Toward a History of Jewish Thought

Toward a History of Jewish Thought PDF

Author: Zachary Alan Starr

Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers

Published: 2020-03-09

Total Pages: 580

ISBN-13: 1532693079

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The work is a history of Jewish beliefs regarding the concept of the soul, the idea of resurrection, and the nature of the afterlife. The work describes these beliefs, accounts for the origin of these beliefs, discusses the ways in which these beliefs have evolved, and explains why the many changes in belief have occurred. Views about the soul, resurrection, and the afterlife are related to other Jewish views and to broad movements in Jewish thought; and Jewish intellectual history is placed within the context of the history of Western thought in general. That history begins with the biblical period and extends to the present time.

American Judaism

American Judaism PDF

Author: Jonathan D. Sarna

Publisher: Yale University Press

Published: 2019-06-25

Total Pages: 558

ISBN-13: 0300190395

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Jonathan D. Sarna's award-winning American Judaism is now available in an updated and revised edition that summarizes recent scholarship and takes into account important historical, cultural, and political developments in American Judaism over the past fifteen years. Praise for the first edition: "Sarna . . . has written the first systematic, comprehensive, and coherent history of Judaism in America; one so well executed, it is likely to set the standard for the next fifty years."--Jacob Neusner, Jerusalem Post "A masterful overview."--Jeffrey S. Gurock, American Historical Review "This book is destined to be the new classic of American Jewish history."--Norman H. Finkelstein, Jewish Book World Winner of the 2004 National Jewish Book Award/Jewish Book of the Year

The Hebrew Book in Early Modern Italy

The Hebrew Book in Early Modern Italy PDF

Author: Joseph R. Hacker

Publisher: University of Pennsylvania Press

Published: 2011-08-19

Total Pages: 334

ISBN-13: 081220509X

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The rise of printing had major effects on culture and society in the early modern period, and the presence of this new technology—and the relatively rapid embrace of it among early modern Jews—certainly had an effect on many aspects of Jewish culture. One major change that print seems to have brought to the Jewish communities of Christian Europe, particularly in Italy, was greater interaction between Jews and Christians in the production and dissemination of books. Starting in the early sixteenth century, the locus of production for Jewish books in many places in Italy was in Christian-owned print shops, with Jews and Christians collaborating on the editorial and technical processes of book production. As this Jewish-Christian collaboration often took place under conditions of control by Christians (for example, the involvement of Christian typesetters and printers, expurgation and censorship of Hebrew texts, and state control of Hebrew printing), its study opens up an important set of questions about the role that Christians played in shaping Jewish culture. Presenting new research by an international group of scholars, this book represents a step toward a fuller understanding of Jewish book history. Individual essays focus on a range of issues related to the production and dissemination of Hebrew books as well as their audiences. Topics include the activities of scribes and printers, the creation of new types of literature and the transformation of canonical works in the era of print, the external and internal censorship of Hebrew books, and the reading interests of Jews. An introduction summarizes the state of scholarship in the field and offers an overview of the transition from manuscript to print in this period.

The Gate to Perfection

The Gate to Perfection PDF

Author: Rabbi Professor Dr. Walter Homolka

Publisher: Berghahn Books

Published: 1994-10-01

Total Pages: 145

ISBN-13: 1800736746

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A timely book: as Israelis and Arabs are moving towards a settlement, this study offers a valuable historical dimension, from the Jewish point of view, to the main issue involved, i.e., the idea of peace. The authors maintain that peace has always played an important role in Jewish thought, that in fact Judaism as a religion is characterized by the striving for peace. They reach this conclusion after having examined a variety of sources, ranging from the biblical texts of Old Israel to the Talmudic tradition and Jewish Philosophy of Religion up until the twentieth century.

Jewish People, Jewish Thought

Jewish People, Jewish Thought PDF

Author: Robert M. Seltzer

Publisher:

Published: 1980

Total Pages: 904

ISBN-13:

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This classic survey of the main features of the Jewish historical landscape exposes students to the rich scholarly literature on Jewish history, theology, philosophy, mysticism, and social thought that has been produced in the last century and a half. It shows Judaism as a creative response to ultimate issues of human concern by members of a group that has faced a unique concatenation of political, economic, and geographical circumstances. -- From product description.

From Continuity to Contiguity

From Continuity to Contiguity PDF

Author: Dan Miron

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2010-07-19

Total Pages: 560

ISBN-13: 0804775028

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Dan Miron—widely recognized as one of the world's leading experts on modern Jewish literatures—begins this study by surveying and critiquing previous attempts to define a common denominator unifying the various modern Jewish literatures. He argues that these prior efforts have all been trapped by the need to see these literatures as a continuum. Miron seeks to break through this impasse by acknowledging discontinuity as the staple characteristic of modern Jewish writing. These literatures instead form a complex of independent, yet touching, components related through contiguity. From Continuity to Contiguity offers original insights into modern Hebrew, Yiddish, and other Jewish literatures, including a new interpretation of Franz Kafka's place within them and discussions of Sholem Aleichem, Sh. Y. Abramovitsh, Akhad ha'am, M. Y. Berditshevsky, Kh. N. Bialik, and Y. L. Peretz.

