Adiel Schremer
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195383775
- eISBN:
- 9780199777280
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195383775.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion in the Ancient World
This book seeks to reconstruct the earliest rabbinic discourse of minut (frequently understood as the Hebrew equivalent of the Christian term “heresy”), and to reassess the place that early ...
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This book seeks to reconstruct the earliest rabbinic discourse of minut (frequently understood as the Hebrew equivalent of the Christian term “heresy”), and to reassess the place that early Christianity occupied in that discourse. It suggests that the emergence of the rabbinic discourse of religious identity was a response to an identity crisis of a post-traumatic society, shattered by the powerful Roman empire. In order to re-affirm its values and distinct Jewish identity Palestinian rabbinic society developed a discourse of “heresy,” in which its religious boundaries were re-established by the labeling of some Jews as minim, and their placement beyond the pale. That discourse emphasized notions of social and communal solidarity and belonging, much more than a strictly defined concept of “correct belief,” and minim, accordingly, were Jews who's fault was seen in their separation from the rest of the Jewish community. The place that Christianity occupied in that discourse was relatively small, and the early Christians, who only gradually were introduced into the category of minim and became to be considered as such, were not its main target. Throughout Late Antiquity, the “significant other” for Palestinian Rabbis remained the Roman Empire, and the religious challenge with which they were mostly occupied was the Empire's power and the challenge it posed to the belief in God's power and His divinity.Less
This book seeks to reconstruct the earliest rabbinic discourse of minut (frequently understood as the Hebrew equivalent of the Christian term “heresy”), and to reassess the place that early Christianity occupied in that discourse. It suggests that the emergence of the rabbinic discourse of religious identity was a response to an identity crisis of a post-traumatic society, shattered by the powerful Roman empire. In order to re-affirm its values and distinct Jewish identity Palestinian rabbinic society developed a discourse of “heresy,” in which its religious boundaries were re-established by the labeling of some Jews as minim, and their placement beyond the pale. That discourse emphasized notions of social and communal solidarity and belonging, much more than a strictly defined concept of “correct belief,” and minim, accordingly, were Jews who's fault was seen in their separation from the rest of the Jewish community. The place that Christianity occupied in that discourse was relatively small, and the early Christians, who only gradually were introduced into the category of minim and became to be considered as such, were not its main target. Throughout Late Antiquity, the “significant other” for Palestinian Rabbis remained the Roman Empire, and the religious challenge with which they were mostly occupied was the Empire's power and the challenge it posed to the belief in God's power and His divinity.
Byron L. Sherwin
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- February 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195336238
- eISBN:
- 9780199868520
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195336238.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
Recent sociological studies have confirmed the persistence of profound internal challenges to the continuity of Judaism as a religion and to the Jews as a people. These challenges are eroding the ...
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Recent sociological studies have confirmed the persistence of profound internal challenges to the continuity of Judaism as a religion and to the Jews as a people. These challenges are eroding the foundations of Jewish identity and are threatening the authenticity of Judaism as a historical living faith-tradition. This work “makes the case” for a return to Jewish theology as a means of restoring Jewish authenticity and for reversing self-destructive trends. After identifying and critiquing various “substitute faiths” embraced by many contemporary Jews in Chapters One and Two, the nature and goals of Jewish theology are examined (Chapter Three). Rather than depicting theology as “faith seeking understanding,” the chapters that follow present a comprehensive theology of Judaism, deeply rooted in classical Jewish texts, and an understanding of theology as “faith seeking meaning (Chapter Four). Rather than portraying theology, as often has been the case, as a systematic creed imposed from without, theology is presented here as an outcome of the dialogue between an individual's quest for meaning and the spiritual and intellectual resources of a historical faith-tradition—in this case, Judaism. Features of faith such as living in a covenantal relationship (Chapter Five), seeking a rendezvous with God in the self, the sacred word, the world, and the sacred and ethical deed, are offered as paths to individual meaning and to creating one's life as a work of art (Chapter Six), despite the challenges of evil and absurdity encountered in daily experience (Chapters Seven and Eight).Less
Recent sociological studies have confirmed the persistence of profound internal challenges to the continuity of Judaism as a religion and to the Jews as a people. These challenges are eroding the foundations of Jewish identity and are threatening the authenticity of Judaism as a historical living faith-tradition. This work “makes the case” for a return to Jewish theology as a means of restoring Jewish authenticity and for reversing self-destructive trends. After identifying and critiquing various “substitute faiths” embraced by many contemporary Jews in Chapters One and Two, the nature and goals of Jewish theology are examined (Chapter Three). Rather than depicting theology as “faith seeking understanding,” the chapters that follow present a comprehensive theology of Judaism, deeply rooted in classical Jewish texts, and an understanding of theology as “faith seeking meaning (Chapter Four). Rather than portraying theology, as often has been the case, as a systematic creed imposed from without, theology is presented here as an outcome of the dialogue between an individual's quest for meaning and the spiritual and intellectual resources of a historical faith-tradition—in this case, Judaism. Features of faith such as living in a covenantal relationship (Chapter Five), seeking a rendezvous with God in the self, the sacred word, the world, and the sacred and ethical deed, are offered as paths to individual meaning and to creating one's life as a work of art (Chapter Six), despite the challenges of evil and absurdity encountered in daily experience (Chapters Seven and Eight).
