of Heaven must be accepted. Without this, he argues, it is no religion, nothing. The narrator observes that Pem slumps in his chair and holds his hands to his head, recognizing the moment when rationalism hits the wall. The old man's challenge reveals the tension between the EJ's scholarly, CE-framed approach and the traditional faith that resists such questioning. The narrator also wonders, not without some anger at himself, whether Sarah Blumenthal, the rabbi, had depended on her late husband Joshua for her theology, and whether she was capable of carrying his ideas forward. This moment underscores the limits of the rationalist project that CE represents, even as it remains the temporal and intellectual foundation of the EJ congregation.