The Book Documents The Vanishing Heritage Of The Relatively Unknown Indian Jewsih Communities: The Bene Israel Of Maharashtra, The Cochin Jews Of The Malabar Coast, And The Baghdadi Jews Who Settled In Bombay And Calcutta. It Combines Scholarship With Photographic Documentation.
This book explores the extraordinary differentiation of the Baghdadi Jewish community over time during their sojourn in India from the end of the eighteenth century until their dispersion to Indian diasporas in Israel and English-speaking countries throughout the world after India gained independence in 1947. Chapters on schools, institutions and culture present how Baghdadis in India managed to maintain their communities by negotiating multiple identities in a stratified and complex society. Several disciplinary perspectives are utilized to explore the super-diversity of the Baghdadis and the ways in which they successfully adapted to new situations during the Raj, while retaining particular traditions and modifying and incorporating others. Providing a comprehensive overview of this community, the contributions to the book show that the legacy of the Baghdadi Jews lives on for Indians today through landmarks and monuments in Mumbai, Pune and Kolkata, and for Jews, through memories woven by members of the community residing in diverse diasporas. Offering refreshing historical perspectives on the colonial period in India, this book will be of interest to those studying South Asian Studies, Diaspora and Ethnic Studies, Sociology, History, Jewish Studies and Asian Religion.
This collection analyzes the affinities and interactions between Indic and Judaic civilizations from ancient to contemporary times. The contributors propose a new, global understanding of commerce and culture, to reconfigure how we understand the way great cultures interact, and present a new constellation of diplomacy, literature, and geopolitics.
Volume Three contains 1643 records on South Asia selected from the ABIA South and Southeast Asian Art and Archaeology Index database at www.abia.net. Volume Three has been compiled by specialists of the ABIA Project stationed at Leiden, Colombo, New Delhi, Dhaka, Kathmandu and Peshawar. It features a selection of publications in print published between 2002 and 2007 on prehistory and protohistory, historical archaeology, art history (from ancient to contemporary), material culture, epigraphy and palaeography, numismatics and sigillography. Covered are South Asia and culturally related regions of Afghanistan, South Uzbekistan, South Tajikistan and Tibet. The bibliographic descriptions (with the original diacritics), controlled keywords and elucidating annotations make this reference work into a reliable guide to recent scholarly work in the fields of the ABIA Index.
The Book Documents The Vanishing Heritage Of The Relatively Unknown Indian Jewsih Communities: The Bene Israel Of Maharashtra, The Cochin Jews Of The Malabar Coast, And The Baghdadi Jews Who Settled In Bombay And Calcutta. It Combines Scholarship With Photographic Documentation.
One of the most striking contemporary religious phenomena is the world-wide fascination with Judaism. Traditionally, few non-Jews converted to the Jewish faith, but today millions of people throughout the world are converting to Judaism and are identifying as Jews or Israelites. In this volume, leading scholars of issues related to conversion, Judaising movements and Judaism as a New Religious Movement discuss and explain this global movement towards identification with the Jewish people, from Germany and Poland to China and Nigeria.
A Hindu-Jewish Conversation: Root Traditions in Dialogue is a historical, theological, and phenomenological engagement of the Hindu and Jewish traditions, two “root” traditions that give rise to other—in some ways very different—types of religious traditions. Rachel Fell McDermott and Daniel F. Polish explore conceptions of the divine, which are frequently cited as the most serious obstacle to a serious theological engagement between the two traditions; differences in attitude towards heroes, saints, and holy people; the religious resources and challenges experienced by Hindu and Jewish women; what can be learned about Hindu and Jewish spiritual outpouring by comparing Hindu devotional poetry and the Book of Psalms; the ways in which the two traditions address the fraught question of theodicy, or why bad things happen to good people; the status of “the land” and nationalist claims on it; and the uncomfortable question of caste and its possible social parallels in the Jewish tradition. The authors weave considerations of these topics into an ongoing conversation that offers students of both traditions new ways of thinking both about their intersections and about the history of religion in general. A coda explores these same issues by recounting an actual series of discussions convened between Hindu and Jewish practitioners.
South Asia is home to many of the world's most vibrant religious faiths. It is also one of the most dynamic and historically rich regions on earth, where changing political and social structures have caused religions to interact and hybridise in unique ways. This textbook introduces the contemporary religions of South Asia, from the indigenous religions such as the Hindu, Jain, Buddhist and Sikh traditions, to incoming influences such as Christianity, Judaism and Islam. In ten chapters, it surveys the nine leading belief systems of South Asia and explains their history, practices, values and worldviews. A final chapter helps students relate what they have learnt to religious theory, paving the way for future study. Written by leading experts, Religions of South Asia combines solid scholarship with clear and lively writing to provide students with an accessible and comprehensive introduction. All chapters are specially designed to aid cross-religious comparison, following a standard format covering set topics and issues; the book reveals to students the core principles of each faith, compares it to neighbouring traditions, and its particular place in South Asian history and society. It is a perfect resource for all students of South Asia's diverse and fascinating faiths.