Great Assembly” are a fiction of Pharisaic erudition, invented to bridge the gap between prophecy and Pharisaic Judaism. This invention gives insight into the beginnings of that movement, and the tradition shows that there was a problem regarding the public use of the Song and its place among the Holy Writings (which were read in public). The well-known discussion in the Mishnah tractate Yadayim, whether the Song “imparts uncleanness to the hands,”57 does not appear to be a question about canonicity