"Where do our ideas about economics and economic policy come from? Critics of contemporary economics complain that belief in free markets, among economists and many ordinary citizens too, is a form of religion. It turns out that there is something to the idea: not in the way the critics mean, but in a deeper, more historically grounded sense. Contrary to the conventional historical view of economics as entirely a secular product of the Enlightenment, religion exerted a powerful influence from the outset. Benjamin M. Friedman demonstrates that the foundational transition in thinking about what we now call economics, beginning in the eighteenth century, was decisively shaped by the hotly contended lines of religious thought within the English-speaking Protestant world. Beliefs about God-given human character, about our destiny after this life, and about the purpose of our existence, were all under challenge in the world in which Adam Smith and his contemporaries lived. Those debates explain the puzzling behavior so many of our fellow citizens whose views about economic policies, and whose voting behavior too, seems sharply at odds with what would be to their own economic benefit. Understanding the origins of the relationship between religious thinking and economic thinking, together with its ongoing consequences, provides insights into our current economic policy debates and ways to shape more functional policies for all citizens"--

Rabbi Rebecca Alpert is a leading voice in progressive Judaism. A crusader for reform within the Jewish community, she was one of the first women in Jewish history to be ordained a rabbi. Alpert is a celebrated teacher, an expert on Jewish American religious history, and a key public advocate for progressive social issues in contemporary Jewish life. In Whose Torah?, Alpert sketches a compelling portrait of the progressive values that belong to the core of Judaism today. Reaching deeply into the sources of Jewish tradition, she highlights with unflinching moral clarity the textual basis for a truly just vision of life for all who care about sexual, economic, and racial justice and for those who would oppose all forms of discrimination, unjust war, and the destruction of the environment. Alpert also carefully considers what it means to be Jewish in contemporary America―offering both a passionate and deeply learned defense of progressive Jewish identity. Whose Torah? will be an essential intellectual resource for progressive Jews and for anyone searching for the religious underpinnings of contemporary progressive politics. Elaine Pagels, Harrington Spear Paine Foundation Professor of Religion at Princeton University, is the author of numerous, widely acclaimed books on Gnosticism and early Christianity, including The Gnostic Gospels, Beyond Belief, and Reading Judas.

Is patriarchy necessary to ensure responsible fathering? Lawrence H. Fuchs, author of Family Matters, argues that the link between male dominance and fatherhood is no longer iron-clad. Analyzing the universality of patriarchy and its incentives for cultural fatherhood, Fuchs concedes that the importance of biological differences between the sexes was a possible, even plausible, basis for the evolution of patriarchy. But in this timely work he imagines a new paradigm of fatherhood for a post-patriarchal age, one inspired by the history of Jewish patriarchy. Two millennia ago the rabbis established the strategies to curb the extreme abuses of patriarchy found in all civilizations. They did so by according wives significant sexual and economic rights. In the last two centuries as Jews became more integrated into the societies in which they lived, their unique variation of patriarchy was disrupted. Fuchs argues that the Jewish story sets the precedent for fundamental change in the nature of patriarchy today, thus breaking what may have been the evolutionary connection between male dominance and incentives for fatherhood. It is Fuchs's startling conclusion that the Jewish precedent points to the next step in evolution: fathers without patriarchy.

Iconoclast David F. Noble traces the evolution and eclipse of the biblical mythology of the Promised Land, the foundational story of Western Culture. Part impassioned manifesto, part masterful survey of opposed philosophical and economic schools, "Beyond the Promised Land" brings into focus the twisted template of the Western imagination and its faith-based market economy. From the first recorded versions of "the promise" saga in ancient Babylon, to the Zapatistas' rejection of promises never kept, Noble explores the connections between Judeo-Christian belief and corporate globalization. Inspiration for activists and students alike. David Noble is the author of "Progress Without People" (BTL, 1995) and "Digital Diploma Mills" (BTL, 2002). He teaches history at York University, Toronto.

Over the last twenty years, there has been a growing understanding that conflicts in or over holy places differ from other territorial conflicts. A holy site has a profound meaning, involving human beliefs, strong emotions, "sacred" values and core identity self-perceptions; therefore a dispute over such land differs from a "regular" dispute over land. In order to resolve conflicts over holy sites, one must be equipped with an understanding of the cultural, religious, social and political meaning of the holy place to each of the contesting groups. This book seeks to understand the many facets of disputes and the triggers for the outbreak of violence in and around holy sites. It analyses fourteen case studies of conflicts over holy sites in Palestine/ Israel, including major holy sites such as Al-Haram al-Sharif/the Temple Mount, the Western Wall and the Cave of the Patriarchs/Al-Ibrahimi Mosque in Hebron, in addition to disputes over more minor sites. It then compares these conflicts to similar cases from other regions and provides an analysis of effective and ineffective conflict mitigation and resolution tools used for dealing with such disputes. Furthermore, the book sheds light on the role of sacred sites in exacerbating local and regional ethnic conflicts. By providing a thorough and systematic analysis of the social, economic and political conditions that fuel conflicts over holy sites and the conditions that create tolerance or conflict, this book will be a key resource for students and scholars of conflict resolution, political science and religious studies.

This volume of essays is intended as a tribute to the distinguished medieval historian Christopher Brooke. It addresses new questions in areas of medieval history which Professor Brooke has made his own: urban life and religious life. The fourteen essays explore the coexistence of religious ideas and ecclesiastical institutions with urban practices and townspeople. They span five hundred years of the history of western Christendom, ranging from Magdeburg to Majorca, and from Cambridge to Cluny. The essays break new ground in a number of areas in medieval history: in economic history, the history of ideas, and the history of religious institutions. The contributors have been attuned throughout to the complex interactions of groups and ideas within urban space. The book also contains a bibliography of Christopher Brooke's writings and an appreciation of his work.

So, according to Peter Abelard, did his wife Heloise state in characteristically stark terms the antithetical demands of family and scholarship. Heloise was not alone in making this assumption. Sources from Jerome onward never cease to remind us that the life of the mind stands at odds with life in the family. For all that we have moved in the past two generations beyond kings and battles, fiefs and barons, motherhood has remained a blind spot for medieval historians. Whatever the reasons, the result is that the historiography of the medieval period is largely motherless. The aim of this book is to insist that this picture is intolerably one-dimensional, and to begin to change it. The volume is focussed on the paradox of motherhood in the European Middle Ages: to be a mother is at once to hold great power, and by the same token to be acutely vulnerable. The essays look to analyse the powers and the dangers of motherhood within the warp and weft of social history, beginning with the premise that religious discourse or practice served as a medium in which mothers (and others) could assess their situation, defend claims, and make accusations. Within this frame, three main themes emerge: survival, agency, and institutionalization. The volume spans the length and breadth of the Middle Ages, from late Roman North Africa through ninth-century Byzantium to late medieval Somerset, drawing in a range of types of historian, including textual scholars, literary critics, students of religion and economic historians. The unity of the volume arises from the very diversity of approaches within it, all addressed to the central topic.