Bet Aviv Lunch and Learn

Of all the contributions of Talmudic culture to the Jewish world, the most central is the positive
power of dispute, or machloket. Not all types of dispute, mind you, but rather disputes for the
sake of heaven. These questions were explored first and foremost through the stories and
disputes of Hillel and Shammai and their students, perhaps the first dispute within Judaism that
did not lead to a schism, but rather to the normalizing of disagreement.
The texts herein introduce three basic disputes of Hillel and Shammai, and brings to the
forefront three ways of engaging with disagreement: pluralism, tolerance and deviance.