20th Century Jewish Religious Thought

20th Century Jewish Religious Thought PDF

Author: Arthur A. Cohen

Publisher: U of Nebraska Press

Published: 2010-01-01

Total Pages: 1186

ISBN-13: 082760971X

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JPS is proud to reissue Cohen and Mendes-Flohr’s classic work, perhaps the most important, comprehensive anthology available on 20th century Jewish thought. This outstanding volume presents 140 concise yet authoritative essays by renowned Jewish figures Eugene Borowitz, Emil Fackenheim, Blu Greenberg, Susannah Heschel, Jacob Neusner, Gershom Scholem, Adin Steinsaltz, and many others. They define and reflect upon such central ideas as charity, chosen people, death, family, love, myth, suffering, Torah, tradition and more. With entries from Aesthetics to Zionism, this book provides striking insights into both the Jewish experience and the Judeo-Christian tradition.

New Directions in Jewish Philosophy

New Directions in Jewish Philosophy PDF

Author: Aaron W. Hughes

Publisher: Indiana University Press

Published: 2010

Total Pages: 377

ISBN-13: 0253221641

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Breaking with strictly historical or textual perspectives, this book explores Jewish philosophy as philosophy. Often regarded as too technical for Judaic studies and too religious for philosophy departments, Jewish philosophy has had an ambiguous position in the academy. These provocative essays propose new models for the study of Jewish philosophy that embrace wider intellectual arenas—including linguistics, poetics, aesthetics, and visual culture—as a path toward understanding the particular philosophic concerns of Judaism. As they reread classic Jewish texts, the essays articulate a new set of questions and demonstrate the vitality and originality of Jewish philosophy.

Toward a Jewish Theology of Liberation

Toward a Jewish Theology of Liberation PDF

Author: Marc H. Ellis

Publisher: SCM Press

Published: 2003-01-02

Total Pages: 170

ISBN-13: 9780334028994

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Marc Ellis fine book about the future of the Jewish community was first published in 1987. But twenty years on, in the light of recent events in the Middle East and post-September 11, its powerful message of hope, directed towards a people 'poised between Holocaust and empowerment', remains as powerful, apposite, and pressingly relevant as it was before. Ellis begins with two poles: the holocaust and the pain and vision that issue from it. This leads him into ethics, and he highlights the contrast between the depth of Jewish ethical commitment and the paucity of renewal movements within Judaism. The author then addresses all suffering peoples, and the Christian liberation movements active among them, so that the holocaust may be set in a wider context. Against this background, Ellis sees it as essential that the journeys and visions of dissenting Jews - such as Etty Hillesum and Martin Buber - should be re-appraised. An alternative perspective of what it means to be Jewish begins to emerge, and in the final chapter a Jewish theology of liberation is essayed, which is a theology prepared 'to enter the danger zones of contemporary Jewish life', often at some cost.

Judeophobia

Judeophobia PDF

Author: Peter SchŠfer

Publisher: Harvard University Press

Published: 2009-06-01

Total Pages: 330

ISBN-13: 9780674043213

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Taking a fresh look at what the Greeks and Romans thought about Jews and Judaism, Peter Schafer locates the origin of anti-Semitism in the ancient world. Judeophobia firmly establishes Hellenistic Egypt as the generating source of anti-Semitism, with roots extending back into Egypt's pre-Hellenistic history. A pattern of ingrained hostility toward an alien culture emerges when Schafer surveys an illuminating spectrum of comments on Jews and their religion in Greek and Roman writings, focusing on the topics that most interested the pagan classical world: the exodus or, as it was widely interpreted, expulsion from Egypt; the nature of the Jewish god; food restrictions, in particular abstinence from pork; laws relating to the sabbath; the practice of circumcision; and Jewish proselytism. He then probes key incidents, two fierce outbursts of hostility in Egypt: the destruction of a Jewish temple in Elephantine in 410 B.C.E. and the riots in Alexandria in 38 C.E. Asking what fueled these attacks on Jewish communities, the author discovers deep-seated ethnic resentments. It was from Egypt that hatred of Jews, based on allegations of impiety, xenophobia, and misanthropy, was transported first to Syria-Palestine and then to Rome, where it acquired a new element: fear of this small but distinctive community. To the hatred and fear, ingredients of Christian theology were soon added--a mix all too familiar in Western history.