Stranger within Your Gates

If the people of Israel understood themselves to share a common ancestry as well as a common religion, how could a convert to their faith who did not share their ethnicity fit into the ancient Israelite community? While it is comparatively simple to declare religious beliefs, it is much more difficult to enter a group whose membership is defined in ethnic terms. In showing how the rabbis struggled continually with the dual nature of the Israelite community and the dilemma posed by converts, Gary G. Porton explains aspects of their debates. This text analyzes references to converts in the full corpus of rabbinic literature. The intellectual dilemma in discussions of marriage, religious practice, inheritance of property and much else are explored here. Reviewing the rabbinic literature text by text, Porton exposes the rabbis' frequently ambivalent and ambiguous views. The text focuses upon the opinions of the community into which the convert enters, rather than on the testimony of the convert. By approaching data with various methods, Porton aims to increase the reader's understanding of conversion and the nature of the people of Israel in rabbinic literature.