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Karaism: An Introduction to the Oldest Surviving Alternative Judaism (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Daniel J. LaskerFinalist for National Jewish Book Award for Scholarship 2022. Karaite Judaism emerged in the ninth century in the Islamic Middle East as an alternative to the rabbinic Judaism of the Jewish majority. Karaites reject the underlying assumption of rabbinic Judaism, namely, that Jewish practice is to be based on two divinely revealed Torahs, a written one, embodied in the Five Books of Moses, and an oral one, eventually written down in rabbinic literature. Karaites accept as authoritative only the Written Torah, as they understand it, and their form of Judaism therefore differs greatly from that of most Jews. Despite its permanent minority status, Karaism has been an integral part of the Jewish people continuously for twelve centuries. It has contributed greatly to Jewish cultural achievements, while providing a powerful intellectual challenge to the majority form of Judaism. This book is the first to present a comprehensive overview of the entire story of Karaite Judaism: its unclear origins; a Golden Age of Karaism in the Land of Israel; migrations through the centuries; Karaites in the Holocaust; unique Jewish religious practices, beliefs, and philosophy; biblical exegesis and literary accomplishments; polemics and historiography; and the present-day revival of the Karaite community in the State of Israel.
Ageing in Medieval Jewish Culture (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Elisha Russ-FishbaneThis is a seminal study of cultural attitudes to old age among Jews of the medieval Mediterranean and Near Eastern regions. Rigorously researched and accessibly written, it will appeal to scholars across a range of disciplines as well as to the broader public. While the focus is on Jewish society and culture, critical context regarding the social history of ageing is provided by comparative perspectives from the Muslim world as well as from Spain and Provence and other areas of Christian Europe that were in the Arabic Andalusian cultural orbit. The study draws on many literary genres and scholarly disciplines: philosophy and theology, ethics and law, biblical commentary, Hebrew poetry, medical literature, and a host of marriage contracts, personal letters, and family and communal records from the Cairo Genizah. The result is a nuanced portrait of ageing as both a lived reality and a cultural paradigm in medieval Jewish society.
Jewish Politics in Spinoza's Amsterdam (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Anne O. AlbertThis book untangles a web of ideas about politics, religion, exile, and community that emerged at a key moment in Jewish history and left a lasting mark on Jewish ideas. In the shadow of their former member Baruch Spinoza’s notoriety, and amid the aftermath of the Sabbatian messianic movement, the Spanish and Portuguese Jews of seventeenth-century Amsterdam underwent a conceptual shift that led them to treat their self-governed diaspora community as a commonwealth. Preoccupied by the question of why and how Jews should rule themselves in the absence of a biblical or messianic sovereign state or king, they forged a creative synthesis of insights from early modern Christian politics and Jewish law and traditions to assess and argue over their formidable communal government. In so doing they shaped a proud new theopolitical self-understanding of their community as analogous to a Christian state.Through readings of rarely studied sermons, commentaries, polemics, administrative records, and architecture, Anne Albert shows that a concentrated period of public Jewish political discourse among the community’s leaders and thinkers led to the formation of a strong image of itself as a totalizing, state-like entity—an image that eventually came to define its portrayal by twentieth-century historians. Her study presents a new perspective on a Jewish population that has long fascinated readers, as well as new evidence of Jewish reactions to Spinoza and Sabbatianism, and analyses the first Jewish reckoning with modern western political concepts.
Quakers and their Meeting Houses
by Chris SkidmoreThis book provides a fascinating account of the architecture and historical development of the Quaker meeting house from the foundation of the movement to the twenty-first century. The Quaker meeting house is a distinctive building type used as a place of worship by members of the Society of Friends (Quakers). Starting with buildings of the late-seventeenth century, the book maps how the changing beliefs and practices of Quakers over the last 350 years have affected the architecture of the meeting house. The buildings considered are illustrated, predominantly in colour, and are from England, Scotland and Wales, with some consideration of colonial American examples. The book commences with an introduction which provides an accessible account of the early history of Quakerism and it concludes with a consideration of whether there is a Quaker architectural style and of what it might consist.