Yossi Shain
- Published in print:
- 2007
- Published Online:
- September 2007
- ISBN:
- 9780195307221
- eISBN:
- 9780199785513
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195307221.003.0006
- Subject:
- Religion, Religion and Society
This chapter examines the relationship between the American Jewish community and Israel from the perspective of a transnational struggle over Jewish pluralism. The question of Jewish identity in ...
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This chapter examines the relationship between the American Jewish community and Israel from the perspective of a transnational struggle over Jewish pluralism. The question of Jewish identity in Israel and in the United States, the continuing insistence of many Jewish Americans on perceiving Israel as a critical source of their own identity, and Israel's direct or indirect involvement in the lives of all Jewish communities create a dynamic in which reciprocal influences mutually constitute Jewish identity. The new modes of Jewish American participation in Israeli affairs — domestic and international, on the one hand, and Israeli rethinking of its own position vis-à-vis the Diaspora in terms of legitimacy, status, power, and identity, on the other — has opened the way for greater negotiation over, and coordination of, the meaning and purpose of Judaism in our time.Less
This chapter examines the relationship between the American Jewish community and Israel from the perspective of a transnational struggle over Jewish pluralism. The question of Jewish identity in Israel and in the United States, the continuing insistence of many Jewish Americans on perceiving Israel as a critical source of their own identity, and Israel's direct or indirect involvement in the lives of all Jewish communities create a dynamic in which reciprocal influences mutually constitute Jewish identity. The new modes of Jewish American participation in Israeli affairs — domestic and international, on the one hand, and Israeli rethinking of its own position vis-à-vis the Diaspora in terms of legitimacy, status, power, and identity, on the other — has opened the way for greater negotiation over, and coordination of, the meaning and purpose of Judaism in our time.
Gail Gaisin Glicksman and Allen Glicksman
David E. Guinn (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- September 2006
- ISBN:
- 9780195178739
- eISBN:
- 9780199784943
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0195178734.003.0016
- Subject:
- Religion, Philosophy of Religion
In recent years a new approach to the study of religion in the social sciences has emerged. It differs from the classical approach in four important ways. First, it treats all specific religious ...
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In recent years a new approach to the study of religion in the social sciences has emerged. It differs from the classical approach in four important ways. First, it treats all specific religious traditions as subsets or specific expressions of some underlying domain that is universal across all groups. Second this new approach treats religion as generally beneficent, and in this way it differs from both those theoreticians like Durkheim and Weber, who saw a more complex relationship between religion and society, and those such as Marx and Freud, who generally took a negative view of the effect of religion. Third, adherents of this new approach claim to be able to identify a therapeutic effect of religion on the physical and mental health of individuals, treating religion as a “health behavior”. This chapter asks whether this new approach accomplishes the goals of its proponents. It examines the Jewish identities felt by American Jews sixty-five years of age and older as a test case.Less
In recent years a new approach to the study of religion in the social sciences has emerged. It differs from the classical approach in four important ways. First, it treats all specific religious traditions as subsets or specific expressions of some underlying domain that is universal across all groups. Second this new approach treats religion as generally beneficent, and in this way it differs from both those theoreticians like Durkheim and Weber, who saw a more complex relationship between religion and society, and those such as Marx and Freud, who generally took a negative view of the effect of religion. Third, adherents of this new approach claim to be able to identify a therapeutic effect of religion on the physical and mental health of individuals, treating religion as a “health behavior”. This chapter asks whether this new approach accomplishes the goals of its proponents. It examines the Jewish identities felt by American Jews sixty-five years of age and older as a test case.
Edith Bruder
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780195333565
- eISBN:
- 9780199868889
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195333565.001.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
Over the last several decades, an astonishing phenomenon has developed: a Jewish rebirth of sorts occurring throughout Africa. Different ethnic groups proclaim that they are returning to long ...
