In their long history, Jews encountered political, social, cultural, and religious crises which threatened not only their very existence but Jewish identity as well. Examples for such crises include the Babylonian Exile, the so-called Hellenistic Religious reforms, the first and second Jewish war, the inquisition, and the Shoah, but also the encounter of modernity or socio-economic developments. Political, cultural, and religious crises did not coin Jewish culture, thought, and religion but forced Jews from the very beginnings of Judaism until today to rethink and shape their Jewish identity anew. This volume asks how Jews coped with events that threatened Jewish existence, culture, and religion and how they responded to them. Each crisis was different in nature and evoked hence different developments in Jewish culture, thought, and religion.

English summary: This book presents eight studies on the textual history of Jewish scriptures from Antiquity to the Middle Ages which engage in various aspects of Emanuel Tov's textcritical work. Contributions by Emanuel Tov, Armin Lange, Josef M. Oesch, Friedrich V. Reiterer, Hermann-Josef Stipp, Hanna Tervanotko, Kevin Trompelt and Jozsef Zengeller. German description: Die Textfunde von Qumran und der Codex Aleppo markieren zwei Wendepunkte in der Textgeschichte der Hebraischen Bibel. Die Textgeschichte dieser Sammlung judischer Schriften steht im Zentrum des wissenschaftlichen Lebens von Emanuel Tov, den die Universitat anlasslich seines 65. Geburtstags mit einem internationalen Symposium ehrte, welches seine Thesen diskutierte. Der vorliegende Band veroffentlicht diese kritische Wurdigung der textgeschichtlichen Forschungen von Emanuel Tov sowie eine seiner eigenen Arbeiten zu dem Thema. Mit Beitragen von Emanuel Tov, Armin Lange, Josef M. Oesch, Friedrich V. Reiterer, Hermann-Josef Stipp, Hanna Tervanotko, Kevin Trompelt und Jozsef Zengeller.