Jews and the Wine Trade in Medieval Europe: Principles and Pressures (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Haym SoloveitchikAlthough Jews were at the centre of commercial activity in medieval Europe, a talmudic ban on any wine touched by a Gentile prevented them from engaging in the lucrative wine trade. Wine was consumed in vast quantities in the Middle Ages, and the banks of the Rhineland hosted some of the finest vineyards in northern Europe. German Jews were, until the thirteenth century, a merchant class. How could they abstain from trading in one of the region’s major commodities? In time, they ruled that it was permissible to accept wine in payment of debt, but forbade trading in it, and they maintained that ban throughout the Middle Ages. Further study in the twelfth century, however, led Talmudists to discover that Jews were only forbidden to profit from trading in Gentile wine if they dealt with idolaters, but that trade with Christians and Muslims was permitted. Nevertheless, the German community refused to take advantage of this clear licence. Using Jewish and Gentile sources, this study probes the sources of this powerful taboo. In describing the complex ways in which deeply held cultural values affect Jews’ engagement in the economy of the surrounding society, this book also illustrates the law of unintended consequences—how the ban on Gentile wine led both to a major Jewish contribution to German viticulture and to the involvement of Jews in moneylending, with all its tragic consequences.
Louis Jacobs and the Quest for a Contemporary Jewish Theology (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Miri Freud-KandelFor Louis Jacobs, the quest—the process of engaging with and thinking about Jewish faith—was a lifelong pursuit. He offered a model in the 1960s, a period characterized by general religious crisis, of an observant, committed, but intellectually curious Judaism that empowered individual seekers to address challenges to faith. In Orthodox Judaism at the time a battle was under way for religious control. Generating a widespread controversy in British Jewry known as the ‘Jacobs Affair’, his thought offers a lens for examining the trajectory of Orthodoxy. In a contemporary context marked by the changing cultural and intellectual concerns of a ‘post-secular’ age, the focus of some of these debates over religious control has shifted. Yet Jacobs’ emphasis on a personal quest is as relevant as ever, perhaps more so. This first book-length analysis of his theology unpacks the building blocks of his thought. It argues that, despite its particularities and limitations, his approach can provide a powerful model for contemporary religious seekers in the context of a growing impetus away from established, denominationally bound forms of religion. Many orthodox believers across a range of faiths continue to prefer the certainty of unquestionable religious truth claims rather than pursuing a subjective search for religious meaning. For those seeking alternative models for the contemporary Jewish quest, a reconsideration of Jacobs’ theology can offer valuable tools.
Hindu Goddesses: Beliefs & Practices (The Sussex Library of Religious Beliefs & Practice)
by Lynn FoulstonThis book explores the diversity of Hindu goddesses and the variety of ways in which they are worshiped. Although they undoubtedly have ancient origins, Hindu goddesses and their worship is still very much a part of the fabric of religious engagement in India today. The book offers an introduction to a complex and often baffling field of study. Part I, "Beliefs" provides a series of encounters with a range of Hindu goddesses starting with the idea of 'Goddess' as a philosophical concept. Topics include textual evidence for belief structures, goddess mythology, and the importance of 'the Goddess' in Tantrism. Part II, "Practices" leads the reader through the tangled web of goddess worship, pausing along the way to examine the contrast between temple and local worship, the splendour of festivals and the importance of pilgrimage to those places in India where goddesses are considered to reside. A Conclusion provides details of contemporary developments in goddess worship, such as the appearance of new deities who supply the needs of worshipers in the twenty-first century. No prior knowledge is necessary as the book is aimed at undergraduate students and anyone interested in the religions and philosophy of India.
The Human Phenomenon: Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, 2nd Edition
by Sarah Appleton-WeberThe Human Phenomenon by the priest, paleontologist, and geologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin is his book of the Earth, a discovery and an epic journey to open the way out for humanity in a time of world conflict and to release the spirit of the Earth. As Virgil led Dante, so Teilhard guides his reader back in spacetime to experience the birth of our planet as it emprisons the human future in its globe and motion, then forward, through the emergence of life, the birth of thought and socialization, and the unique mode of human unfolding as humanity covers the whole planet in an entirely new membrane, the Noosphere.