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Over the last several decades, an astonishing phenomenon has developed: a Jewish rebirth of sorts occurring throughout Africa. Different ethnic groups proclaim that they are returning to long forgotten Jewish roots and African clans trace their lineage to the Lost Tribes of Israel. This book addresses the elaboration and the development of Jewish identities by Africans. Africans have encountered Jewish myths and traditions in multiple forms and under a number of situations. The context and circumstances of these encounters produced a series of influences that gradually led, within some African societies, to the elaboration of a new Jewish identity connected with that of the Diaspora. The book presents one by one the different groups of Black Jews from western central, eastern, and southern Africa, and the ways in which they have used and imagined their oral history and traditional customs to construct a distinct Jewish identity. The purpose of the book is to review the processes and immensely complex interactions which shaped these new religious identities. It explores the way in which Africans have interacted with the ancient mythological sub-strata of both western and Africans idea of Jews in order to create a distinct Jewish identity. It particularly seeks to identify and to assess colonial influences and their internalization by African societies in the shaping of new African religious identities. Along with these notions the book examines how, in the absence of recorded African history, the eminently malleable accounts of Jewish lineage developed by African groups inspired by Judaism co-exist with the possible historical traces of a Jewish presence in Africa.Less
Over the last several decades, an astonishing phenomenon has developed: a Jewish rebirth of sorts occurring throughout Africa. Different ethnic groups proclaim that they are returning to long forgotten Jewish roots and African clans trace their lineage to the Lost Tribes of Israel. This book addresses the elaboration and the development of Jewish identities by Africans. Africans have encountered Jewish myths and traditions in multiple forms and under a number of situations. The context and circumstances of these encounters produced a series of influences that gradually led, within some African societies, to the elaboration of a new Jewish identity connected with that of the Diaspora. The book presents one by one the different groups of Black Jews from western central, eastern, and southern Africa, and the ways in which they have used and imagined their oral history and traditional customs to construct a distinct Jewish identity. The purpose of the book is to review the processes and immensely complex interactions which shaped these new religious identities. It explores the way in which Africans have interacted with the ancient mythological sub-strata of both western and Africans idea of Jews in order to create a distinct Jewish identity. It particularly seeks to identify and to assess colonial influences and their internalization by African societies in the shaping of new African religious identities. Along with these notions the book examines how, in the absence of recorded African history, the eminently malleable accounts of Jewish lineage developed by African groups inspired by Judaism co-exist with the possible historical traces of a Jewish presence in Africa.
Peter Y. Medding
- Published in print:
- 1999
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195128208
- eISBN:
- 9780199854592
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195128208.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
This chapter presents a general approach to the development of personal identity, exploring the ways in which various group identities may be incorporated into the emerging personal identity of an ...
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This chapter presents a general approach to the development of personal identity, exploring the ways in which various group identities may be incorporated into the emerging personal identity of an individual. The approach is based on a conceptual model developed for the analysis of social influence and extended to the analysis of personal involvement in social systems. This model is not specifically addressed to identity formation, but it has some relevance to the development of identity both at the level of the individual and at that of the group — that is, both to personal and to national or ethnic identity. The chapter explores the implications of this model for identity formation at these two levels, with special reference to Jewish identity.Less
This chapter presents a general approach to the development of personal identity, exploring the ways in which various group identities may be incorporated into the emerging personal identity of an individual. The approach is based on a conceptual model developed for the analysis of social influence and extended to the analysis of personal involvement in social systems. This model is not specifically addressed to identity formation, but it has some relevance to the development of identity both at the level of the individual and at that of the group — that is, both to personal and to national or ethnic identity. The chapter explores the implications of this model for identity formation at these two levels, with special reference to Jewish identity.
Sabine Feisst
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- September 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195372380
- eISBN:
- 9780199896967
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195372380.003.0003
- Subject:
- Music, History, American, History, Western
Chapter 3 illuminates Schoenberg’s socialization in and acculturation to America and shows how he negotiated three identities. His German identity is reflected in his interactions with his family and ...
