<HTML>Please excuse the length of this response.
You ask:
Why has Gemara become the centerpiece (oftentimes to the exclusion of all
else) of higher education in the religious world?
The talmudic scheme of education (le'olam yeshaleish adam middotav, etc.)
recommends equal portions of Mikra, Mishna and Gemara. This prescription
was intended for, and suited, an agrarian society. Farmers work hard, but
only during daylight hours--which gives them ample daily study time, and
they work seasonally--which frees them for extensive study during the
agriculturally fallow months, which happen to be Elul and Adar--hence
their selection as yarhei kalla.
This was fine as long as most Jews were farmers.
This situation changed beginning with the Arab conquest of Persia (Bavel,
the largest concentration of Jews in the world) in the 8th century. In
order to encourage the native Zoroastrians to convert to Islam (they could
not be forcibly converted because, like Jews and Christians, they were
"people of the book" and granted religious freedom by the Qur'an), the
Arabs strictly limited land ownership to Muslims. The Persians converted
to keep their land, the Jews gave up their land, moved into the cities and
became merchants.
They were now confronted with the predicament of having a traditional
threefold curriculum with only one-third the time available previously for
study.
Their dilemma was addressed to Rav Natronai Gaon in the form of a she'elah
lehalakhah: Should they continue to study Mikra, Mishnah and Gemara
equally in spite of the severe restrictions now placed upon their leisure
time? His response, in the form of a teshuvah (appearing in Otzar haGeonim
ed. Lyk) was to revise the curriculum so that all available study time
would be focused on one subject. The question was: Which one? He replied
that the study of Mikra excluded both Mishnah and Gemara, and that of
Mishnah incorporated some Mikra but still excluded Gemara. The study of
Gemara, on the other hand, incorporated both Mikra and Mishnah, so that is
what he recommended.
In addition, he cited a homily based on the verse in Kohelet: "kol
ha-nehalim holkhim el ha-yam," declaring Mikra and Mishnah to be "nehalim"
and the gemara a "yam" which is surely amongst the earliest references or
allusions to "yam ha-talmud."
This means that the total concentration on Talmud was a "hora'at sha`ah."
The proof is that if we look at the "Golden Age," a period in which the
Jews who were the direct heirs of the communities of Bavel recovered the
ample leisure time they had previously lost, we see that, in general, they
reverted back to the original curriculum studying not only Gemara but also
Mikra and (more to the point!) Mishnah.
This was not universal, however, as testified to by references in Ibn
Jannah's "Sefer haRikmah" to the "ba`alei halakah veTalmud" who disparaged
the study of Hebrew grammar and philology, calling it "almost heretical,"
and to a comparable reference in the commentary of Rabbi Yosef Kara (of
Northern France) in which he refers to halakhists and Talmudists who "make
fun of peshat."
I've already written too much, so I'll close with the observation that
Rabbi Eliach's modest proposal for a perek Tanakh yomi would bring us much
closer to what Hazal originally intended for us to study, than does the
current preoccupation--bordering on obsession--with Talmud.
Moshe</HTML>
