The fifth through eighth centuries saw the emergence of a variety of forms of literature outside the rabbinic corpus among Jews in Palestine & Babylonia. At the same time, Jewish communities in Palestine & elsewhere commissioned a significant body of mosaics & other ritual & decorative objects for their synagogues. We consider both texts & material evidence to develop a more variegated picture of Jews & Judaism in late antiquity, with units on the liturgical poetry (piyyut) & mosaic art of the synagogue, apocalyptic literature & hekhalot texts, & the narrative midrash Pirqei Rabbi Eliezer, in their larger, primarily Christian, context.