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Chapter 3 illuminates Schoenberg’s socialization in and acculturation to America and shows how he negotiated three identities. His German identity is reflected in his interactions with his family and émigré acquaintances, including Hanns Eisler, Thomas Mann, and Alma Mahler; retention of European habits; and compositions reflecting German music. His Jewish identity is revealed in his political activism; faith; interactions with Jews, such as rabbi Stephen Wise and composer Joseph Achron; concern with Jewish politics and the development of a Jewish music; and in his Jewish-themed works. His American identity is manifested in his adoption of an American lifestyle; friendships with Americans, such as Henry Cowell, George Gershwin, Oscar Levant, and Adolph Weiss; and works influenced by America. The myth of Schoenberg’s resistance to Americanization is debunked.Less
Chapter 3 illuminates Schoenberg’s socialization in and acculturation to America and shows how he negotiated three identities. His German identity is reflected in his interactions with his family and émigré acquaintances, including Hanns Eisler, Thomas Mann, and Alma Mahler; retention of European habits; and compositions reflecting German music. His Jewish identity is revealed in his political activism; faith; interactions with Jews, such as rabbi Stephen Wise and composer Joseph Achron; concern with Jewish politics and the development of a Jewish music; and in his Jewish-themed works. His American identity is manifested in his adoption of an American lifestyle; friendships with Americans, such as Henry Cowell, George Gershwin, Oscar Levant, and Adolph Weiss; and works influenced by America. The myth of Schoenberg’s resistance to Americanization is debunked.
Tessa Rajak
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- September 2009
- ISBN:
- 9780199558674
- eISBN:
- 9780191720895
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199558674.001.0001
- Subject:
- Classical Studies, Literary Studies: Classical, Early, and Medieval
The first translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek was a major translation in Western culture. This literary and social study is about the ancient creators and receivers of the translations and ...
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The first translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek was a major translation in Western culture. This literary and social study is about the ancient creators and receivers of the translations and about their impact. The book shows how the Greek Bible served the Jewish diaspora for over half a millennium, providing the foundations of life for a highly text-centred ethnic and religious minority as they fell under the pressures of the powerful imperial cultures of Greece and Rome, and of a dominant, ‘colonial’ language, Greek. Those large communities of the eastern Mediterranean, with their converts and sympathizers, determined the pattern of Jewish existence outside Palestine for centuries. Far from being isolated and inward-looking, they were, we now know, active members of their city environments. Yet they were not wholly assimilated. The book asks exactly how the translations operated as tools for the preservation of group identity and how, even in their language, they offered a quiet cultural resistance. The Greek Bible translations ended up as the Christian Septuagint, taken over along with the entire heritage of the remarkable hybrid culture of Hellenistic Judaism, during the process of the Church's long drawn-out parting from the Synagogue. That transference allowed the recipients to sideline Christianity's original Jewishness and history to be re-written. In this book, history is recovered and a great cultural artifact is restored to its proper place.Less
The first translation of the Hebrew Bible into Greek was a major translation in Western culture. This literary and social study is about the ancient creators and receivers of the translations and about their impact. The book shows how the Greek Bible served the Jewish diaspora for over half a millennium, providing the foundations of life for a highly text-centred ethnic and religious minority as they fell under the pressures of the powerful imperial cultures of Greece and Rome, and of a dominant, ‘colonial’ language, Greek. Those large communities of the eastern Mediterranean, with their converts and sympathizers, determined the pattern of Jewish existence outside Palestine for centuries. Far from being isolated and inward-looking, they were, we now know, active members of their city environments. Yet they were not wholly assimilated. The book asks exactly how the translations operated as tools for the preservation of group identity and how, even in their language, they offered a quiet cultural resistance. The Greek Bible translations ended up as the Christian Septuagint, taken over along with the entire heritage of the remarkable hybrid culture of Hellenistic Judaism, during the process of the Church's long drawn-out parting from the Synagogue. That transference allowed the recipients to sideline Christianity's original Jewishness and history to be re-written. In this book, history is recovered and a great cultural artifact is restored to its proper place.
Milton Shain
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195134681
- eISBN:
- 9780199848652
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195134681.003.0038
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
A review of the book, People of the Book: Thirty Scholars Reflect on Their Jewish Identity by Jeffrey Rubin–Dorsky and Shelley Fisher Fishkin (eds.) is presented. Introducing this enterprising and ...
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A review of the book, People of the Book: Thirty Scholars Reflect on Their Jewish Identity by Jeffrey Rubin–Dorsky and Shelley Fisher Fishkin (eds.) is presented. Introducing this enterprising and creative collection, the editors ask “whether the commitment and creativity that has enabled the Jewish people to survive for five thousand years may be reconfigured anew at the end of the 20th century.” Their question relates to those doomsday prophecies that see acculturation and assimilation delivering a death blow to Jewish “peoplehood.” At issue here is the very meaning of “Jewishness.” Is it, as some claim, a question of faith and observance — or can the net of Jewishness be cast wider to incorporate other meaningful modes of Jewish identity? The editors firmly believe that the latter is possible, at least in America. Paradigms of Jewishness can be reconfigured; identity is “something one does, not something one has”.Less
A review of the book, People of the Book: Thirty Scholars Reflect on Their Jewish Identity by Jeffrey Rubin–Dorsky and Shelley Fisher Fishkin (eds.) is presented. Introducing this enterprising and creative collection, the editors ask “whether the commitment and creativity that has enabled the Jewish people to survive for five thousand years may be reconfigured anew at the end of the 20th century.” Their question relates to those doomsday prophecies that see acculturation and assimilation delivering a death blow to Jewish “peoplehood.” At issue here is the very meaning of “Jewishness.” Is it, as some claim, a question of faith and observance — or can the net of Jewishness be cast wider to incorporate other meaningful modes of Jewish identity? The editors firmly believe that the latter is possible, at least in America. Paradigms of Jewishness can be reconfigured; identity is “something one does, not something one has”.
