Jacob Neusner, one of the world's foremost scholars of rabbinical texts, has died aged 84.
The New York-based Conservative rabbi and professor was behind the publication of almost 1,000 books.
His translations of the Talmud - both the Babylonian and Jerusalem versions - were just one aspect of his work, which also covered Jewish-Christian relations, the Holocaust, contemporary American Judaism and numerous other topics.
Pope Benedict, when he was a cardinal, lauded Dr Neusner's 1993 work in which the American scholar imagined himself holding a theological discussion with Jesus.
