The Concise Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (1993 page)

Title of leading Jewish sages of the Babylonian
academies
. Only two are mentioned by name in the
Talmud
, R. Na
man b. Isaac (
BBB
22a) and R.
Abbahu
(
B.Hul
. 49a).

 
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(Heb.,
she’elot u-teshuvot
, ‘questions and answers’). Exchanges of letters primarily on Jewish
halakhic
matters. From the
geonic
period, the
oral law
was largely disseminated throughout the
diaspora
by means of responsa. The geonic responsa were copied and sometimes collected into
kovazim
(‘collections’). Unlike the geonim, the
rishonim
sometimes indicated doubt and used such expressions as ‘in my humble opinion’ or ‘requires further thought’. Orthodox rabbinic authorities have continued to give responsa to this day (
aharonim
), and the responsa literature provides an important source for the social history of the various Jewish communities through the ages.

 
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Restoration movements
.

A tendency, in Christianity, to turn away from established churches and to seek to ‘restore’ what is taken to be primitive or original Christianity. Frequently associated with
charismatic
gifts and
millennial
expectations, examples are the Church of the
Latter Day Saints
, or the House Church movement.

 
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(Lat.,
resurgo
, ‘I arise’). The destiny of the dead in the restoration to them of bodies through which their continuing identity can be expressed. The belief occurs especially in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. In Judaism, the belief that people will ultimately be raised from the dead is not found in the Hebrew scriptures until the end of the biblical period. However, by the
rabbinic
period, the doctrine had become a central tenet of the Jewish religion. In rabbinic thought the doctrine involved reward and punishment for the whole nation, and a belief that body and
soul
are indivisible and both will be resurrected. Later Jewish philosophers continued to disagree on the details. In general,
Progressive Judaism
has abandoned the doctrine of the resurrection of the body in favour of belief in the immortality of the soul, but it remains a basic tenet of
Orthodoxy
.
In Christianity, the belief in resurrection rests partly in the teaching attributed to Jesus and in the debates in the Jewish context of the time, but much more in the
resurrection
of Christ. This produced the traditional teaching that at the
parousia
of Christ departed souls will be restored to a bodily life, and the saved will enter in this renewed form upon the life of heaven.
For Resurrection in Islam (Arab.,
ba‘th
,
nush
r
), see
YAUM AL-QIY
MA
;
YAUM AL-DIN
.

 
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