Ritchie Robertson
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780199248889
- eISBN:
- 9780191697784
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199248889.003.0005
- Subject:
- Literature, European Literature, 20th-century Literature and Modernism
This chapter turns to what historians have recently called ‘dissimilation’, the affirmation of Jewishness in response to an unwelcoming society. It inquires into new ways of being Jewish and ...
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This chapter turns to what historians have recently called ‘dissimilation’, the affirmation of Jewishness in response to an unwelcoming society. It inquires into new ways of being Jewish and reinventing Jewish identity: the rediscovery and revaluation of the traditional Jewish communities of eastern Europe; the notion that the Jew was really an Oriental and hence endowed quite differently from the Europeans among whom he was stranded; and finally the Zionist movement, typified by Theodor Herzl, which sought to solve the Jewish question by transporting the Jews to a new, or old, home in the East.Less
This chapter turns to what historians have recently called ‘dissimilation’, the affirmation of Jewishness in response to an unwelcoming society. It inquires into new ways of being Jewish and reinventing Jewish identity: the rediscovery and revaluation of the traditional Jewish communities of eastern Europe; the notion that the Jew was really an Oriental and hence endowed quite differently from the Europeans among whom he was stranded; and finally the Zionist movement, typified by Theodor Herzl, which sought to solve the Jewish question by transporting the Jews to a new, or old, home in the East.
Marion A. Kaplan
- Published in print:
- 2005
- Published Online:
- January 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780195171648
- eISBN:
- 9780199871346
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195171648.003.0016
- Subject:
- History, European Early Modern History
This chapter shows how the experiences of Jewish children, teens, and young adults in the German education system had a critical impact on how they formed their identities as Jews and as Germans. ...
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This chapter shows how the experiences of Jewish children, teens, and young adults in the German education system had a critical impact on how they formed their identities as Jews and as Germans. Jewish and other German children imbibed the German classics, German nationalism, and strong doses of discipline at school. In public, Jews accepted Christianity in the schools, either officially or unofficially, permitting and even encouraging the decline of Jewish schools. In private, the home and family, not the Jewish religion lessons they were required to take, influenced the depth of their religious and ethnic identities.Less
This chapter shows how the experiences of Jewish children, teens, and young adults in the German education system had a critical impact on how they formed their identities as Jews and as Germans. Jewish and other German children imbibed the German classics, German nationalism, and strong doses of discipline at school. In public, Jews accepted Christianity in the schools, either officially or unofficially, permitting and even encouraging the decline of Jewish schools. In private, the home and family, not the Jewish religion lessons they were required to take, influenced the depth of their religious and ethnic identities.
Sacha Stern
- Published in print:
- 2001
- Published Online:
- November 2003
- ISBN:
- 9780198270348
- eISBN:
- 9780191600753
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/0198270348.003.0001
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
Ancient sources including the books of Enoch and Jubilees, Qumran and related literature, Philo, Josephus, Graeco‐Roman, and early Christian sources, reveal that a variety of solar and lunar ...
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Ancient sources including the books of Enoch and Jubilees, Qumran and related literature, Philo, Josephus, Graeco‐Roman, and early Christian sources, reveal that a variety of solar and lunar calendars were used by Jews in the second century b.c.—first century c.e. From the first century c.e., however, lunar calendars became the norm throughout the Jewish world. This stands in contrast with the development of non‐Jewish calendars in the Roman Empire, and especially in the Roman Near East: after the arrival of the Romans, the lunar, Seleucid calendar was generally abandoned in favour of solar calendars modelled on the Julian. Thus the Jewish lunar calendar would appear to have become, in the context of the Roman Empire, a marker of Jewish identity and distinctiveness.Less
Ancient sources including the books of Enoch and Jubilees, Qumran and related literature, Philo, Josephus, Graeco‐Roman, and early Christian sources, reveal that a variety of solar and lunar calendars were used by Jews in the second century b.c.—first century c.e. From the first century c.e., however, lunar calendars became the norm throughout the Jewish world. This stands in contrast with the development of non‐Jewish calendars in the Roman Empire, and especially in the Roman Near East: after the arrival of the Romans, the lunar, Seleucid calendar was generally abandoned in favour of solar calendars modelled on the Julian. Thus the Jewish lunar calendar would appear to have become, in the context of the Roman Empire, a marker of Jewish identity and distinctiveness.
