Matthias B. Lehmann
- Published in print:
- 2014
- Published Online:
- May 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780804789653
- eISBN:
- 9780804792462
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Stanford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.11126/stanford/9780804789653.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Jewish Studies
Emissaries from the Holy Land tells the story of a philanthropic network that was overseen by the Jewish community leadership in the Ottoman capital city of Istanbul between the 1720s and the 1820s ...
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Emissaries from the Holy Land tells the story of a philanthropic network that was overseen by the Jewish community leadership in the Ottoman capital city of Istanbul between the 1720s and the 1820s in support of the impoverished Jews of Palestine. Putting the notion of Jewish solidarity, Jewish unity, and the enduring centrality of the Holy Land for the Jewish world to the test, the community leadership in Palestine and their allies in Istanbul dispatched rabbinic emissaries on fundraising missions everywhere from the shores of the Mediterranean to the port cities of the Atlantic seaboard, from the Caribbean to India. This book explores how this eighteenth-century philanthropic network was organized and how relations of trust and solidarity were built across vast geographic differences. It looks at how the emissaries and their supporters understood the relationship between the Jewish diaspora and the Land of Israel, and it shows how cross-cultural encounters and competing claims for financial support involving Sephardic, Ashkenazi, and North African emissaries and communities contributed to the transformation of Jewish identity in the eighteenth century.Less
Emissaries from the Holy Land tells the story of a philanthropic network that was overseen by the Jewish community leadership in the Ottoman capital city of Istanbul between the 1720s and the 1820s in support of the impoverished Jews of Palestine. Putting the notion of Jewish solidarity, Jewish unity, and the enduring centrality of the Holy Land for the Jewish world to the test, the community leadership in Palestine and their allies in Istanbul dispatched rabbinic emissaries on fundraising missions everywhere from the shores of the Mediterranean to the port cities of the Atlantic seaboard, from the Caribbean to India. This book explores how this eighteenth-century philanthropic network was organized and how relations of trust and solidarity were built across vast geographic differences. It looks at how the emissaries and their supporters understood the relationship between the Jewish diaspora and the Land of Israel, and it shows how cross-cultural encounters and competing claims for financial support involving Sephardic, Ashkenazi, and North African emissaries and communities contributed to the transformation of Jewish identity in the eighteenth century.
Adam Teller
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780691161747
- eISBN:
- 9780691199863
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691161747.003.0027
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
This concluding chapter assesses whether the fate of the Polish Jewish refugees in each of the three major arenas in which they found themselves was really a single, interconnected refugee crisis or ...
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This concluding chapter assesses whether the fate of the Polish Jewish refugees in each of the three major arenas in which they found themselves was really a single, interconnected refugee crisis or whether there were, in fact, three different crises sparked by a common cause: the mid-seventeenth-century wars of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Underlying all of the differences in the conditions in each of the three regions were numerous commonalities. Perhaps most important was the sense of solidarity that induced Jews to come to the aid of other Jews in distress. The term most commonly used at the time to describe this connection was “brotherhood.” The phenomena examined in this book are indeed, therefore, aspects of a single refugee crisis. The chapter then considers how large the problem was and how well Jewish society dealt with its challenges. It also highlights the effects of the refugee crisis on Jewish society, both while it was happening and in the longer term, and the importance of the crisis for the course of early modern and modern Jewish history in general.Less
This concluding chapter assesses whether the fate of the Polish Jewish refugees in each of the three major arenas in which they found themselves was really a single, interconnected refugee crisis or whether there were, in fact, three different crises sparked by a common cause: the mid-seventeenth-century wars of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Underlying all of the differences in the conditions in each of the three regions were numerous commonalities. Perhaps most important was the sense of solidarity that induced Jews to come to the aid of other Jews in distress. The term most commonly used at the time to describe this connection was “brotherhood.” The phenomena examined in this book are indeed, therefore, aspects of a single refugee crisis. The chapter then considers how large the problem was and how well Jewish society dealt with its challenges. It also highlights the effects of the refugee crisis on Jewish society, both while it was happening and in the longer term, and the importance of the crisis for the course of early modern and modern Jewish history in general.
Jonathan Ray
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- March 2016
- ISBN:
- 9780814729113
- eISBN:
- 9780814729120
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- NYU Press
- DOI:
- 10.18574/nyu/9780814729113.003.0007
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
This chapter looks at Jewish religious identity. Religion operated as an organizing principle in Sephardic life. The key elements of this process included the adoption of local customs in new areas ...
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This chapter looks at Jewish religious identity. Religion operated as an organizing principle in Sephardic life. The key elements of this process included the adoption of local customs in new areas of settlement, the importance of public displays of piety and allotment of honors, and the different ways in which rabbis and average Jews dealt with the religious identity of the former Conversos who reverted to Judaism during this period. The shared set of religious values and legal tradition that had bound together Mediterranean Jewry for centuries continued to allow for mutual recognition, understanding, and support throughout the Jewish world. However, the divisions between rabbinic ideals and popular practice that had strained Jewish solidarity before 1492 remained a defining characteristic of Sephardic life.Less
This chapter looks at Jewish religious identity. Religion operated as an organizing principle in Sephardic life. The key elements of this process included the adoption of local customs in new areas of settlement, the importance of public displays of piety and allotment of honors, and the different ways in which rabbis and average Jews dealt with the religious identity of the former Conversos who reverted to Judaism during this period. The shared set of religious values and legal tradition that had bound together Mediterranean Jewry for centuries continued to allow for mutual recognition, understanding, and support throughout the Jewish world. However, the divisions between rabbinic ideals and popular practice that had strained Jewish solidarity before 1492 remained a defining characteristic of Sephardic life.
Adam Teller
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9780691161747
- eISBN:
- 9780691199863
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Princeton University Press
- DOI:
- 10.23943/princeton/9780691161747.003.0018
- Subject:
- Religion, Judaism
This chapter provides an overview of the Polish–Lithuanian Jews' flight westward after 1648. Three major issues underlie the discussion as a whole. First is the nature of Jewish solidarity in those ...
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This chapter provides an overview of the Polish–Lithuanian Jews' flight westward after 1648. Three major issues underlie the discussion as a whole. First is the nature of Jewish solidarity in those years and the fate of the Jewish refugees outside Poland–Lithuania when the religious imperative to ransom captives was not a relevant issue. Second is the policies adopted by the states of the Holy Roman Empire toward the refugees and their impact on the refugees themselves as they tried to rebuild their lives on German lands. Third is the new social and cultural formations created by the encounter of “eastern” and “western” Ashkenazim in the wake of the refugee crisis and their consequences for the development of German Jewry in both the short and long term.Less
This chapter provides an overview of the Polish–Lithuanian Jews' flight westward after 1648. Three major issues underlie the discussion as a whole. First is the nature of Jewish solidarity in those years and the fate of the Jewish refugees outside Poland–Lithuania when the religious imperative to ransom captives was not a relevant issue. Second is the policies adopted by the states of the Holy Roman Empire toward the refugees and their impact on the refugees themselves as they tried to rebuild their lives on German lands. Third is the new social and cultural formations created by the encounter of “eastern” and “western” Ashkenazim in the wake of the refugee crisis and their consequences for the development of German Jewry in both the short and long term.
