Volume XXII of the distinguished annual Studies in Contemporary Jewry explores the major and rapid changes experienced by a population known variously as "Sephardim," "Oriental" Jews and "Mizrahim" over the last fifty years. Although Sephardim are popularly believed to have originated in Spain or Portugal, the majority of Mizrahi Jews today are actually the descendants of Jews from Muslim and Arab countries in the Middle East, North Africa, and Asia. They constitute a growing proportion of Israeli Jewry and continue to revitalize Jewish culture in places as varied as France, Latin America, and the United States.
Sephardic Jewry and Mizrahi Jews offers a collection of new scholarship on the issues of self-definition and identity facing Sephardic Jewry. The essays draw on a variety of disciplines--demography, history, political science, sociology, religious and gender studies, anthropology, and literature. Contributors explore the issues surrounding the emergence and increasingly wide usage of "Mizrahi" in place of "Sephardic," as well as the invigoration of Sephardic Judaism. They look at the evolution of Sephardic politics in Israel through the dramatic rise and continuing influence of the Shas political party and its spiritual leader, Rabbi Ovadia Yosef. Other contributors examine the variegated nature of Mizrahi immigration to Israel, fictional portraits of female Mizrahi immigrants to Israel in the 1940s and 1950s, contemporary Mizrahi Israel feminism, modern Arab historiography's portrayal of Jews of Muslim lands, and the changing Sephardic halakhic tradition.

The Sefer Yetsirah (the Book of Creation ) is a core text of the early kabbalah, yet scholars have struggled to establish even the most basic facts about the work. This project attempts to discover the ways in which diagrams accompanying the text and its commentaries show trends in the development of the kabbalistic tradition as a whole.

The focus of this book is on early Jewish interpretations of the ambiguous relationship between God and 'the angel of the Lord/God' in texts like Genesis 16, 22 and 31. Genesis 32 is included since it exhibits the same ambiguity and constitutes an inseparable part of the Jacob saga. The study is set in the wider context of the development of angelology and concepts of God in various forms of early Judaism. When identifying patterns of interpretation in Jewish texts, their chronological setting is less important than the nature of the biblical source texts. For example, a common pattern is the avoidance of anthropomorphism. In Genesis 'the angel of the Lord' generally seems to be a kind of impersonal extension of God, while later Jewish writings are characterized by a more individualized angelology, but the ambivalence between God and his angel remains in many interpretations. In Philo's works and Wisdom of Solomon, the 'Logos' and 'Lady Wisdom' respectively have assumed the role of the biblical 'angel of the Lord'. Although the angelology of Second Temple Judaism had developed in the direction of seeing angels as distinct personalities, Judaism still had room for the idea of divine hypostases.

The history of Israel goes back 4,000 years, and conflict has dogged much of its past. But today's headlines continue to highlight the Israeli-Palestinian struggle and Israel's quest for peace. Even so, another struggle is quietly rampant within world Jewry: the fight to secure Israel's future.

Offering a unique perspective on this issue, "The Fair Dinkum Jew" serves as an informative primer to show how the Abrahamic Covenant is vital to Israel's survival. Author Allan Russell Juriansz discusses the three great pillars of this Covenant-Land, Torah, and Messiah-and shows how Israel's only hope for security lies within these terms.

Juriansz breaks down years of Jewish history to prove the relevance of Judaism to Jewish existence and future in terms of the Abrahamic Covenant. He then discusses diff erent aspects of the Arab infi ltration and occupation of Palestine and examines the current confl ict between Jews and Arab Palestinians in terms of the post-1967 borders. In addition, he off ers potential solutions for peace that could possibly lead to stability within the Middle East.

"The Fair Dinkum Jew" issues a stirring call for Israel's need to believe in and defend its political, national, and religious integrity.

This book challenges Voltaire's doctrine of toleration. Can a Jew be a philosopher? And if so, at what cost? It seeks to provide an organic interpretation of Voltaire's attitude towards Jews, problematising the issue against the background of his theory of toleration. To date, no monograph entirely dedicated to this theme has been written. This book attempts to provide an answer to the crucial questions that have emerged in the past fifty years through a process of reading and analysis that starts with the publication of Des Juifs (1756), and ends with the posthumous publication of the apocryphal article 'Juifs' in the Kehl edition of the Dictionnaire Philosophique (1784).