Ezra Mendelsohn (ed.)
- Published in print:
- 1997
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195112030
- eISBN:
- 9780199854608
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195112030.001.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
This volume collects chapters on Jewish literature which deal with “the manifold ways that literary texts reveal their authors' attitudes toward their own Jewish identity and toward diverse aspects ...
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This volume collects chapters on Jewish literature which deal with “the manifold ways that literary texts reveal their authors' attitudes toward their own Jewish identity and toward diverse aspects of the “Jewish question.”” Chapters in this volume explore the tension between Israeli and Diaspora identities, and between those who write in Hebrew or Yiddish and those who write in other “non-Jewish” languages. The chapters also explore the question of how Jewish writers remember history in their “search for a useable past.” From chapters on Jabotinsky's virtually unknown plays to Philip Roth's novels, this book provides a strong overview of contemporary themes in Jewish literary studies.Less
This volume collects chapters on Jewish literature which deal with “the manifold ways that literary texts reveal their authors' attitudes toward their own Jewish identity and toward diverse aspects of the “Jewish question.”” Chapters in this volume explore the tension between Israeli and Diaspora identities, and between those who write in Hebrew or Yiddish and those who write in other “non-Jewish” languages. The chapters also explore the question of how Jewish writers remember history in their “search for a useable past.” From chapters on Jabotinsky's virtually unknown plays to Philip Roth's novels, this book provides a strong overview of contemporary themes in Jewish literary studies.
Alan Montefiore
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- November 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780231153003
- eISBN:
- 9780231526791
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Columbia University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7312/columbia/9780231153003.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Religion
This book looks at the conflict between two very different understandings of identity: the more traditional view that an identity carries with it certain duties and obligations, and an opposing view ...
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This book looks at the conflict between two very different understandings of identity: the more traditional view that an identity carries with it certain duties and obligations, and an opposing view in which there can be no rationally compelling move from statements of fact to “judgments of value.” According to this second view, individuals must take responsibility for determining their own values and obligations. The book illustrates through personal experience the practical implications of this characteristically philosophical debate. It finally settles on the following answer: both the “traditional” assumption that individuals must recognize certain values and obligations, and the contrary view that individuals are ultimately responsible for determining their own values, are deeply embedded in differing conceptions of society and its relation to its members. The book also examines the misunderstandings between those for whom identity constitutes a conceptual bridge connecting the facts of who and what a person may be to the value commitments incumbent upon them, and those for whom the very idea of such a bridge can be nothing but a confusion. Using key examples from the notoriously vexed case of Jewish identity, the book depicts the practical significance of the differences between these worldviews, particularly for those who have to negotiate them.Less
This book looks at the conflict between two very different understandings of identity: the more traditional view that an identity carries with it certain duties and obligations, and an opposing view in which there can be no rationally compelling move from statements of fact to “judgments of value.” According to this second view, individuals must take responsibility for determining their own values and obligations. The book illustrates through personal experience the practical implications of this characteristically philosophical debate. It finally settles on the following answer: both the “traditional” assumption that individuals must recognize certain values and obligations, and the contrary view that individuals are ultimately responsible for determining their own values, are deeply embedded in differing conceptions of society and its relation to its members. The book also examines the misunderstandings between those for whom identity constitutes a conceptual bridge connecting the facts of who and what a person may be to the value commitments incumbent upon them, and those for whom the very idea of such a bridge can be nothing but a confusion. Using key examples from the notoriously vexed case of Jewish identity, the book depicts the practical significance of the differences between these worldviews, particularly for those who have to negotiate them.
Daniel B. Schwartz
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691142913
- eISBN:
- 9781400842261
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691142913.003.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
This introductory chapter considers why the hallmark of modern Jewish identity is its resistance to—and, at the same time, obsession with—definition. Like battles over national identity in the modern ...