Isaac Aboab da Fonseca: Jewish Leadership in the New World
by Moises OrfaliFrom 1642 to 1654 Isaac Aboab da Fonseca was the hakham (Torah scholar) and spiritual leader of the oldest Jewish community in the New World. As a Hebrew grammarian, a poet, and a mystic, as well as an excellent and very popular preacher, Aboab da Fonseca (born 1605) was not only one of the most interesting Jewish personalities of the seventeenth century, but his writings are an invaluable historical resource with regard to many aspects of Jewish life in Dutch Colonial Brazil, the local attitudes towards Jews, and corroboration of events outlined in contemporary literary sources. His forebears were so-called New Christians, having undergone compulsory conversion to Catholicism in Portugal. In order to be able to live freely as professing Jews, the family moved in about 1612 to Amsterdam. There, Hakham Isaac Uziel of Fez became his Talmud teacher; among his colleagues was Menasseh Ben Israel. In 1638 he was confirmed as one of the four hakhamim of the new congregation Talmud Torah of Amsterdam. In 1641/42 he accepted the nomination for hakham of the growing Jewish community in Recife, Brazil, where he was in charge of all rabbinical functions and gave lectures in Talmud and Hebrew. In the interim he wrote the Hebrew grammar Melekhet ha-Dikduk, published here in translation for the first time. Aboab da Fonseca enjoyed a few prosperous years until the Portuguese rebellion caused the economic ruin of the Jews of Dutch Brazil. His salary much reduced, he nevertheless remained to lead and help his people until the occupation of Recife by Brazilian-Portuguese troops on January 26, 1654. Upon returning to Amsterdam, his inclination toward mysticism made him one of the leading believers in the false messiah Shabbetai Zvi. But his writing and scholarship remained undiminished: In 1646 he wrote Zekher asiti leniflaot El, in which he described events in Dutch Brazil after the outbreak of the war; he also published a Hebrew translation of the Spanish cabbalistic works of Abraham Cohen Herrera, Casa de Dios y Puerta del Cielo, under the title Shaar ha-Shamayim (The Gate of Heaven). This first scholarly monograph on Isaac Aboab da Fonseca and his intellectual and spiritual contributions, includes discussion of his commentary on the Pentateuch entitled Parafrasis Comentada sobre el Pentateuco, as well as a consideration of Aboab's involvement in the ban of Spinoza.
Is He Out There?: Debating The God Delusion
by Paul LaffanIs He Out There? is an interdisciplinary examination of the Christian reaction to Dawkinss The God Delusion. That reaction has offered a wide range of counter-arguments, among them: that Dawkinss demonstration of how God almost certainly doesnt exist addresses an out-dated conception of God; that science and religion are not conflictual as Dawkins contends and indeed may well be converging upon an understanding of how God acts in the universe; that Dawkinss denigration of the Bible depends on an overly literal reading; and that Dawkins assumes a narrative of progress in which human beings take the place of God in controlling the course of history. Is He Out There? responds to these arguments in the context of current scientific understanding, biblical criticism and philosophy. Paul Laffan demonstrates how the desire to meet the challenge posed by Dawkinss viewpoint has led to the perversion of scientific theories and accepted positions in other important fields of inquiry. It suggests that Christianity is wedded to a God who is the cause of the universe a classical conception of cause that is anachronistic; that denying the Bible was read for most of the Christian era as offering a literal account of divine creation is a significant misrepresentation of doctrinal history; and that a complete dismissal of progress requires the dismissal of scientific achievement. The author considers the extent to which attractive, secular values like tolerance and freedom of opinion are Christian in source and whether moral systems require God to underwrite them. The wide-ranging nature of Is He Out There? not only provides a review of the state of contemporary Christian apology but is a measured address of the arguments put forward in The God Delusion and indeed of the substantive commentary on Dawkinss thesis.