Blending the deep traditions of Jewish humanism with modern philosophical expressions, this book argues that Jewish values are not fixed propositions embedded in written form that can be easily handed off from one generation to the next.

The scholarly study of the texts traditionally regarded as sacred in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam has been an important aspect of Wissenschaft des Judentums and was often conceptualized as part of Jewish theology. Featuring studies on Isaak Markus Jost's Jewish children's Bible, Samson Raphael Hirsch's complex position on the question whether or not the Hebrew Bible is to be understood within the context of the Ancient Orient, Isaac Mayer Wise's "The Origin of Christianity," Ignaz Goldziher's Scholarship on the Qur'an, modern translators of the Qur'an into Hebrew, and the German translation of the Talmud, the volume attempts to shed light on some aspects of this phenomenon, which as a whole seems to have received few scholarly attention, and to contextualize it within the contemporary intellectual currents.

After forty years of feminism, views of the traditional Jewish family, religion, and gender roles have changed. In the process a new literature has been created, new paradigms born, and many Jewish women writers have been reevaluated, reclaimed, and renamed, with their Jewish heritage often overlooked or misinterpreted." Modern Jewish Women Writers in America "includes groundbreaking essays and interviews with scholars and authors who reveal that despite pressures of assimilation, personal goals, and in some cases, anti-Semitism, they have never been able to divorce their lives or literature from being Jewish.

Is the Bible a Hellenistic book? The essays in this volume respond to that challenging question, formulated by Niels Peter Lemche, and offer everything from qualified agreement to vociferous opposition. In so doing, they debate and illuminate the many features of Jewish writing in the Second Temple period, including not only the scriptures themselves and their own history, but the non-canonized literature of the late Second-Temple period. As with all the volumes in this pioneering series, the editor, Lester Grabbe, introduces and reflects upon the discussion and its implications for one of the most controversial topics in current biblical studies.

In this classic work of Jewish mystical thought, world-renowned scholar Rabbi Adin Steinsaltz explores the major questions asked by modern Jews about the nature of existence in Gods universe. The title The Thirteen Petalled Rose, taken from the opening lines of the seminal work of Jewish mysticism, the Zohar, refers to the collective souls of the Jewish people, which scholars have likened to the fullness of a rose and its petals. This expanded edition of The Thirteen Petalled Rose features a new preface and two new chapters that provide a moving explanation of the Kabbalistic view of devotion, and a profound interpretation of the prophet Elijahs Introduction to the Zohar.

'Queen Sheba Talking': Finally Queen Sheba is found It is a fascinating investigation leading to the where about Queen Sheba is hiding? 3000 years of colourful history is revealed by Hisham Amili. Who was Queen Sheba and did King Solomon really exist? Indeed was Jerusalem built when Queen Sheba visited Solomon or did she visit him in Mecca instead? 'Queen Sheba talking' is revealing many secrets of the Near East Civilisations, Camels, Jews and Ethiopians? The book entertains the possibility that Queen Sheba and king Solomon were neither neighbours nor prominent, merely virtual leaders. On the other hand 'Queen Sheba Talking' provides great evidence to support their true existence but 150 years after their traditional biblical dates. Unlike Amili's previous books, there are many charts and tables in his new 'Queen Sheba talking' simplifying the tale and serving the feeds that led to her throne. It is a fascinating read with great imagination based on actual records of history and antiquities . Contrary to Napoleon, Alexandra, Cleopatra or even Hitler, the story of Queen Sheba has greater impact and more secrets to explore. It is a powerful true story of love, religion, civilisation, trade, gender and ultimate control on people and their aspiration.

Although in Second Temple literature we find a variety of songs concerned with the future of Jerusalem, little attempt has been made to analyse these comparatively as a generic group. In this study, three songs have been selected on the basis of their similarity in style, ideas and their apparent original composition in Hebrew. The texts have been subjected to a literary analysis both individually and then comparatively.