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This introductory chapter considers why the hallmark of modern Jewish identity is its resistance to—and, at the same time, obsession with—definition. Like battles over national identity in the modern state, clashes over the nature and limits of Jewishness have frequently taken the shape of controversies over the status—and stature—of marginal Jews past and present. The Jewish rehabilitation of historical heretics and apostates with a vexed relationship to Judaism has become so much a part of contemporary discourse that it is difficult to imagine secular Jewish culture without it. Yet this tendency has a beginning as well as a template in modern Jewish history, which the chapter introduces in the figure of Baruch (or Benedictus) Spinoza (1632–1677)—“the first great culture-hero of modern secular Jews,” and still the most oft-mentioned candidate for the title of first modern secular Jew.Less
This introductory chapter considers why the hallmark of modern Jewish identity is its resistance to—and, at the same time, obsession with—definition. Like battles over national identity in the modern state, clashes over the nature and limits of Jewishness have frequently taken the shape of controversies over the status—and stature—of marginal Jews past and present. The Jewish rehabilitation of historical heretics and apostates with a vexed relationship to Judaism has become so much a part of contemporary discourse that it is difficult to imagine secular Jewish culture without it. Yet this tendency has a beginning as well as a template in modern Jewish history, which the chapter introduces in the figure of Baruch (or Benedictus) Spinoza (1632–1677)—“the first great culture-hero of modern secular Jews,” and still the most oft-mentioned candidate for the title of first modern secular Jew.
Ewa Morawska
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- March 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780199793495
- eISBN:
- 9780190254667
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199793495.003.0001
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
This chapter presents a number of essays which look at the issue of the ethnicity of Jewish people. The first essay compares the historical experiences of Jewish communities in different countries ...
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This chapter presents a number of essays which look at the issue of the ethnicity of Jewish people. The first essay compares the historical experiences of Jewish communities in different countries and different periods. The second one examines the divisive role of ethnicity among the Jewish people in the 1920s through analysis of the case of Russian-born writer Moissaye Olgin's step towards communism. The third looks at the analytic value of ethnicity focusing on intermarriage, group blending and ethnic group strength in immigrant Jewish societies in the U.S. The next describes verbal communication of American Jews based on the result of a 2008 sociolinguistic survey. The following essay examines the relationship between identity and ethnicity as phenomena and concepts, focusing on the experiences of Jews in the U.S. Another examines a plural dimensional aspect of ethnic research on Jews. The seventh essay examines the usefulness of the ethnicity concept in studying Jews. The last one presents research concerning Jewish ethnicity and the application of the concept of ethnicity in the study of the Jewish experience.Less
This chapter presents a number of essays which look at the issue of the ethnicity of Jewish people. The first essay compares the historical experiences of Jewish communities in different countries and different periods. The second one examines the divisive role of ethnicity among the Jewish people in the 1920s through analysis of the case of Russian-born writer Moissaye Olgin's step towards communism. The third looks at the analytic value of ethnicity focusing on intermarriage, group blending and ethnic group strength in immigrant Jewish societies in the U.S. The next describes verbal communication of American Jews based on the result of a 2008 sociolinguistic survey. The following essay examines the relationship between identity and ethnicity as phenomena and concepts, focusing on the experiences of Jews in the U.S. Another examines a plural dimensional aspect of ethnic research on Jews. The seventh essay examines the usefulness of the ethnicity concept in studying Jews. The last one presents research concerning Jewish ethnicity and the application of the concept of ethnicity in the study of the Jewish experience.
Peter Levine
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195085556
- eISBN:
- 9780199854042
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195085556.003.0014
- Subject:
- History, Cultural History
This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the role of sport in helping East European Jewish immigrants to the U.S. during the first half of the 20th century adopt to American life. The ...
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This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the role of sport in helping East European Jewish immigrants to the U.S. during the first half of the 20th century adopt to American life. The findings reveal that the scarcity of outstanding American Jewish athletes belies the significant connections between sport and the American Jewish experience. The results also indicate that though Jewish American engagement in sport was rather short, sport played a very important role in assimilation and in the formation and meaning of Jewish and American identities.Less
This chapter sums up the key findings of this study on the role of sport in helping East European Jewish immigrants to the U.S. during the first half of the 20th century adopt to American life. The findings reveal that the scarcity of outstanding American Jewish athletes belies the significant connections between sport and the American Jewish experience. The results also indicate that though Jewish American engagement in sport was rather short, sport played a very important role in assimilation and in the formation and meaning of Jewish and American identities.
Daniel B. Schwartz
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- October 2017
- ISBN:
- 9780691142913
- eISBN:
- 9781400842261
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691142913.003.0004
- Subject:
- Philosophy, History of Philosophy
This chapter skips ahead fifty years from the previous chapter to find the roots of the heroic and prototypical image of Spinoza in the historical fiction of the young Berthold Auerbach (1812–1882), ...