Light of Zen in the West: Incorporating 'The Supreme Doctrine' and 'The Realization of the Self'
by Graham RoothThis Centenary Commemorative Edition also includes two lesser known works Buddha and the Intuition of the Universal and Techniques of Timeless Realization. The volume is complemented by a detailed Glossary, an Index, an Original Foreword by Aldous Huxley (1955), an Original Preface by Swami Siddheswarananda (1955), and a Contemporary Foreword by Professor Asanga Tilakaratne. Benoits writings on the human predicament and the path to inner freedom were influenced by his studies in Zen Buddhism and psychoanalysis. There is, as well, an evident dialogue in Benoits writings between the Gurdjieff teaching and Zen, with insightful ideas about universal laws, inner work, the human machine, and work in life. The Supreme Doctrine and The Realization of the Self foreshadow contemporary transpersonal and integral psychology: through the re-integration of psychology and metaphysics, Benoit invites us to make our own journey toward spiritual transformation and the intuitive understanding of universal truths. This Centenary Commemorative Edition also includes two lesser known works Buddha and the Intuition of the Universal and Techniques of Timeless Realization. The volume is complemented by a detailed Glossary, an Index, an Original Foreword by Aldous Huxley (1955), an Original Preface by Swami Siddheswarananda (1955), and a Contemporary Foreword by Professor Asanga Tilakaratne.
Ten Myths About the Jews
by Maria Luiza CarneiroTen Myths about the Jews analyzes the complex facets of anti-Semitism and anti-Judaism in an accessible and easy-to-read format. Based on wide research, Brazilian historian Maria Luiza Tucci Carneiro examines different manifestations against Jews and their faith through history and political culture along the centuries. Ten omnipresent accusations were configured by anti-Semites in axioms that became myths: Myth 1: The Jews killed Christ. Myth 2: The Jews are a secret entity. Myth 3: The Jews control the world economy. Myth 4: There are no poor Jews. Myth 5: The Jews are greedy. Myth 6: The Jews have no homeland. Myth 7: The Jews are racists. Myth 8: The Jews are parasites. Myth 9: The Jews control the media. Myth 10: The Jews manipulate the United States. Tucci Carneiro unmasks the roots of anti-Semitism and exposes contemporary prejudices. Her book is an invitation to reflect upon current realities marked by racism and shows how the main myths about the Jews have been vested of a verisimilitude that has persisted for the last 2000 years, all over the world, by means of hatred of the other, political/religious opportunism and economic deceit. The myths are kept alive by means of constant repetition and re-elaboration of a particular narrative, invariably seductive. The author proves each of the ten myths in terms of their historical record, their origins and purposes. Even though Jews are fully integrated into western society in multiple ways (entrepreneurship, medicine, literature, philosophy, the arts), racist myths against the community have been particularly resilient; they attempt to override common sense and their continuous circulation and rehashing through scapegoating and caricature has had profound negative repercussions for society as a whole. Ten Myths, now published in five languages, is an essential tool in the struggle against the discourse of racist hatred.
In the Shadow of Sinai: Stories of Travel and Biblical Research
by Agnes Smith LewisIN THE SHADOW OF SINAI: A STORY OF TRAVEL AND RESEARCH FROM 1895-1897 and HOW THE CODEX WAS FOUND: A NARRATIVE OF TWO VISITS TO SINAI: FROM MRS LEWIS'S JOURNALS, 1892-1893—published here in a new one-volume edition—were originally published in the late 1890's, to great acclaim. They are not only interesting and witty travelogues, but they are also a superb record of the discovery of the Syriac palimpsest, and a narrative of the journeys and adventures surrounding that research. The text describes a very remarkable variant of the reported spoken word of Jesus Christ (Matthew xii: 36), which will be of interest to all Christians and scholars.
The Plight of Jewish Deserted Wives, 1851-1900: A Social History of East European Agunah
by Dr Haim SperberAgunot (Agunah, sing., meaning anchored in Hebrew) is a Jewish term describing women who cannot remarry because their husband has disappeared. According to Jewish law (Halacha) a woman can get out of the marriage only if the husband releases her by granting a divorce writ (Get), if he dies, or if his whereabouts is not known. Women whose husbands cannot be located, and who have not been granted a Get, are considered Agunot. The Agunah phenomenon was of major concern in East European Jewry and much referred to in Hebrew and Yiddish media and fiction. Most nineteenth-century Agunot cases came from Eastern Europe, where most Jews resided (twentieth-century Agunot were primarily in North America, and will be the subject of a forthcoming book). Seven variations of Agunot have been identified: Deserted wives; women who refused to receive, or were not granted, a Get; widowed women whose brothers-in-law refused to grant them permission to marry someone else (Halitza); women whose husbands remains were not found; improperly or incorrectly written Gets; women whose husbands became mentally ill and were not competent to grant a Get; women refused a Get by husbands who had converted to Christianity or Islam. The book explores the reasons for desertion and the plight of the left-alone wife. Key is the change from a legal issue to a social one, with changing attitudes to philanthropy and public opinion at the fore of explanation. A statistical database of circa 5000 identified Agunot is to be published simultaneously in a separate companion volume (978-1-78976-167-2).
