In this controversial book, the authors show how the Roman-Jewish wars were precipitated partly by Jewish demographic and religious expansion and by conflict with the Greeks and their culture. They argue that the trauma and humiliation of defeat, stimulated Jewish cultural growth, particularly in Hebrew, during and after the wars. This culture was an implicit rejection of Graeco-Roman civilization and values in favour of a more exclusivist religious cultural nationalism. This form of nationalism, though unique in the ancient world, anticipates more recent cultural national movements of defeated peoples.

The Encyclopedia of Modern Jewish Culture is an extensively updated revision of the very successful Companion to Jewish Culture published in 1989 and has now been updated throughout. Experts from all over the world contribute entries ranging from 200 to 1000 words broadly, covering the humanities, arts, social sciences, sport and popular culture, and 5000-word essays contextualize the shorter entries, and provide overviews to aspects of culture in the Jewish world. Ideal for student and general readers, the articles and biographies have been written by scholars and academics, musicians, artists and writers, and the book now contains up-to-date bibliographies, suggestions for further reading, comprehensive cross referencing, and a full index. This is a resource, no student of Jewish history will want to go without.

This book, by a non-Jewish analytic philosopher, addresses the issue of whether, and to what extent, current opposition to Israel on the liberal-left embodies anti-Semitic stances. It argues that the dominant climate of liberal opinion does, however inadvertently, disseminate a range of anti-Semitic assertions and motifs of the most traditional kind. It then advocates a return to an unrestricted anti-racism which would allow liberals to defend Palestinian interests without, in the process, demonizing Jews.

A representative selection from the man with the acid pen and the perfect pitch for hypocrisy, who was as much the voice of 1920s Berlin as Georg Grosz was its face. Kurt Tucholsky was a brilliant reporter, satirist, poet, lyricist, and storyteller of the Weimar Republic, a pacifist and a democrat; a fighter, lady's man, theater lover, political animal, and also an early warner against the Nazis. They hated and loathed Tucholsky, and drove him out of his country. The famed journalist became an outcast, an enemy of the state. His books were burned and banned in 1933, he died alone in Sweden. But he is not forgotten.With this extraordinary and also funny book, Tucholsky's work about his hometown Berlin is published for the first time in the United States.

American cities are today more diverse than at any time in history. The continuing flow of new immigrants has settled in urban and suburban areas that have undergone visible change in population and neighborhoods. While Chicago long served as the convenient and well-studied model for urban sociology, for many Los Angeles has become the focal point for study of the postmodern heteropolis. It is interesting that for sociologists New York City, especially its outer boroughs such as Brooklyn and Queens, has largely remained outside the intense gaze of urban study. As the nation's largest city New York has long had a mosaic of social worlds comparable to that of Chicago, and displays an ethnic diversity comparable to that of Los Angeles. Because New York City presents us with a less easily recognizable mosaic and a more free form scattering of ethnic social spaces, it is seldom thought of as a pre or post-modern "model" for other metropolitan areas. The eight articles presented in this volume represent both older and established ethnic and racial communities as well as new and emerging groups in New York City. These include Italian communities, African American, as well as newer Jewish, Caribbean, and Asian groups.

'If Salt Has Memory' comprises essays, memoirs and fiction by Jewish writers in exile from many lands. The anthology is particularly strong on Jewish writers in exile from Iraq, Iran and South America, and includes several essays translated from Arabic.

During the high Middle Ages, the tosafists flourished in northern Europe and revolutionized the study of the Talmud. These Jewish scholars did not participate in the philosophical and religious thought that concerned Christendom, and today they are seen as having played a limited role in mystical or esoteric studies. Ephraim Kanarfogel now challenges this conventional view of the tosafists, showing that many individuals were influenced by ascetic and pietistic practices and were involved with mystical and magical doctrines. He traces the presence of these disciplines in the pre-Crusade period, shows how they are intertwined, and suggests that the widely available Hekhalot literature was an important conduit for this material. He also demonstrates that the asceticism and esotericism of the German Pietists were an integral part of Ashkenazic rabbinic culture after the failure of Rashbam and other early tosafists to suppress these aspects of pre-Crusade thinking. The identification of these various forms of spirituality places the tosafists among those medieval rabbinic thinkers who sought to supplement their Talmudism with other areas of knowledge such as philosophy and kabbalah, demonstrating the compatibility of rabbinic culture and mysticism. These interests, argues Kanarfogel, explain both references to medieval Ashkenazic rabbinic figures in kabbalistic literature and the acceptance of certain ascetic and mystical practices by later Ashkenazic scholars. Drawing on original manuscript research, Kanarfogel makes available for the first time many passages produced by lesser known tosafists and rabbinic figures and integrates the findings of earlier and contemporary scholarship, much of it published only in Hebrew. "Peering through the Lattices" provides a greater appreciation for these texts and opens up new opportunities for scholarhship in Jewish history and thought.