The volume publishes papers read at the tenth International Conference on the Deuterocanonical Books, Budapest, 2013. The authors explore various aspects of this literature, with pre-eminent emphasis on their relation to diverse early Jewish texts and traditions; their reactions on Hellenism; and the way they treated as a canonical collection within their history of interpretation.

This volume will concentrate its search for religious individuality on texts and practices related to texts from Classical Greece to Late Antiquity. Texts offer opportunities to express one's own religious experience and shape one's own religious personality within the boundaries of what is acceptable. Inscriptions in public or at least easily accessible spaces might substantially differ in there range of expressions and topics from letters within a sectarian religious group (which, at the same time, might put enormous pressure on conformity among its members, regarded as deviant by a majority of contemporaries). Furthermore, texts might offer and advocate new practices in reading, meditating, remembering or repeating these very texts. Such practices might contribute to the development of religious individuality, experienced or expressed in factual isolation, responsibility, competition, and finally in philosophical or theological reflections about "personhood" or "self". The volume develops its topic in three sections, addressing personhood, representative and charismatic individuality, the interaction of individual and groups and practices of reading and writing. It explores Jewish, Christian, Greek and Latin texts.

It is crucial today to understand how religions can exist harmoniously in a shared environment, whether local or global. A reasoned approach to this question was sought by participants at a stimulating conference of the International Association for the History of Religions (IAHR) in a predominantly Muslim country, Indonesia. Themes treated include the relation between theoretical approaches and religious viewpoints, practical problems and conflict resolution at the local level, and religious education with special reference to the role of Muslim schools (pesantren) in Indonesia.

The papacy of Pius XII (1939-1958) has been a source of near-constant debate and criticism since his death over half a century ago. Powerful myths have arisen around him, and central to them is the dispute surrounding his alleged silence during the years of the Holocaust. In this groundbreaking work, historian Paul O'Shea examines the papacy as well as the little-studied pre-papal life of Eugenio Pacelli in order to illuminate his policies, actions, and statements during the war. Drawing carefully and comprehensively on the historical record, O'Shea convincingly demonstrates that Pius was neither an anti-Semitic villain nor a "lamb without stain." Ultimately, Pius's legacy reveals the moral crisis within many parts of the fractured Christian Commonwealth as well as the personal culpability of Pacelli, the man and pope.

Rabbi Safran's compelling book about the need to incorporate the traditional view of modesty if we are to save our children from the superficiality, the decadence and the damaging influences of our modern, "progressive" society, opens with a simple question, "What can an Orthodox rabbi tell me about my children or my life?"
In his book, Rabbi Dr. Safran goes on to make clear that an Orthodox rabbi has quite a bit to say about the modern world, the power of spirituality, and the particularly powerful religious worldview of Judaism. Rabbi Safran presents the traditional view of modesty in the context of Judaism's unique way of looking at the world. For Judaism, seeks an appropriate balance between the physical and the spiritual, denying neither and recognizing that the beauty of God's creative wisdom inhabits both.
Rabbi Safran presents the traditional Jewish view of modesty, tzniut, by first questioning the "benefit" that the modern world has bestowed upon us. Indeed, he takes the strong position that our modern world has sought to turn our children into "commodities" that serve to benefit a corporate bottom line, but not the best interests of our children.
The superficiality of the modern world, with its emphasis on body image, has done a profound disservice to us and to our children. There are ever more young people turning to illicit sexual encounters, alcohol and drug abuse, and who suffer from psychological struggles like eating disorders. In this context, Rabbi Safran does not present tzniut as a "quick fix." Far from it. He establishes the textual, spiritual and historical context for modesty and demonstrates with candor

Since the Enlightenment period, German-Jewish intellectuals have been prominent voices in the multi-facetted discourse on the reinterpretation of Jewish tradition in light of modern thinking. Paul Mendes-Flohr, one of the towering figures of current scholarship on German-Jewish intellectual history, has made invaluable contributions to a better understanding of the religious, cultural and political dimensions of these thinkers' encounter with German and European culture, including the tension between their loyalty to Judaism and the often competing claims of non-Jewish society and culture. This volume assembles essays by internationally acknowledged scholars in the field who intend to honor Mendes-Flohr's work by portraying the abundance of religious, philosophical, aesthetical and political aspects dominating the thinking of those famous thinkers populating German Jewry's rich and complex intellectual world in the modern period. It also provides a fresh theoretical outlook on trends in Jewish intellectual history, raising new questions concerning the dialectics of assimilation. In addition to that, the volume sheds light on thinkers and debates that hitherto have not been accorded full scholarly attention.

