[Avodah] Tablet: The Rabbinic Network

[Micha Berger]

From
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/history/articles/the-rabbinic-network

The article is about diagrams, so you'll need to go there to see the network
he's describing.

But the prettiest and cleanest picture is a connection map with such
hubs of connections like Rava, Abayei, Rav, Rav Yochanan, Rav Sheishes,
R Huna and the like.

Tir'u baTov!
-Micha

    The Rabbinic Network
    Using new digital techniques to unravel foundational questions about
    the Talmud
    By Michael Satlow
    May 03, 2021

    ...
    A few years ago, as part of my increasing interest in such digital
    approaches (which often goes under the umbrella term, "digital
    humanities" or DH), I began to conceive of a project that would
    visualize and analyze the network of ancient rabbis. Such a project,
    ...
    I decided to begin by mapping a single interaction as presented in
    a single version of a single text: the rabbinic citation network
    presented in the Vilna edition of the Babylonian Talmud. Focusing the
    project in this manner has two advantages. First, among the different
    kinds of rabbinic interactions found in rabbinic literature (e.g.,
    rabbis who ask questions of other rabbis; rabbis who visit other
    rabbis), citationsor rabbis who say things in the names of other
    rabbisare by far the most numerous, making a good test case. Second,
    a full digital version of the Vilna edition of the Babylonian Talmud
    was freely available.

    What was most important to me, though, was that the focus of
    the project was on the network as a whole rather than individual
    rabbis. My questions focused on how the network looked and functioned,
    not on the roles played by specific, historical rabbis...

    A few years ago, as part of my increasing interest in such digital
    approaches (which often goes under the umbrella term, "digital
    humanities" or DH), I began to conceive of a project that would
    visualize and analyze the network of ancient rabbis. Such a project,
    I knew, faced formidable methodological obstacles. The same problems
    that stymied our reliance on historical attributions applied to our
    work: How could such a project be conceived when the manuscripts
    were messy and the attributions potentially unreliable?

    I decided to begin by mapping a single interaction as presented in
    a single version of a single text: the rabbinic citation network
    presented in the Vilna edition of the Babylonian Talmud. Focusing the
    project in this manner has two advantages. First, among the different
    kinds of rabbinic interactions found in rabbinic literature (e.g.,
    rabbis who ask questions of other rabbis; rabbis who visit other
    rabbis), citationsor rabbis who say things in the names of other
    rabbisare by far the most numerous, making a good test case. Second,
    a full digital version of the Vilna edition of the Babylonian Talmud
    was freely available.

    What was most important to me, though, was that the focus of
    the project was on the network as a whole rather than individual
    rabbis. My questions focused on how the network looked and functioned,
    not on the roles played by specific, historical rabbis...