Music historian Irene Heskes takes a topical and chronological approach to present an exhaustive examination of the history, form and meaning of Jewish musical traditions. Chapters include: Documenting the Heritage; Bible, Liturgy, and Cantorial Art; The Musical Heritage of Sephardic and Oriental Jewry; Music of Mysticism and Piety; The Yiddish Musical World of Eastern Europe; The Holocaust Era; America; The Music of Zion and Israel; Composers and Compositions; and Women.

In two places in the First Gospel (Matt 10:5b-6; 15:24) the Messianic mission of Jesus and his disciples is limited to a group called a ~the lost sheep of the house of Israela (TM). In light of Matthewa (TM)s intense interest in Jesusa (TM) Davidic Messiahship and the Jewish Shepard-King traditions surrounding King David it is argued that the 'lost sheep of the house of Israel'refers to remnants of the former northern kingdom of Israel who continued to reside in the northern region of the ideal Land of Israel.

The historical involvement of Jews in the political Left is well known, but far less attention has been paid to the political and ideological factors which attracted Jews to the Left. After the Holocaust and the creation of Israel many lost their faith in universalistic solutions, yet lingering links between Jews and the Left continue to exist.

The Song of Songs is a fascinating text. Read as an allegory of God’s love for Israel, the Church, or individual believers, it became one of the most influential texts from the Bible. This volume includes twenty-three essays that cover the Song’s reception history from antiquity to the present. They illuminate the richness of this reception history, paying attention to diverse interpretations in commentaries, sermons, and other literature, as well as the Song’s impact on spirituality, theological and intellectual debates, and the arts.

The purpose of The Jewish Communities in New England is to inform readers about the Jewish community in each of the six New England States: Rhode Island, Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Vermont. Factual, inspirational, and poetic, it serves as a scholarly guide to institutions of Jewish life in this dynamic American region. Stocked with valuable information about community, schools, restaurants, and synagogues, Keith Warwick's study will appeal to members of the Jewish community, sociologists, teachers, cultural anthropologists, and the general reader.

In this urgent book, Alan M. Dershowitz shows why American Jews are in danger of disappearing - and what must be done now to create a renewed sense of Jewish identity for the next century. In previous times, the threats to Jewish survival were external - the virulent consequences of anti-Semitism. Now, however, in late-twentieth-century America, the danger has shifted. Jews today are more secure, more accepted, more assimilated, and more successful than ever before. They've dived into the melting pot - and they've achieved the American Dream. And that, according to Dershowitz, is precisely the problem. More than 50 percent of Jews will marry non-Jews, and their children will most often be raised as non-Jews. Which means, in the view of Dershowitz, that American Jews will vanish as a distinct cultural group sometime in the next century - unless they act now. Speaking to concerned Jews everywhere, Dershowitz calls for a new Jewish identity that focuses on the positive - the 3,500-year-old legacy of Jewish culture, values, and traditions. Dershowitz shows how this new Jewish identity can compete in America's open environment of opportunity and choice - and offers concrete proposals on how to instill it in the younger generation.

The Halbjuden of Hitler's Germany were half Christian and half Jewish but, like the rest of the Mischlinge (or "partial-Jews"), were far too Jewish in the eyes of the Nazis. Thus, while they were allowed for a time to coexist with the rest of German society, they were granted only the most marginal or menial jobs, restricted from marrying Aryans or even leading normal social lives, and sent eventually to forced-labor and concentration camps. More than 70,000 Germans were subjected to these restrictions and indignities, created and fostered by Hitler's morally bankrupt race laws, yet to this day few personal accounts of their experiences exist.

James Tent movingly recounts how these men and women from all over Germany and from all walks of life struggled to survive in an increasingly hostile society, even as their Jewish relatives were disappearing into the East. It draws on extensive interviews with twenty survivors, many of whom were teenagers when Hitler came to power, to show how "half Jews" coped with conditions on a day-to-day basis, and how the legacy of the hatred they suffered has forever lingered in their minds.

Tent provides gripping stories of life beneath the boot-heel of Nazi rule: a woman deemed unsuited for a career in nursing because the shape of her earlobes and breasts indicated she was not "racially suited," a man arrested for "race defilement" because he lived with an Aryan woman, and many others. Writing with a deep and abiding respect for his subjects, Tent shows how Nazi discrimination and persecution affected the lives of the Mischlinge beginning in 1933, and he tells how such treatment intensified through the later years of the war.