Wilderness as Metaphor for God in the Hebrew Bible
by Robert Miller IIThe ancient Israelite authors of the Hebrew Bible were not philosophers, so what they could not say about God in logical terms, they expressed through metaphor and imagery. To present God in His most impenetrable otherness, the image they chose was the desert. The desert was Ancient Israels southern frontier, an unknown region that was always elsewhere: from that elsewhere, God has come -- God came from the South (Hab 3:3); God, when you marched from the desert (Ps 68:8); from his southland mountain slopes (Deut 33:2). Robert Miller explores this imagery, shedding light on what the biblical authors meant by associating God with deserts to the south of Israel and Judah. Biblical authors knew of its climate, flora, and fauna, and understood this magnificent desert landscape as a fascinating place of literary paradox. This divine desert was far from lifeless, its plants and animals were tenacious, bizarre, fierce, even supernatural. The spiritual importance of the desert in a biblical context begins with the physical elements whose impact cognitive science can elucidate. Travellers and naturalists of the past two millennia have experienced this and other wildernesses, and their testimonies provide a window into Israel's experience of the desert. A prime focus is the existential experience encountered. Confronting the desert's enigmatic wildness, its melding of the known and unknown, leads naturally to spiritual experience. The books panoramic view of biblical spirituality of the desert is illustrated by the ways spiritual writers -- from Biblical Times to the Desert Fathers to German Mysticism -- have employed the images therefrom. Revelation and renewal are just two of many themes. Folklore of the Ancient Near East, and indeed elsewhere, that deals with the desert / wilderness archetype has been explored via Jungian psychology, Goethean Science, enunciative linguistics, and Hebrew philology. These philosophies contribute to this exploration of the Hebrew Bible's desert metaphor for God.
Jews in Muslim Lands, 1750–1830: Volume I: The Ottoman Middle East (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Yaron TsurThis fascinating tour of the Jewish communities of the Ottoman Middle East, on the eve of the changes that would come to unsettle the Ottoman territories, reveals a surprisingly varied world. Visiting Istanbul, Damascus, Acre, Jerusalem, Aleppo, Basra, and Cairo, we see different landscapes, meet diverse Jewish societies, and encounter the range of their economic activities. We also see how Christians and Jews struggled with each other to establish their position in the Muslim world and secure their livelihood. In the process, the author reconsiders fundamental questions. What is a ‘diaspora’? To what extent did the surrounding culture impact the Jewish communities of the area? And, most interestingly, how did these communities respond to the onset of modernity? Though relating to Jewish society in its entirety, the main focus is on its most powerful members: the notables, who were close to the ruling elite or involved in international trade. Tsur discusses their strengths and weaknesses, considers the relationship between their position and that of the rest of the Jewish community, and analyses their eventual downfall. His study offers new insights into the social mechanisms that enabled them to establish close ties with the ruling elite and to function within it.
Desire and Disunity: Christian Communities and Sexual Norms in the Late Antique West (Studies in Medieval and Early Modern Belief and Culture)
by Ulriika VihervalliAn Open Access edition will be available on publication thanks to the kind sponsorship of the libraries participating in the Jisc Open Access Community Framework OpenUP initiative. Desire and Disunity explores the struggles of Christianising late ancient sexuality in the late Roman West. Through an examination of fourth to sixth century sermons, letters, laws, and treatises in Latin-speaking communities, the difficulties of late antique clerics in moving ascetically influenced sexual ideals into wider practice become evident. Western clerics faced challenges on several fronts: the dedication and devoutness of lay Christians varied, while the military-political upheavals of the fifth century created new challenges and opportunities for influencing one’s flock. Furthermore, Roman sexual norms continued to inform the thinking of many clerics and lay figures alike, even when in opposition to more scripturally based moral reasoning. Problems of bigamy, concubinage, sex work, incest, homosexual acts, adultery, and more troubled western Christian communities, with contradicting rules and traditions on what was acceptable and what was not. What reach did elite clerical perspectives on sexual norms have amongst the non-elite? How did clerics navigate tensions between the idealisation of Christian communal purity and the actions of congregants that fell short of these ideals? What influenced clerical perceptions of sex and how did they articulate these ideas to their audiences? Clerical sources of this time reflect these challenges as well as varying church attempts to reform the sex lives of their congregants – and, indeed, church failure in doing so.
