This work revisits the millennia-old Jewish-Christian encounter by providing a nuanced understanding of its challenges as well as presenting new perspectives on hitherto neglected areas of cultural, religious, and social interchange and influence.
The delicate balance between toleration and repulsion of the Jews, a tiny minority living within the Christian world, stands at the center of studies of religion and society. The development of this difficult relationship on many levels, theological, institutional, and individual, is a matter of continuing relevance in religious history from ancient to contemporary contexts. This volume, written by the leading scholars of Jewish-Christian engagement, seeks to revisit the question in light of new sources and re-readings of older sources. The old view of two implacable enemies battling for their version of truth, of Jews living as insular pariahs within a hostile world, the tale of persecution by the mighty of the weak, has given way to a much more nuanced understanding of areas of congruence, of cultural, economic, and social interchange. The volume examines changes in the Christian posture toward the Jews occurring in a time and place of tremendous cultural and religious creativity in Western European society. It seeks to understand how Jews integrated elements of Christian culture into their own. The volume spans some of the key turning points in the Jewish-Christian relationship and re-examines critical texts, religious disputations, and cultural interactions.
This book challenges the standard conception of the Middle Ages as a time of persecution for Jews. Jonathan Elukin traces the experience of Jews in Europe from late antiquity through the Renaissance and Reformation, revealing how the pluralism of medieval society allowed Jews to feel part of their local communities despite recurrent expressions of hatred against them. Elukin shows that Jews and Christians coexisted more or less peacefully for much of the Middle Ages, and that the violence directed at Jews was largely isolated and did not undermine their participation in the daily rhythms of European society. The extraordinary picture that emerges is one of Jews living comfortably among their Christian neighbors, working with Christians, and occasionally cultivating lasting friendships even as Christian culture often demonized Jews. As Elukin makes clear, the expulsions of Jews from England, France, Spain, and elsewhere were not the inevitable culmination of persecution, but arose from the religious and political expediencies of particular rulers. He demonstrates that the history of successful Jewish-Christian interaction in the Middle Ages in fact laid the social foundations that gave rise to the Jewish communities of modern Europe. Elukin compels us to rethink our assumptions about this fascinating period in history, offering us a new lens through which to appreciate the rich complexities of the Jewish experience in medieval Christendom.
""New Perspectives in American Jewish History: A Documentary Tribute to Jonathan D. Sarna," compiled by Sarna's former students, presents heretofore unpublished, neglected, and rarely seen historical records, documents, and images that illuminate the heterogeneity, breadth, diversity, and colorful dynamism of the American Jewish experience"--
This volume of collected essays addresses the Fourth Gospel's stance toward Jews and its impact on Jewish-Christian relations from antiquity to the present day in media such as sermons, iconography, art, music, and film. It will provide new insight into the Gospel of John and contribute to the mutual understanding between Christians and Jews.
In these chapters, a group of renowned international scholars seek to describe Paul and his work from “within Judaism,” rather than on the assumption, still current after thirty years of the “New Perspective,” that in practice Paul left behind aspects of Jewish living after his discovery of Jesus as Christ (Messiah). After an introduction that surveys recent study of Paul and highlights the centrality of questions about Paul’s Judaism, chapters explore the implications of reading Paul’s instructions as aimed at Christ-following non-Jews, teaching them how to live in ways consistent with Judaism while remaining non-Jews. The contributors take different methodological points of departure: historical, ideological-critical, gender-critical, and empire-critical, and examine issues of terminology and of interfaith relations. Surprising common ground among the contributors presents a coherent alternative to the “New Perspective.” The volume concludes with a critical evaluation of the Paul within Judaism perspective by Terence L. Donaldson, a well-known voice representative of the best insights of the New Perspective.
An honest, probing look at the dynamics of the New Testament - in relation to problems that disconcert Jews and Christians today. Despite the New Testament's impact on Jewish history, virtually all Jews avoid knowledge of its underlying dynamics. Jewish families and communities thus remain needlessly stymied when responding to a deeply Christian culture. Their Christian friends, meanwhile, are left perplexed as to why Jews are wary of the Gospel's ''good news.'' This long - awaited volume offers an unprecedented solution - oriented introduction to Jesus and Paul, the Gospels and Revelation, leading Jews out of anxieties that plague them, and clarifying for Christians why Jews draw back from Christians' sacred writings. Accessible to laypeople, scholars and clergy of all faiths, innovative teaching aids make this valuable resource ideal for rabbis, ministers and other educators. Topics include: The Gospels, Romans and Revelation - the Key Concerns for Jews Misusing the Talmud in Gospel Study Jesus' Trial, the ''Virgin Birth'' and Empty Tomb Enigmas Millennialist Scenarios and Missionary Encroachment The Last Supper and Church Seders Is the New Testament Antisemitic? While written primarily with Jews in mind, this groundbreaking volume will also help Christians understand issues involved in the origin of the New Testament, the portrayal of Judaism in it, and why for centuries their ''good news'' has been a source of fear and mistrust among Jews.
Christian-Jewish relations have had changing fortunes throughout the centuries. Occasionally there has been peace and even mutual understanding, but usually these relations have been ones of tension, often involving recrimination and even violence. This volume addresses a number of the major questions that have been at the heart and the periphery of these tenuous relations through the years. The volume begins with a number of papers discussing relations as Christianity emerged from and defined itself in terms of Judaism. Other papers trace the relations through the intervening years. And a number of papers confront issues that have been at the heart of the troubled twentieth century. In all, these papers address a sensitive yet vital set of issues from a variety of approaches and perspectives, becoming in their own way a part of the ongoing dialogue.
Jews among Christians explores a corpus of illuminated Hebrew manuscripts of the Lake Constance region produced in the first decades of the fourteenth century. The author Sarit Shalev-Eyni, Professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, provides a detailed and insightful study of the content, design, and iconography of the illustrations and decorations of a group of Ashkenahzi codices, thereby uncovering a surprising interface between Jews and Christians in the urban workshops of the time. Here, Christian artists would include midrashic components required by their Jewish instructor while drawing on the iconographic traditions of their Christian education, and artists of both religions were able to represent their own theological attitudes as well as profane tendencies and parody - in short, the various aspects of late medieval culture.A close comparison with the well-known Gradual of St. Katharinenthal, now in Zurich, and manuscripts such as the Schocken Bible, formerly in Jerusalem, and the Tripartite Mahzor -- originally bound as two volumes, but now split between Budapest, London and Oxford -- places the corpus firmly in the Lake Constance region and all but confirms the instructor to be one Hayyim, the scribe. The author's discussion of Hayyim's life and work and her historical overview of the relations between Jews and Christians in the final chapters of the book deepens our understanding of the religious and cultural dialogue between the two faiths not only in the production of this group of manuscripts but in the course of every-day life in the Middle Ages.