"A Nation of Philosophers" is the description given by the Hellenistic Greek thinkers to the Jews when the Greeks and Jews first encountered each other, c.300BCE. By this era, after the destruction of the First Temple and Jerusalem, 586 BCE, great changes had taken place in Judaism.
"A Nation of Philosophers" probes this mysterious and controversial transition. At first flirting with the modern, the universal, then in rejection and renunciation, the Jews became the "People of the Book," turning inward to the moral roots of YHWH's teachings as given to Moses. Now, once more an alien people, they could only search their sacred writings for meaning. Thus the Talmud was created. With it the Jews gave new moral and intellectual depth to their role as a people chosen by God.