Jewish Studies Commons^™

The Shtetl In Context, Thomas Hubka

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

The town plans that will be analyzed were part of a greater, pre-nineteenth century Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, including most of today's Poland, Lithuania, Belarus, and western Ukraine. The overall organization and character of the Polish, eighteenth century, small Jewish town was primarily developed during the fourteenth-through-eighteenth century Polish colonization of its eastern provinces in what is now Lithuania, Belarus, and Ukraine.

Emw 2005: Jews And Urban Spaces, Emw 2005

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

The second Early Modern Workshop (August, 2005) was hosted by the Louis L. Kaplan Chair in Jewish History, the Department of History, and the Rebecca and Joseph Meyerhoff Center for Jewish Studies at the University of Maryland; by the Hebraica Section of the Library of Congress, Washington, D.C., and supported by Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT.

Texts and maps cover a number of urban and geographic settings from London, to The Hague, Frankfurt, Livorno, Florence, Strasbourg, Prague, Poznań, and Minsk. They deal with physical personal space (minutes from the Poznań community record book; responsum of Rabbi Isaac the Great from Poznań; …

Tribulations Of The Patriarch Joseph And Jesus In Greek And Latin Piety, Lawrence Frizzell

Department of Religion Publications

The dramatic account of Joseph and his brothers in Genesis 37-50 has been the subject of many commentaries and reflections, by both Jews and Christians. How have the questions of crime and forgiveness been treated as a major theme by Christians? From early texts the pious effort to interpret the biblical message into a coherent whole led to a link between Joseph and Jesus. How has this been developed in the first millennium of Christianity? Father Frizzell examined this theme in “Tribulations of the Patriarch Joseph and Jesus in Greek and Latin Piety,” which he originally presented at the Medieval …

Islands: Jewish Themes And Images In Selected Poems Of Muriel Rukeyser, Wendy Susan Howard Gray

Theses & Honors Papers

An exploration of Rukeyser's work is a transformative experience. The reader need not come to see the world through the same lenses that Rukeyser saw it in order to be transformed. That is, one need not agree with Rukeyser that 1) the world is a place of Oneness that embraces all (even the ugliness and evil) that appears to divide it; 2) that observation is given voice by poetry; and 3) that the poet who sees suffering must, out of love, give poetry that speaks for those who cannot speak for themselves. One need only put on Rukeyser's lenses for …

Review Of The Book Dictionary Of Literary Biography, Vol. 299: Holocaust Novelists, John A. Drobnicki

Publications and Research

Review of the book Dictionary of literary biography, Vol. 299: Holocaust novelists.

Surviving To Excel: The Last German Jewish Autobiographies Of Holocaust Survivors Ruth Klüger, Marcel Reich-Ranicki, And Paul Spiegel, Frederick Lubich

World Languages and Cultures Faculty Publications

(First paragraph) Ruth Klüger’s Weiterleben: Eine Jugend (1992) is one of the first narratives of a series of testimonials of the last members of the generation of Holocaust survivors, which began to appear toward the end of the twentieth century.1 The author was born in 1931 in Vienna, where her first years of socialization were already marked by a rapidly growing discrimination against the city’s Jewish population. In 1942 she was deported together with her mother to Theresienstadt and eventually to Auschwitz, whose death machinery she survived by shear luck and her determination to live. At the age of sixteen, …

The Boom Of Testimony After Communism: The Voices Of The Holocaust Survivors In Romania: 1989-2005, Stefan Cristian Ionescu

History Faculty Articles and Research

"In this article I intend to deal with the relation between Jewish survivors and Holocaust remembrance in post-communist Romania. Therefore I will investigate the consequences of the Holocaust experience on Jewish survivors from the perspective of how, when and why they remember the catastrophe. My investigation will not particularly focus on the level of the trauma and sufferings they have to live with, but rather on how the political, social and cultural factors have managed to influence the public recollection of the war sufferings and the survivors’ attitude towards Holocaust remembrance. I am interested in discovering mainly the way these …

The Ties That Bind: Experiences Of Family In Maine, 1900-Present, Univeristy Of Southern Maine, Susie Bock, Joseph S. Wood, Maureen Elgersman Lee, Abraham J. Peck, Howard M. Solomon

Publications (Annual Event Catalog)

