Product Description: Hasidism, a controversial, mystical-religious movement of Eastern European origin, has posed a serious challenge to mainstream Judaism from its earliest beginnings in the middle of the eighteenth century. Decimated by the Holocaust, it has risen like a phoenix from the ashes and has reconstituted itself as a major force in the world of ultra-Orthodox Judaism...read more

Product Description: David Biale zeichnet den Aufstieg des j|dischen Säkularismus anhand jener visionären Schriftsteller und Denker nach, die f|r seine Entfaltung wegweisend waren. Auf die facettenreiche Geschichte des Judentums blickend, spannt er einen Bogen von der Bibel bis in die Gegenwart; er belegt, inwiefern die von diesen Visionären hervorgebrachte säkulare Tradition spezifisch j|disch ist und wie die Entstehung des j|dischen Säkularismus nicht nur eine Reaktion auf die Moderne war, sondern Kräften entsprang, die lange Zeit hindurch innerhalb des Judentums selbst am Werk waren...read more

Product Description: Intellectuals rarely make a significant impact on one field of scholarship let alone several, yet Amos Funkenstein (1937-1995) displayed an intellectual range that encompassed several disciplines and broke new ground across seemingly impenetrable scholarly boundaries...read more

Product Description: Blood contains extraordinary symbolic power in both Judaism and Christianity—as the blood of sacrifice, of Jesus, of the Jewish martyrs, of menstruation, and more. Yet, though they share the same literary, cultural, and religious origins, on the question of blood the two religions have followed quite different trajectories...read more

Product Description: Scattered over much of the world throughout most of their history, are the Jews one people or many? How do they resemble and how do they differ from Jews in other places and times? What have their relationships been to the cultures of their neighbors? To address these and similar questions, some of the finest scholars of our day have contributed their insights to Cultures of the Jews, a winner of the National Jewish Book Award upon its hardcover publication in 2002...read more

A collection of essays by twenty-three international scholars sheds new light on the history of the Jews from biblical times to the modern day and explores the fundamental question of Jewish culture and identity at each period in history, in three chronological sections--Mediterranean Origins, Diversities of Diaspora, and Modern Encounters. 30,000 first printing.

Product Description: Twelve distinguished historians, political theorists, and literary critics present new perspectives on multiculturalism in this important collection. Central to the essays (all but one is appearing in print for the first time) is the question of how the Jewish experience can challenge the conventional polar opposition between a majority "white monoculture" and a marginalized "minorities of color multiculture...read more (view table of contents, read Amazon.com's description)

Drawing on works ranging from the Book of Ruth to the novels of Isaac Bashevis Singer, from the films of Woody Allen to the teachings of Hasidism, this book shows that the contemporary dilemmas of Jewish desire have their analogues in the past. David Biale is the author of "Gershom Sholem" and "Power and Powerlessness in Jewish History", both National Jewish Book Award winners.

Product Description: WINNER OF THE 1987 JWB NATIONAL JEWISH BOOK AWARD FOR HISTORYIn this radical reinterpretation of Jewish history, David Biale tackles the myth of Jewish political passivity between the fall of an independent Jewish Commonwealth in 70 C...read more