The Huguenots in Later Stuart Britain: Volume III: The Huguenots and the Defeat of Louis XIV's France
by Robin GwynnThe Revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685 was enacted within France, but shook all Europe. This was especially true in Britain, by 1700 the home of the largest concentration of Huguenot refugees. Recent historians have dismissed religious persecution as irrelevant to French economic and political decline from the 1680s. This volume, though, shows the refugees played a central role in France’s economic woes and Louis XIV’s eventual defeat as they helped pave the way for William III’s initial success in England in 1688, then assisted in the consolidation of his power. Using markedly different sets of primary sources, the book establishes three key conclusions. First, the importance of the refugees in relation to the Glorious Revolution in England. Second, the vital contribution of Huguenot soldiers in Ireland, especially at the bloodiest battle of the Irish wars at Aughrim in 1691, which was definitive in a way the better-known battle of the Boyne was not. Third, the significance of the close connections between the French Church of London at Threadneedle Street and the foundation of the Bank of England in 1694 and its survival through its troubled early years. Without the persecutions in France, William would not have succeeded in his near-bloodless invasion of England, which for the first time enabled a coalition that the French king could not simply browbeat and dominate. Nor could William have thereafter secured his position militarily and financially in time to check Louis and establish the foundations for later English successes. Louis XIV’s treatment of the Huguenots was fundamental both to his eventual defeat, and to Britain’s rising power in the early eighteenth century.
Œuvres complètes de Voltaire: Lettres sur les Anglais (III) (Œuvres complètes de Voltaire (Complete Works of Voltaire) #6C)
by VoltairePart of the complete works of the French philosopher, historian and social reformer, Voltaire, in which he uses the example of the English to show the connections between religious tolerance, political freedom and international trade. For students and scholars of the 18th-century Enlightenment.
Œuvres complètes de Voltaire: Religious works of 1776 (Œuvres complètes de Voltaire (Complete Works of Voltaire) #79B)
by VoltairePart of the complete works of the French philosopher, historian and social reformer, Voltaire. Contains the author's last great works dealing with religion, in which he aims at the final destruction of Christian superstition, and religious intolerance. For students and scholars of the 18th-century Enlightenment.
Œuvres complètes de Voltaire: Fragments divers (Œuvres complètes de Voltaire (Complete Works of Voltaire) #84)
by VoltairePart of the complete works of the French philosopher, historian and social reformer, Voltaire. This volume brings together a range of miscellaneous short texts by Voltaire, mostly undated, and principally manuscript fragments that shed light on his working methods. For students and scholars of the 18th-century Enlightenment.
Covenant and World Religions: Irving Greenberg, Jonathan Sacks, and the Quest for Orthodox Pluralism (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Alon Goshen-GottsteinA new paradigm for relations between religions, one of acceptance and collaboration, requires not only a willingness to move beyond a tradition of hostility and competition but also significant theological rethinking. Within Jewish Orthodoxy there have been very few voices that have advanced and justified a vision of other faiths in this light: to this day, the reigning paradigm is one of practical collaboration while avoiding theologically based engagement or reflection. Two of the most important Orthodox Jewish voices advocating change have been those of Irving Yitz Greenberg and Jonathan Sacks. This book presents the theological, moral, and social views of these two leading rabbis. It focuses on the significance of covenant for both, and how they adapt this concept to enable the development of a Jewish view of other religions. In considering how they may have influenced each other, it also studies the limitations and internal contradictions that characterize their work as they attempt to point the way forward, in a spirit of dialogue, to continuing theological reflection on Judaism’s approach to world religions.