These testimonies offer rare insight into how Nazi persecution functioned at a very personal level. Tent's witnesses share experiences in school and problems in the workplace, where the best survival strategy was to find an unobtrusive niche in a nondescript job. They tell of obstacles to personal and romantic relationships. And they soberly remind us that by 1944 they too were rounded up for forced labor, certain to be the next victims of Nazi genocide.

"In the Shadow of the Holocaust" demonstrates the lengths to which the Nazis were willing to go in order to eradicate Judaism-a fanaticism that increased over time and even in the face of impending military defeat. These people mostly survived the Holocaust, yet they paid for their re-assimilation into German society by remaining silent in the face of haunting memories. This book breaks that silence and is a testament to human endurance under the most trying circumstances.

The only comprehensive resource of its kind, this interdisciplinary bibliography lists and describes all significant books, dissertations, articles, and periodicals on the subject of Latin American Jews published in any language between 1970 and 1986. Annotations of every work cited are based on critical evaluation by scholars immersed in the subject matter.

Part I is a bibliography of recent monographs, dissertations, and scholarly articles published mainly in English, Spanish, Portuguese, Yiddish, and Hebrew. Providing access to some 750 works, most of which are not cited in other standard references, it covers topics ranging from agriculture, history, and anti-semitism to literary and social criticism. Biographic notes are supplied on authors whose work has been especially important to the development of the field. Part II lists and evaluates holdings of 220 Latin American Jewish periodicals in U.S. archives and libraries and is arranged by country. Author, title, and subject indexes are provided. This volume is an essential tool for research and study in Latin American history, Jewish history, ethnic studies, and related disciplines.

With an ongoing international conference, Jewish humor in recent years has been a subject of serious scholarly inquiry. Most academic publications, however, have been individual works representing a particular thesis or viewpoint, generally on literary aspects. The present collection of essays by scholars from England, France, the United States, Denmark, Israel, and Australia explores characteristics of Jewish humor from a variety of perspectives, including anthropology, literature, psychology, sociology, and religion.

Geographically, the work distinguishes between the Jewish humor of Israel and that of the diaspora; historically, it traces Jewish humor to the Bible. The linkages with Judaism and the Yiddish language are explored. Essays deal with the Jewish use of humor in stressful and tragic situations, with self-disparagement in Jewish humor, with anti-semitism and stereotyping, and with Jewish women as the objects of humor. The contributions to world culture of humorists Sholom Aleichem, Woody Allen, Philip Roth, Charlie Chaplin, and numerous contemporary performers are discussed as are the Jewish theorists of humor, including Sigmund Freud, Henri Bergson, and Arthur Koestler. An interdisciplinary book, it will be of interest to students and researchers of Jewish tradition and folklore, Jewish-American literature, American studies, and humor, popular culture, anthropology, psychology, and sociology.

Between 1933 and the outbreak of war in 1939, over 60,000 Jewish refugees fled to Britain from Germany, Austria, and Czechoslovakia. Some 50,000 settled there. No previous historical study of this group of immigrants exists, though they form one of the most high-profile groups of refugees to have come to Britain in the 20th century, both as survivors of the Nazi terror and as high-achieving contributors to British society. This book - now available in paperback - focuses on the first quarter-century of these Jewish refugees' settlement in Britain. It covers new ground by drawing on a rich source of contemporary material: the previously untapped monthly journal of the Association of Jewish Refugees - AJR Information. The journal is the only contemporary source that provides material for a full-scale history of these refugees when they established themselves permanently in Britain, as well as how they adapted to British society and developed their distinctive 'Continental' identity and culture that characterized them in their adopted homeland.

Gradually receiving legal rights from the eighteenth century onwards, Jews in Germany and Austria adapted to their surrounding culture with success but also with increasing strain as antisemitism gathered pace. Ritchie Robertson offers a cogent examination of this dual process and investigates how its tensions were articulated in a range of literary works, by both Jews and Gentile authors, from the Enlightenment to the 1930s.

Discover what Jewish people in America have to say about Israel their voices have never mattered more than they do now.

As anti-Israel sentiment spreads around the world from Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to former President Jimmy Carter it has never been more important for American Jews to share their feelings and thoughts about Israel, and foster a connection to Israel in the next generation of Jewish and Christian adults.

This inspirational book features the insights of top scholars, business leaders, professionals, politicians, authors, artists, and community and religious leaders covering the entire denominational spectrum of Jewish life in America today and offers an exciting glimpse into the history of Zionism in America with statements from Jews who saw the movement come to life. Presenting a diversity of views, it will encourage people of all ages and backgrounds to think about what Israel means to them and, in particular, help young adults jump start their own lasting, personal relationship with Israel.