Discusses medieval poetry in Hebrew (plus one example in Old French) dealing with martyrdom in the face of forced conversion. Deals with the ideal of Jewish resistance to persecution, but notes also the influence of Christian culture on Jewish literature. Focuses on Jewish martyrs in Blois, Troyes, and Paris. Notes how Talmud burnings impacted on the literature, reflected in the idea of the immortality of both the Jews and their books. Elucidates how the literature, often directed at the educated Jewish elite (the Tosafists and their pupils), reflected ideals of Jewish life as well as death. Suggests the latter ideal may have led most Ashkenazi Jews to prefer "Kiddush Hashem" or exile to conversion, when faced with that choice.

According to the account in the Book of Exodus, God addresses the children of Israel as they stand before Mt. Sinai with the words, "You shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation" (19:6). The sentence, Martha Himmelfarb observes, is paradoxical, for priests are by definition a minority, yet the meaning in context is clear: the entire people is holy. The words also point to some significant tensions in the biblical understanding of the people of Israel. If the entire people is holy, why does it need priests? If membership in both people and priesthood is a matter not of merit but of birth, how can either the people or its priests hope to be holy? How can one reconcile the distance between the honor due the priest and the actual behavior of some who filled the role? What can the people do to make itself truly a kingdom of priests? Himmelfarb argues that these questions become central in Second Temple Judaism. She considers a range of texts from this period, including the Book of Watchers , the Book of Jubilees , legal documents from the Dead Sea Scrolls, the writings of Philo of Alexandria, and the Book of Revelation of the New Testament, and goes on to explore rabbinic Judaism's emphasis on descent as the primary criterion for inclusion among the chosen people of Israel—a position, she contends, that took on new force in reaction to early Christian disparagement of the idea that mere descent from Abraham was sufficient for salvation.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

This tightly focused collection of essays, from an invited seminar of international specialists, centres on the question of the apocalyptic worldview around the time of the Maccabean revolt. What was the nature of apocalyptic at this time? Did the Maccabees themselves have a distinct apocalyptic worldview? These questions lead to other, more specific queries: who of the various groups held such a view? Certain of the essays analyse the characteristics of the apocalypses and related literature in this period, and whether the apocalyptic worldview itself gave rise to historical events or, at least, influenced them. The collection begins with two introductory essays. Both the main and short papers have individual responses, and two considered responses by well-known experts address the entire collection. The volume finishes with a concluding chapter by the lead editor that gives a perspective on the main themes and conclusions arising from the papers and discussion.

Summary: Describes the Second Temple period (the first few centuries before and after the common era) and its influence on the development of Rabbinic Judaism, which is the foundation for all of modern Judaism.

"An indispensible companion text, Texts and Traditions includes the essential documents of the various religious trends of the Second Temple and Rabbinic periods as well as Josephus, Greek and Aramaic inscriptions, classical historians and talmudic sources." --Book Jacket.

Theology is, by definition, rational discourse about God and, by extension, the rational discourse about religious matters in general. Humans are rational--though not only rational--creatures and, as such, they are ever striving to verbalize, to rationalize, and to systematize. But, if theology is rational discourse about a primary experience rather than experience itself, we are faced with the problem of whether theology can really do full justice to the primary experience. Theologians have often list sight of the fact that theology is an interpretive discipline, that the primary source of religious knowledge is human experience, and that we have in our experience only hints and intimations of God. The images and nuances of poetry may be better suited than logical discourse for capturing these hints and intimations. Alongside its technical theological tractates, Judaism has always had its prayerbook, and the language of prayer is the language of poetry. Theological systems may come and go, but the theology that is translatable into liturgy remains. Liturgical poems expressing the unconventional and the idiosyncratic share the same prayerbook pages with conventional theology, just as conflicting ideas had always shared the same pages of Talmud and Midrash, where no uniformity of theological positions was ever enforced. Ibn Ezra's advice to "pray only in a literalist manner" was hardly the advice by which Jews let themselves be guided. The poetry of the synagogue proves it. The traditional Jewish liturgy contains not only the standard prayers ordained in the Talmud and the ritual codes, but also poetic embellishments of all kinds. Such poetic embellishments, or piyyutim, take the form of hymns to be sung in conjunction with the standard prayers, and of poetic inserts in the standard prayers themselves. Jakob Petuchowski presents ten such poems in pointed Hebrew, with translation, commentary, and introduction to the theological theme of each poem. The poems-ranging from the sixth to the fourteenth centuries and hailing Palestine, Spain, France, Germany, and Italy-introduce the reader to innovative poetic expressions of unconventional and daring theological ideas that have been incorporated into the standard liturgy. This reprint edition is an indispensible introduction to piyyut (medieval liturgical poetry) for all students of Jewish thought and culture.