Must a Jew Believe Anything? (The Littman Library of Jewish Civilization)
by Menachem KellnerThe crucial question for today's Jewish world, Menachem Kellner argues, is not whether Jews will have Jewish grandchildren, but how many different sorts of mutually exclusive Judaisms those grandchildren will face. Kellner’s short, brisk, and accessible book examines how the split that threatens the Jewish future can be avoided. The first six chapters of this strongly argued book analyse what religious faith means in classical Judaism and will be of interest to anyone seeking lucid insights into the nature of Judaism. The final chapter builds upon the conclusions of the first six in order to argue for a new way of construing the relationship of Orthodoxy to non-Orthodox Jews and institutions. Kellner argues that the Orthodox practice of framing the debate with non-Orthodox movements in terms of dogmatic fidelity contrasted with heresy is not the traditional Jewish approach, and that the debate could well be framed in other ways, ways that would allow all Jews to work together towards a less polarized Jewish future. Undoubtedly, Must a Jew Believe Anything? has the potential to make a difference to how Orthodoxy understands itself and its relationship to other Jewish movements in the modern world. For the second edition, the author has added a substantial Afterword, reviewing his thinking on the subject and addressing the reactions to the original edition.
Secularization and the World Religions
The question of religion, its contemporary and future significance and its role in society and state is currently perceived as an urgent one by many and is widely discussed within the public sphere. But it has also long been one of the core topics of the historically oriented social sciences. The immense stock of knowledge furnished by the history of religion and religious studies, theology, sociology and history has to be introduced into the public conscience today. This can promote greater awareness of the contemporary global religious situation and its links with politics and economics and counter rash syntheses such as the “clash of civilizations”. This volume is concerned with the connections between religions and the social world and with the extent, limits, and future of secularization. The first part deals with major religious traditions and their explicit or implicit ideas about the individual, social and political order. The second part gives an overview of the religious situation in important geographical areas. Additional contributions analyze the legal organization of the relationship between state and religion in a global perspective and the role of the natural sciences in the process of secularization. The contributors are internationally renowned scholars like Winfried Brugger, José Casanova, Friedrich Wilhelm Graf, Hans Joas, Hans G. Kippenberg, Gudrun Krämer, David Martin, Eckart Otto and Rudolf Wagner.
Polin: Polish-Jewish Relations in North America (Polin: Studies in Polish Jewry #19)
Poland today is a very different country from the Poland of the past, yet attitudes inherited from the past continue to affect Polish–Jewish relations in the present. In Poland itself, now a free society, memories of the Jewish place in Poland’s history, long suppressed by communism, are being re-evaluated. In America the attitudes that had divided the two sides in the Old Country seemed for a long time to be becoming more entrenched. This volume—probably the first comprehensive study of Polish–Jewish relations in North America—explores how this situation came about, and also considers the efforts being made to put the resentments caused by past conflicts to one side as the influences long dominant in the Polish–Jewish relationship in North America begin to lose their formative power. The contributors deal boldly with matters at the heart of the relationship. There is an attempt to quantify the attitudes of both sides to a number of key aspects of the Holocaust, and fascinating questions are raised about how the Holocaust has distorted the perceptions that Poles and Jews have of each other, and why the Holocaust remains a problem in Polish–Jewish relations. Stereotyping is confronted head-on. There is an investigation of how crude stereotypes of Polish peasants have found their way into Jewish history textbooks, crucially affecting the disposition of American Jews towards Poland, and of how the stereotyped world of the shtetl still haunts the American Jewish imagination, with great consequences for attitudes to Poles and Polish Americans. The way in which this stereotype is challenged by realities encountered in the context of the March of the Living is provocatively discussed, along with the options for dealing with a landscape ‘poor in Jews, but rich in Jewish ruins’. A number of chapters describe attempts to overcome mutual stereotyping, including a detailed and valuable account of the National Polish American–Jewish American Council, and of the attempts that have been made to steer the Jedwabne debate in a constructive direction. These small beginnings show that it is possible to go beyond past differences and to concentrate instead on what has linked Poles and Jews in their long history. As in earlier volumes of Polin, substantial space is given, in ‘New Views’, to recent research in other areas of Polish–Jewish studies.