David Aberbach's book explores major transformations in Jewish life and thought from the Bible to the present and asks fundamental questions: How did ancient Israel evolve from being a people oscillating to and from belief in one God to exclusive monotheism? Which circumstances led to the transition among the Jews in the Roman empire from being a militant, state-based people to being a pacifist, scripture-based people? which social forces attracted the Jews under medieval Islamic rule to secular life and identity? How did emancipation after the American and French revolutions lead to the end of rabbinic dominance? How did nationalism and revived Hebrew language and literatrue transform modern Jewish life and culture? David Aberbach's book is unique in its scope, eclectic approach, and perception of Judaism as a constantly evolving civilization, always in relation to other, dominant cultures.
Introduction
Acknowledgements
PART I: FROM IDOLATRY TO EXCLUSIVE MONOTHEISM
The Iron Age, Imperialism and the Prophets
Trauma and Abstract Monotheism: Jewish Exile and Recovery in the 6th Century BCE
PART II: FROM STATE TO SCRIPTURE/UNIVERSALISM
The Roman-Jewish Wars and Hebrew Cultural Nationalism
The Tannaim, Marcus Aurelius, and the Politics of Stoicized Judaism
PART III: TOWARDS A SECULAR CULTURE
Secular Hebrew Poetry in Muslim Spain 1031-1140
PART IV: FROM THEOLOGY TO SOCIOLOGY
Mystical Union and Grief: The Baal Shem Tov and Krishnamurti
Emancipation and the End of Rabbinic Dominance: Marx and Freud
Conflicting Sociological Identities of Hebrew in Western Civilization
FROM ASSIMILATION TO NATIONALISM
The Renascence of Hebrew and Jewish Nationalism in the Tsarist Empire 1881-1917
DAVID ABERBACH is Associate Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature, McGill University, Montreal, Canada and Visiting Academic at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has published books on three modern Hebrew writers, Mendele, Bialik and Agnon, as well as Surviving Trauma: Loss, Literature and Psychoanalysis, Imperial and Biblical Prophecy 750-500BCE, Charisma in Politics, Religion and the Media: Private Trauma, Public Ideals, and (with Moshe Aberbach) Revolutionary Hebrew: Empire and Crisis.
Description
David Aberbach's book explores major transformations in Jewish life and thought from the Bible to the present and asks fundamental questions: How did ancient Israel evolve from being a people oscillating to and from belief in one God to exclusive monotheism? Which circumstances led to the transition among the Jews in the Roman empire from being a militant, state-based people to being a pacifist, scripture-based people? which social forces attracted the Jews under medieval Islamic rule to secular life and identity? How did emancipation after the American and French revolutions lead to the end of rabbinic dominance? How did nationalism and revived Hebrew language and literatrue transform modern Jewish life and culture? David Aberbach's book is unique in its scope, eclectic approach, and perception of Judaism as a constantly evolving civilization, always in relation to other, dominant cultures.
Contents
Introduction
Acknowledgements
PART I: FROM IDOLATRY TO EXCLUSIVE MONOTHEISM
The Iron Age, Imperialism and the Prophets
Trauma and Abstract Monotheism: Jewish Exile and Recovery in the 6th Century BCE
PART II: FROM STATE TO SCRIPTURE/UNIVERSALISM
The Roman-Jewish Wars and Hebrew Cultural Nationalism
The Tannaim, Marcus Aurelius, and the Politics of Stoicized Judaism
PART III: TOWARDS A SECULAR CULTURE
Secular Hebrew Poetry in Muslim Spain 1031-1140
PART IV: FROM THEOLOGY TO SOCIOLOGY
Mystical Union and Grief: The Baal Shem Tov and Krishnamurti
Emancipation and the End of Rabbinic Dominance: Marx and Freud
Conflicting Sociological Identities of Hebrew in Western Civilization
FROM ASSIMILATION TO NATIONALISM
The Renascence of Hebrew and Jewish Nationalism in the Tsarist Empire 1881-1917
Authors
DAVID ABERBACH is Associate Professor of Hebrew and Comparative Literature, McGill University, Montreal, Canada and Visiting Academic at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has published books on three modern Hebrew writers, Mendele, Bialik and Agnon, as well as Surviving Trauma: Loss, Literature and Psychoanalysis, Imperial and Biblical Prophecy 750-500BCE, Charisma in Politics, Religion and the Media: Private Trauma, Public Ideals, and (with Moshe Aberbach) Revolutionary Hebrew: Empire and Crisis.
|