Whereas the whole concept of Jewish theology is often considered alien to Judaism, this book should contribute to the understanding of the meaning of a truly Jewish theology through these examples.

This report details the operations and activities of the Hebrew Orphan Asylum in New York City, providing insight into the care and education of Jewish orphans during the early 20th century. It includes financial statements, descriptions of special events and programs, and testimonials from former residents. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

Contrary to the Christians, the Muslims did not consider the Bible as a holy text, therefore their polemics against the Jews took the form of Bible criticism. The main arguments used by Muslim thinkers against Judaism was that the Jews falsified God's word, or failed to transmit it properly, or misinterpreted the Bible, or that the Bible had been abrogated by God. The most prominent Muslim writers who developed these themes in the medieval period were Ibn Hazm and the Jewish apostate Samau'al al-Maghribi in the West of the Arab world, and Ibn Qayyim al-Djawziyya in the East. The first two considered, in particular, that it was Ezra ('Uzayr) who deliberately distorted the text of the Bible. Contends that the Muslim critics of the Bible based their arguments greatly on pre-Islamic sources (such as pagan, gnostic, Christian, and anti-Christian writings), and that they, in turn, were the source of early modern European Bible criticism.

Trieste Publishing has a massive catalogue of classic book titles. Our aim is to provide readers with the highest quality reproductions of fiction and non-fiction literature that has stood the test of time. The many thousands of books in our collection have been sourced from libraries and private collections around the world.The titles that Trieste Publishing has chosen to be part of the collection have been scanned to simulate the original. Our readers see the books the same way that their first readers did decades or a hundred or more years ago. Books from that period are often spoiled by imperfections that did not exist in the original. Imperfections could be in the form of blurred text, photographs, or missing pages. It is highly unlikely that this would occur with one of our books. Our extensive quality control ensures that the readers of Trieste Publishing's books will be delighted with their purchase. Our staff has thoroughly reviewed every page of all the books in the collection, repairing, or if necessary, rejecting titles that are not of the highest quality. This process ensures that the reader of one of Trieste Publishing's titles receives a volume that faithfully reproduces the original, and to the maximum degree possible, gives them the experience of owning the original work.We pride ourselves on not only creating a pathway to an extensive reservoir of books of the finest quality, but also providing value to every one of our readers. Generally, Trieste books are purchased singly - on demand, however they may also be purchased in bulk. Readers interested in bulk purchases are invited to contact us directly to enquire about our tailored bulk rates.

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant.

The first few decades of the eighteenth century witnessed an important moment in Jewish-Christian relations, as influential Christian scholars increasingly looked to Jewish texts to reveal the truths of their own faith. To what extent could postbiblical writings help them better understand the New Testament? And who would best be able to explicate these connections?Connecting the Covenants focuses on two separate but entwined stories, the first centering around the colorful character of Moses Marcus. The English-born son of wealthy parents and the grandson of the famous autobiographical author Glikl of Hameln, Marcus was a prominent Jew educated in the Ashkenazic yeshivah at Hamburg. On New Year's Day, 1723, Marcus was baptized as a Christian, later publishing a justification of his conversion and a vindication of his newly discovered faith in a small book in London. A trophy convert, he was promoted by figures at the highest levels of the Anglican Church as a cultural mediator between Judaism and Christianity. His modest successes in the world of the elite clerical establishment were followed, however, by conspicuous failures, both intellectual and material.The second story that David Ruderman tells emerges against the background of Marcus's professional decline. In the end, the prize convert proved to be a theologian of limited ability, far outstripped in sophistication and openness to rabbinic learning by a circle of Enlightenment Protestant scholars. It was not the Jew who had abjured Judaism who was willing or able to apply the Mishnah and Talmud to Christian exegesis, but figures such as William Whiston, Anthony Collins, William Wotton, and the Dutch scholar William Surenhusius who seized upon the ways to connect the covenants.

""Seeking the Hiding God" by Arnold Eisen examines the elusive nature of God and the significance of divine encounters through the lens of Jewish rituals and traditions. The book explores the responsibilities of humans as God's partners and the personal and communal implications of faith and doubt"--