The Ties That Bind opens a window to meaning in the material culture of Mainers outside the dominant culture. Focusing on family, the three Center scholars whose work is catalogued here provide a lens that allows us to peer through that window into something of the complex nature of difference. The three scholars reveal otherwise anonymous Maine people, whose very anonymity came from the difference that was culturally constructed to segregate them from the dominant culture. Family, which reflects something common to every different culture, works here to highlight unity in human diversity. In that way, family also provides a …

"Review Of Symbiosis, Symbolism, And The Power Of The Past: Canaan, Ancient Israel, And Their Neighbors From The Late Bronze Age Through Roman Palaestina. Proceedings Of The Centennial Symposium, W. F. Albright Institute Of Archaeological Research And American Schools Of Oriental Research, Jerusalem, May 29-31, 2000", Dale Launderville Osb

School of Theology and Seminary Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Projecting The Passion: The Invention Of The 'Judeo-Christian Tradition' In The Roman/Biblical Genre Of Postwar American Film, Don Michael Burrows

Inquiry: The University of Arkansas Undergraduate Research Journal

This paper traces the changes in the American view of the relationship between Jews and Christians from the First World War to the present as reflected in motion pictures from the earliest of the biblical epics to Mel Gibson's The Passion of Christ. It demonstrates that the "Judea-Christian tradition " as it has developed since the Second World War is a political theme that functioned first as anti-fascist propaganda and then as anticommunist propaganda that portrayed Jews and Christians as good and free in contrast to Nazis and communists; and it shows what an effective medium the movies were in …

A Jewish Law View Of World Law, Michael J. Broyde

Faculty Articles

This paper will explore two basic Jewish law questions which reflect on the technical issues related to Professor Berman's world law proposal. The first question asks how Jewish law views public international law and whether public international law can be incorporated into the corpus of Jewish law. The second question asks how Jewish law generally incorporates domestic (municipal) law into Jewish law and if this classical paradigm of integration assists in formulating a Jewish law view of world law. To the best of my knowledge, the first matter is a question of nearly first impression in the Jewish law literature.

History Of Clcweb: Comparative Literature And Culture, Steven Tötösy De Zepetnek

CLCWeb Library

No abstract provided.

Political Impetus, And Moral Imperative: The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, Karyn House

Honors Capstones

Capstone submitted as a graduation requirement for the BSU Honors Program.

Invisible Points Of Departure: Reading Rothko’S Christological Imagery, Andrea Pappas

Art and Art History

Jewish identity increasingly figures in new histories of modernism in general, analyses of American art, and, recently, abstract expressionism.1 Although abstract paintings have signified “Jewishness” only since the late sixties, this essay looks at the antecedents of such re-identification in one canonical figure, Mark Rothko, examining three paintings from a narrow range of time in the early days of World War II. His Antigone of 1940 (Figure 1) remains one of his most familiar paintings from the formative period spanning 1940 to mid-1943. It is one of a small handful of works canonized from his early production: paintings that traditionally …

Sefer Zikhronot-Book Of Remembrances By Samuel Aboab (1650), Bernard D. Cooperman

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

This presentation is for the following text(s):

• Sefer Zikhronot-Book of Remembrances

Records Of The Metz Beit Din: Jewish Court Records (1771-1789), Jay R. Berkovitz

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Until roughly 1789, the hallmark of Jewish communal autonomy was the authority granted to rabbinic courts to adjudicate civil cases involving Jewish litigants. Nevertheless, the exclusive civil jurisdiction of these tribunals was challenged regularly by individuals seeking to resolve their disputes in the general courts. In Metz, the much esteemed rabbinic court (beit din) continued to convene until early 1790. Three registers from the beit din are preserved in manuscript at the YIVO Archives in New York. Commencing in 1771, the registers contain nearly two decades of judicial cases totaling 1167 decisions.

The texts included are two cases …

The Jewishness Of Conversos, Talya Fishman

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Talya Fishman discusses rabbinic views on the Jewishness of conversos in the early modern period.

This presentation is for the following text(s):

• Keshet U-Magen
• Respuesta A Un Cavallero Frances
• She'elot u-Teshuvot Yakhin u-Vo'az
• Voice of a Fool

The Order Of Women's Commandments Seder Mitzvot Nashim By Benjamin Slonik (1577), Edward Fram

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Using Benjamin Slonik's Seder mitsvot ha-nashim (1577), Edward Fram discusses the impact of printing on Jewish culture in the early modern period.

