The Hebrew Bible, Nationalism and the Origins of Anti-Judaism
The Hebrew Bible, Nationalism and the Origins of Anti-Judaism

Author: David Aberbach

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2022-10-31

Total Pages: 314

ISBN-13: 1000708276

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In the attempts to unify divided peoples on the basis of a shared past, both historical and mythical, this book illumines aspects of cultural nationalism common since the Middle Ages. As an edited work, the Bible includes texts mostly depicting long-gone historical eras extending over several centuries. Following on from Aberbach’s previous work National Poetry, Empires, and War, this book argues that works of this nature – notably the Mujo-Halil songs in Albania, the Irish stories of Cuchulain, the songs of the Nibelungen in Germany, or the Finnish legends collected in The Kalevala – have an ancient precedent in the Hebrew Bible (to which national literatures often allude and refer), a subject largely neglected in biblical studies. The self-critical element in the Hebrew Bible, common in later national literature, is examined as the basis of later anti-Semitism, as the Bible was not confined to Jews but was adopted in translation by many other national groups. With several dozen original translations from the Hebrew, this book highlights how the Bible influenced and was distorted by later national cultures. Written without jargon, this book is intended for the general reader, but is also an important contribution to the study of the Bible, nationalism, and Jewish history.

The Hebrew Bible, Nationalism and the Origins of Anti-Judaism
The Hebrew Bible, Nationalism and the Origins of Anti-Judaism

Author: David Aberbach

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2022-11-07

Total Pages: 320

ISBN-13: 9781032215969

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In the attempts to unify divided peoples on the basis of a shared past, both historical and mythical, this book illumines aspects of cultural nationalism common since the Middle Ages. As an edited work, the Bible includes texts mostly depicting long-gone historical eras extending over several centuries. Following on from Aberbach's previous work National Poetry, Empires, and War, this book argues that works of this nature - notably the Mujo-Halil songs in Albania, the Irish stories of Cuchulain, the songs of the Nibelungen in Germany, or the Finnish legends collected in the Kalevala - have an ancient precedent in the Hebrew Bible (to which national literatures often allude and refer), a subject largely neglected in biblical studies. The self-critical element in the Hebrew Bible, common in later national literature, is examined as the basis of later anti-Semitism, as the Bible was not confined to Jews but was adopted in translation by many other national groups. With several dozen original translations from the Hebrew, this book highlights how the Bible influenced and was distorted by later national cultures. Written without jargon, this book is intended for the general reader, but is also an important contribution to Biblical, Nationalism, and Jewish Studies.

Bialik, the Hebrew Bible and the Literature of Nationalism
Bialik, the Hebrew Bible and the Literature of Nationalism

Author: David Aberbach

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2023-05-25

Total Pages: 306

ISBN-13: 1000857395

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This book explores the life and poetry of Chaim Nachman Bialik (1873–1934) in the context of European national literature between the French Revolution and World War I, showing how he helped create a modern Hebrew national culture, spurring the revival of Hebrew as a spoken language. The author begins with Bialik’s background in the Tsarist Empire, contextualizing Jewish powerlessness in Eastern Europe in the late nineteenth century. As European anti-Semitism grew, Bialik emerged at the vanguard of a modern Hebrew national movement, building on ancient biblical and rabbinic tradition and speaking to Jewish concerns in neo-prophetic poems, love poems, poems for children, and folk poems. This book makes accessible a broad but representative selection of Bialik’s poetry in translation. Alongside this, a variety of national poets are considered from across Europe, including Solomos in Greece, Mickiewicz in Poland, Shevchenko in Ukraine, Njegoš in Serbia, Petőfi in Hungary, and Yeats in Ireland. Aberbach argues that Bialik as Jewish national poet cannot be understood except in the dual context of ancient Jewish nationalism and modern European nationalism, both political and cultural. Written in clear and accessible prose, this book will interest those studying modern European nationalism, Hebrew literature, Jewish history, and anti-Semitism.

Routledge Handbook on Zionism
Routledge Handbook on Zionism

Author: Colin Shindler

Publisher: Taylor & Francis

Published: 2024-06-28

Total Pages: 739

ISBN-13: 1040025641

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This Handbook, the first of its kind, provides an in- depth examination of the evolution, ideology, history and culture of Zionism and its various movements. Distancing itself from the slogans and cliches of advocacy, the volume provides much-needed context and background on the emergence of Zionism. The Handbook is divided into eight parts – with contributions from some forty of the world’s leading scholars on Zionism –to elucidate its various strands. These include underrepresented areas such as Zionism in the Arab World before the establishment of the State of Israel, Zionism and Marxism, the emergence of the Zionist Right, the language war between Hebrew and Yiddish, the struggle for Jewish women’s suffrage, the poetry of Lea Goldberg, and Zionism in emerging new Jewish communities in locations like Papua New Guinea, Guatemala and Zimbabwe. Another section on Zionism in repressive states stretches from an examination of Zionism in Hitler’s Germany to the Ayatollahs’ Iran today; from subterranean Zionism in Stalin’s Russia to apartheid South Africa. The volume concludes by examining current issues, including the relationship between evangelicals and Zionism in the US, and the representation of Zionism in the age of the internet. Providing a sweeping overview of Zionism in its many forms, the volume will appeal to students, researchers and general readers interested in Jewish studies in the Middle East and beyond, as well as those seeking to understand the roots of contemporary Israel.