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This chapter skips ahead fifty years from the previous chapter to find the roots of the heroic and prototypical image of Spinoza in the historical fiction of the young Berthold Auerbach (1812–1882), using his engagement with the Amsterdam heretic in the 1830s as a lens for exploring tensions in early Reform Judaism between organic and revolutionary visions of religious change. It contends that his 1837 historical novel, Spinoza, ein historischer Roman (Spinoza, a Historical Novel), when studied against the backdrop of his previous Jewish writings, evinces a very personal—but also very contemporary—tug-of-war between two different visions of Jewish modernity: one more reformist and accommodating of a religious framework for change, the other more uncompromisingly radical.Less
This chapter skips ahead fifty years from the previous chapter to find the roots of the heroic and prototypical image of Spinoza in the historical fiction of the young Berthold Auerbach (1812–1882), using his engagement with the Amsterdam heretic in the 1830s as a lens for exploring tensions in early Reform Judaism between organic and revolutionary visions of religious change. It contends that his 1837 historical novel, Spinoza, ein historischer Roman (Spinoza, a Historical Novel), when studied against the backdrop of his previous Jewish writings, evinces a very personal—but also very contemporary—tug-of-war between two different visions of Jewish modernity: one more reformist and accommodating of a religious framework for change, the other more uncompromisingly radical.
Benjamin Schreier
- Published in print:
- 2015
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9781479868681
- eISBN:
- 9781479888436
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9781479868681.003.0002
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Cultural Studies
This chapter focuses on the nationalist identitarianism underwriting the current academic isolation of the historicist mainstream of Jewish American literary practice. It first considers the Jewish ...
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This chapter focuses on the nationalist identitarianism underwriting the current academic isolation of the historicist mainstream of Jewish American literary practice. It first considers the Jewish problem as the problem of “Jewishness” before turning to a discussion of the Jewish identity that underwrites Jewish American literature and how a critical vocabulary capable of liberating Jewish American literary study from the historicist criterion can be developed. It then explores how the specific academic history of Jews and their studies has enabled identitarianism to hinder a critical theorization of the identity of Jewish American literature. It also examines how Jewish literary study can articulate itself in an analytical vector that aims to secure Jewishness as a legible object of both scrutiny and practice, a vector it calls “semitism.” The chapter concludes by noting the importance of the genealogy of the historicism of currently ascendant professional languages of identity in “semitic” literary criticism.Less
This chapter focuses on the nationalist identitarianism underwriting the current academic isolation of the historicist mainstream of Jewish American literary practice. It first considers the Jewish problem as the problem of “Jewishness” before turning to a discussion of the Jewish identity that underwrites Jewish American literature and how a critical vocabulary capable of liberating Jewish American literary study from the historicist criterion can be developed. It then explores how the specific academic history of Jews and their studies has enabled identitarianism to hinder a critical theorization of the identity of Jewish American literature. It also examines how Jewish literary study can articulate itself in an analytical vector that aims to secure Jewishness as a legible object of both scrutiny and practice, a vector it calls “semitism.” The chapter concludes by noting the importance of the genealogy of the historicism of currently ascendant professional languages of identity in “semitic” literary criticism.
Hana Wirth-Nesher
- Published in print:
- 2000
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780195134681
- eISBN:
- 9780199848652
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195134681.003.0027
- Subject:
- History, History of Religion
A review of the book, Philip Roth and the Jews by Alan Cooper is presented. Cooper tells an engaging story of a pioneering, courageous, prophetic hero — the writer Philip Roth — doomed to be ...
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A review of the book, Philip Roth and the Jews by Alan Cooper is presented. Cooper tells an engaging story of a pioneering, courageous, prophetic hero — the writer Philip Roth — doomed to be misunderstood by his readers. Whereas Cooper's admiration, bordering on reverence, for Roth is endearing, his analyses are occasionally marred by this defensive posture. This book is largely a history of the reception of Roth's work, interspersed with summaries and interpretations of the novels as they enter into a dialogue with readers and critics. Its intention is clear: to vindicate Roth, to make a case for him not only as a moralist, but as a writer seriously wrestling with Jewish identity and contemporary Jewish civilization.Less
A review of the book, Philip Roth and the Jews by Alan Cooper is presented. Cooper tells an engaging story of a pioneering, courageous, prophetic hero — the writer Philip Roth — doomed to be misunderstood by his readers. Whereas Cooper's admiration, bordering on reverence, for Roth is endearing, his analyses are occasionally marred by this defensive posture. This book is largely a history of the reception of Roth's work, interspersed with summaries and interpretations of the novels as they enter into a dialogue with readers and critics. Its intention is clear: to vindicate Roth, to make a case for him not only as a moralist, but as a writer seriously wrestling with Jewish identity and contemporary Jewish civilization.