Anti-Jewish Accusations In Poland: A Medieval Or Early Modern Phenomenon?, Magda Teter

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Anti-Jewish accusations of host desecration and ritual murder, both of medieval origin and nature, became characteristic of the early modern period in Poland. Despite their medieval roots, some of the medieval characteristics of the accusations were gradually lost in the early modern period, even though their traces continue to appear in the sources. The presentation discusses the loss of theological significance of the accusations. The host desecration accusations gradually become church robbery cases, even if some theological rhetoric is retained, and the blood libels become cases of Jewish hostility and not of reenacting of the Crucifixion.

This presentation is for …

Trent 1475: The Responses Of A Pope And A Jewish Chronicler, Kenneth Stow

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

This presentation discusses two responses to the 1475 trial of Jews accused of ritually murdering a Christian boy, Simon, in the city of Trent. One comes from Pope Sixtus IV and another, a century later, from a Jewish chronicler, Joseph ha-Cohen.

The Letters Of Bella Perlhefter (1674-75), Elisheva Carlebach

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Elisheva Carlebach discusses the literary legacy of Bella bat Jacob Perlhefter (born c. 1650), accomplished writer, instructor of music and rhythm, and entrepreneurial seventeenth-century businesswoman. Her letters provide a rare glimpse into the life of a seventeenth-century Jewish woman (other than Glikl).

Letter From Jerusalem By Obadiah Of Bertinoro (1488), Elliott Horowitz

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Elliott Horowitz discusses letters by the fifteenth-century Jewish traveler, Obadiah of Bertinoro, who traveled from northern Italy to Jerusalem, as an example of early modern travel literature and encounters with different cultures.

Sefer Ha-Heshek By Hillel Baal Shem (1739), Moshe Rosman

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Moshe Rosman discusses the 1739 book by Hillel Baal Shem as an example of early modern Jewish culture. It focuses on the tension between manuscript and print culture, and esoteric and exoteric knowledge.

The selected passages highlight Hillel's training, the problems caused by charlatans, the undesirable popularization of mystical techniques fostered by the publication of simplistic handbooks, and the tangled relationship between ba'al shem type practices and "proper" medicine.

Click here for the video of the presentation.

Introduction To Triumpho Del Govierno Popular, Anne Oravetz Albert

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

The Triumpho del Govierno Popular, y de la Antiguedad Holandesa by Miguel de Barrios (Daniel Levi de Barrios) describes the political and religious 'government' of the community, and includes accounts of its literary and charitable associations, along with poems, encomia, funeral orations, and other miscellanea from de Barrios' Jewish oeuvre. This excerpt constitutes the opening of the work, part of a 58-page introduction which sets a theme for the rest by relating the exilic governance of the Jewish people to the six days of creation, and the restored monarchy of the messianic age to the seventh day, on which God …

Popularization Of The Kabbalah: Two Early Modern Perspectives, Boaz Huss

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

In this presentation Boaz Huss of Ben Gurion University discusses two texts, one from the sixteenth century, and one from the eighteenth century, illustrating the popularization of the Zohar, the foundational kabbalistic text, in the early modern period.

Introduction To R Hayim Vital And His Treatise Etz Hayim - The Tree Of Life [And To] The Sha'ar Hahaqdamot - Gate Of Principles (1572), Yosef Hacker, Menachem Kallus, Brian Ogren

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Yosef Hacker of Hebrew University in Jerusalem discusses Hayim Vital's Ets Hayim.

Privilege And Statute Of Maria Theresia For The Jews Of Trieste (1771), Lois Dubin

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

In 1771 the Habsburg ruler Maria Theresia issued a Privilege and a Statute to Jews in Trieste, both to confirm their status and to attract additional Jewish merchants to help develop the Adriatic Free Port.

Lois Dubin discusses the legal and historical significance of this privilege.

Click here to view the presentation.

Jewish Legal Status In The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Adam Teller

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

In this presentation, Adam Teller discusses the change of status of Jews in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth from the subjects of the King in the late medieval period to subjects of lords, in private dominions during the early modern period. He contrasts two legal documents: a privilege granted to Jews by King Kazimierz Jagiellończyk (1453) and a privilege granted to Jews in the town of Jampol by the town's owner.

Elia Schadeus' Mysterium: About The Conversion Of The Jews (1592), Debra Kaplan

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

This text reflects Elia Schadeus' position that economic tolerance of Jews and of converts would facilitate conversion to Christianity. It also documents the desperation felt by Jewish converts to Christianity, who had difficulty integrating into both their old and new societies.

Welcome Address At Emw 2004, Magda Teter

Early Modern Workshop: Resources in Jewish History

Welcome address to the first annual Early Modern Workshop.

Click here to view the video