This volume presents the theory of culture of the Russian-born German Jewish social philosopher David Koigen (1879-1933). Heir to Hermann Cohen's neo-Kantian interpretation of Judaism, he transforms the religion of reason into an ethical Intimitatsreligion. He draws upon a great variety of intellectual currents, among them, Max Scheler's philosophy of values, the historical sociology of Max Weber, the sociology of religion of Emile Durkheim, Ernst Troeltsch and Georg Simmel and American pragmatism. Influenced by his personal experience of marginality in German academia yet the same time unconstrained by the dictates of the German Jewish discourse, Koigen shapes these theoretical strands into an original argument which unfolds along two trajectories: theodicy of culture and ethos. Distinguished from ethics, ethos identifies the non-formal factors that foster a group's sense of collective identity as it adapts to continuous change. From a Jewish perspective, ethos is grounded in the biblical covenant as the paradigm of a social contract and corporate liability. Although the normative content of the covenantal ethos is subject to gradual secularization, its metaphysical and existential assumptions, Koigen argues, continue to inform Jewish self-understanding. The concept of ethos identifies the dialectic of tradition as it shapes Jewish religious consciousness, and, in turn, is shaped by the evolving cultural and axiological sensibilities. In consonance, Jewish identity cannot be reduced to ethnicity or a purely secular culture. Urban develops these fragmentary and inchoate theories into a sociology of religious knowledge and suggests to read Koigen not just as a Jewish sociologist but as the first sociologist of Judaism who proposes to overcome the dogmatic anti-metaphysical stance of European sociology.

Opening with the prophet Elijah's ascent into heaven and closing with the people of Judah's descent to Babylonia, 2 Kings charts the story of the two Israelite kingdoms until their destruction. This commentary unfolds the literary dimensions of 2 Kings, analyzes the strategies through which its words create a world of meaning, and examines the book's tales of prophets, political intrigue, royal apostasy, and religious reform as components of larger patterns.

2 Kings pays attention to the writers' methods of representing human character and of twisting chronological time for literary purposes. It also shows how the contests between kings and prophets are mirrored in the competing structures of regnal synchronization and prophecy-fulfillment. Much more than a common chronicle of royal achievements and disasters, 2 Kings emerges as a powerful history that creates memories and forges identities for its Jewish readers.

"2 Kings" is divided into four parts including Part One The Story of Elisha: 2 Kings 1:1-8:6"; Part Two "Revolutions in Aram, Israel, and Judah: 2 Kings 8:7-13:25"; Part Three "Turmoil and Tragedy for Israel: 2 Kings 14-17"; and Part Four "Renewal and Catastrophe for Judah: 2 Kings 18-25."

"Robert L. Cohn is professor of religion and holds the Philip and Muriel Berman Chair in Jewish studies at Lafayette College. Under the auspices of the American Jewish Committee, he lectured on Jewish interpretations of the Bible as the first American Jewish-scholar-in-residence at four Roman Catholic seminaries in Poland.""

The present study addresses problems of an epistemological nature which hinge on the question of how to define Jewish thought. It will take its start in an ancient question, that of the relationship between Jewish culture, Greek philosophy, and then Greco-Roman (and Christian) thought in connection with the query into the history and genealogy of wisdom and knowledge. Our journey into the history of the denomination 'Jewish philosophy' will include a leg that will lead us to certain declarations of political, moral, and scientific principles, and then on to the birth of what is called philosophia perennis or, in Christian circles, prisca theologia. Our subject of inquiry will thus be the birth of the concept of Jewish philosophy, Jewish theology and Jewish philosophy of religion. A special emphasis will fall on the topic treated in the last part of this study: Jewish scepticism, a theme that involves a philosophical attitude founded on dialectical "enquiry", as the etymology of the Greek word skepsis properly means.