Jewish Cultural Nationalism
Jewish Cultural Nationalism

Author: David Aberbach

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2007-09-19

Total Pages: 141

ISBN-13: 1135977925

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Jewish Cultural Nationalism explores the development of Jewish nationalism from the Bible to modern times, focusing on particular movements and places as well as texts which signified, or themselves brought about, change: the Bible (Hebrew prayer book), and the modern Hebrew literature, particularly in Tsarist Russia. While the influence of the Hebrew Bible alone on nationalism in individual periods has been subject to much scholarly study, the present work is unusual in its emphasis on the continuity of Jewish cultural nationalism and its influences through Hebrew texts.

The Hebrew Bible Reborn
The Hebrew Bible Reborn

Author: Yaacov Shavit

Publisher: Walter de Gruyter

Published: 2008-09-25

Total Pages: 577

ISBN-13: 3110200937

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This work, the first of its kind, describes all the aspects of the Bible revolution in Jewish history in the last two hundred years, as well as the emergence of the new biblical culture. It describes the circumstances and processes that turned Holy Scripture into the Book of Books and into the history of the biblical period and of the people – the Jewish people. It deals with the encounter of the Jews with modern biblical criticism and the archaeological research of the Ancient Near East and with contemporary archaeology. The middle section discusses the extensive involvement of educated Jews in the Bible-Babel polemic at the start of the twentieth century, which it treats as a typological event. The last section describes at length various aspects of the key status assigned to the Bible in the new Jewish culture in Europe, and particularly in modern Jewish Palestine, as a “guide to life” in education, culture and politics, as well as part of the attempt to create a new Jewish man, and as a source of inspiration for various creative arts.

John and Anti-Judaism
John and Anti-Judaism

Author: Jonathan Numada

Publisher: Wipf and Stock Publishers

Published: 2021-06-17

Total Pages: 302

ISBN-13: 1725298163

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This study argues that the Gospel of John’s anti-Judaism can be well understood from the perspective of trends apparent within the context of broader Greco-Roman culture. It uses the paradigm of collective memory and aspects of social identity theory and self-categorization theory to explore the theological and narrative functions of the Johannine Jews. Relying upon a diverse range of historical testimony drawn from Greco-Roman literature, inscriptions, and papyri, this work attempts to understand the social identities and social locations of Diaspora Jews as a first step in reading John’s Gospel in the context of the political and social instability of the first century CE. It then attempts to understand John’s theology, its portrayal of Jewish social identity, and the narrative and theological functions of “the Jews” as a group character in light of this historical context. This work attempts to demonstrate that while John’s treatment of Jews and Judaism is multivalent at both social and theological levels, it is primarily focused upon strengthening a Christologically centered Christian identity while attempting to mitigate the attractiveness of Judaism as a religious competitor.

Postmodern Love in the Contemporary Jewish Imagination
Postmodern Love in the Contemporary Jewish Imagination

Author: Efraim Sicher

Publisher:

Published: 2022

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 9781032135069

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"Offering a radical critique of contemporary Israeli and diaspora fiction by major writers of the generation after Amos Oz and Philip Roth, this book asks searching questions about identity formation in Jewish spaces in the twenty-first century and posits global, transnational identities instead of the bipolar Israel/diaspora model. The chapters put into conversation major authors such as Jonathan Safran Foer, Nicole Krauss, Michael Chabon, and Nathan Englander with their Israeli counterparts Zeruya Shalev, Eshkol Nevo, and Etgar Keret and shows that they share common themes and concerns. Read through a postmodern lens, their preoccupation with failed marriage and failed ideals brings to the fore the crises of home, nation, historical destiny, and collective memory in contemporary secular Jewish culture. At times provocative, at others iconoclastic, this innovative study must be read by anyone concerned with Jewish culture and identity today, whether scholars, students, or the general reader"--

The Invention of the Jewish People
The Invention of the Jewish People

Author: Shlomo Sand

Publisher: Verso Books

Published: 2010-06-14

Total Pages: 352

ISBN-13: 178168362X

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A historical tour de force, The Invention of the Jewish People offers a groundbreaking account of Jewish and Israeli history. Exploding the myth that there was a forced Jewish exile in the first century at the hands of the Romans, Israeli historian Shlomo Sand argues that most modern Jews descend from converts, whose native lands were scattered across the Middle East and Eastern Europe. In this iconoclastic work, which spent nineteen weeks on the Israeli bestseller list and won the coveted Aujourd'hui Award in France, Sand provides the intellectual foundations for a new vision of Israel's future.

Transnationalism and the Jews
Transnationalism and the Jews

Author: Jakob Egholm Feldt

Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield

Published: 2016-08-30

Total Pages: 191

ISBN-13: 1783481412

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The concept of transnationalism has been widely used for many years to describe mobility and cross-border relations in the modern, globalized world. Most uses of the concept of transnationalism neglect its historical trajectory and largely ignore the networks that constructed its meaning and normativity. Transnationalism and the Jews directly relates ideas about transnationalism and cultural pluralism to Jewish historical experience. It shows how the Jews and ‘Jewishness’ has been a problematic issue for cultural thought since the Enlightenment, and how this problem produced the alternative ideas of culture and identity that are widely accepted today. It argues that Jewish experience and ‘Jewishness’ helped produced the modern concept of transnationalism and cultural pluralism.