Download or read book Liberalizing Liberal Judaism written by James Waterman Wise and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 158 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book If I Am Not For Myself written by Ruth R. Wisse and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 1992 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For over a century, Jews have been identified with liberalism. Not only have they been a driving force behind the spread of liberal politics; they have also been steadfastly loyal to a doctrine that promised them both safety and political acceptance. Recent evidence suggests that their commitment has not waned. But while Jews continue to stand up for other groups and "vote their conscience", contends Ruth Wisse, the liberal commitment to the Jews is not nearly so strong. Whenever Jews have been attacked - from the trial of Captain Dreyfus to the sustained military and political war against Israel - liberals have been slow to defend Jewish rights and have preferred instead to hold the Jews responsible for the persistence of their enemies. The explanation for this liberal default, Wisse argues, is the survival and success of anti-Semitism. This irrational idea continues to flourish throughout the world, despite the destruction of the fascist and communist regimes that were its deadliest twentieth-century allies. Wisse points out that anti-Semitism's astonishing resilience has put liberals - including liberal Jews - in an impossible position. The only reasonable response to such a doctrine, Wisse insists, is not appeasement or avoidance, but steadfast confrontation and rejection. Yet such opposition is alien to liberal ideas of open-mindedness and strikes many as intolerant. Unwilling to suspend their optimistic view of man as a benevolent and rational being in order to combat a mortal enemy, most liberals - including many Jews - conclude that Jews themselves must be responsible for the continuing wars against them - thus implicitly condoning their sacrifice. Wisse's book, inspired by afriend's emigration to Israel, traces the Jewish romance with liberalism from its discovery by Jewish integrationists and Zionists to the acceptance today by many Jews of a moral equivalence between Zionism and the war against it. She also explores, among the many contradictions of modern Jewish politics, the ambiguous question of Jewish "chosenness", and the Jewish longing for acceptance in a larger human family; the successful Arab war of ideas against Israel; and the dilemma of Jewish writers and intellectuals who wish to transcend their parochializing siege. Above all, she shows how and why anti-Semitism became the twentieth century's most successful ideology and reveals what people in liberal democracies would have to do to prevent it from once again achieving its goal.
Download or read book Why Are Jews Liberals written by Norman Podhoretz and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2009-09-08 with total page 354 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the bestselling author of World War IV, a brilliant investigation of a central question in American politics and culture. During his career as a neoconservative thinker, Norman Podhoretz has been asked no question more often than “Why are so many Jews liberals?” In this provocative book he sets out to solve this puzzle. He first offers a fascinating account of anti-Semitism in the West to show the historical roots of Jewish mistrust of the right. But, Podhoretz argues, since the Six Day War of 1967 Jewish allegiance to the left no longer makes sense, and yet most Jews continue supporting the Democratic Party and the liberal agenda. Reviewing the history of Jewish political attitudes and examining the available evidence, Podhoretz argues against the conventional explanations for Jewish liberalism—finally proposing his own.
Download or read book The Politics of Nonassimilation written by David Verbeeten and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2017-05-15 with total page 389 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Over the course of the twentieth century, Eastern European Jews in the United States developed a left-wing political tradition. Their political preferences went against a fairly broad correlation between upward mobility and increased conservatism or Republican partisanship. Many scholars have sought to explain this phenomenon by invoking antisemitism, an early working-class experience, or a desire to integrate into a universal social order. In this original study, David Verbeeten instead focuses on the ways in which left-wing ideologies and movements helped to mediate and preserve Jewish identity in the context of modern tendencies toward bourgeois assimilation and ethnic dissolution. Verbeeten pursues this line of inquiry through case studies that highlight the political activities and aspirations of three "generations" of American Jews. The life of Alexander Bittelman provides a lens to examine the first generation. Born in Ukraine in 1892, Bittelman moved to New York City in 1912 and went on to become a founder of the American Communist Party after World War I. Verbeeten explores the second generation by way of the American Jewish Congress, which came together in 1918 and launched significant campaigns against discrimination within civil society before, during, and especially after World War II. Finally, he considers the third generation in relation to the activist group New Jewish Agenda, which operated from 1980 to 1992 and was known for its advocacy of progressive causes and its criticism of particular Israeli governments and policies. By focusing on individuals and organizations that have not previously been subjects of extensive investigation, Verbeeten contributes original research to the fields of American, Jewish, intellectual, and radical history. His insightful study will appeal to specialists and general readers interested in those areas.
Download or read book Reappraisals and New Studies of the Modern Jewish Experience written by Brian Smollett and published by BRILL. This book was released on 2014-10-30 with total page 467 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reappraisals and New Studies of the Modern Jewish Experience brings together twenty scholars of Modern Jewish history and thought. The essays provide a fresh perspective on several central questions in Jewish intellectual, social, and religious history from the eighteenth century to the present in the contexts of Russia, Western and Central Europe, and the Americas.
Download or read book The Universalist Leader written by and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 844 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book A Voice That Spoke for Justice written by Melvin I. Urofsky and published by State University of New York Press. This book was released on 2012-02-01 with total page 453 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the first half of this century, a talented and charismatic leadership restructured the American Jewish community to meet the demands and opportunities of a pluralistic, secular society. The work of this generation of titans still guides the current modes of American Jewish life. The last of these giants was the influential reformer Stephen S. Wise--a progenitor of American Zionism, creator of the American and World Jewish Congresses, and founder of the Jewish Institute of Religion. As rabbi of the Free Synagogue, Wise led the fight for a living Judaism responsive to social problems. This engrossing study is more than a chronicle of an ethnic community's adjustment to a host society. Thanks to Melvin Urofsky's painstaking research, it succeeds in revealing the true story behind a legendary and controversial figure in American Jewish history.
Download or read book The Menorah Journal written by and published by . This book was released on 1926 with total page 418 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book We Shall Build Anew written by Shirley Idelson and published by University of Alabama Press. This book was released on 2022-08-30 with total page 279 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "In 1922, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, a leader of the Zionist movement as well as many Progressive causes, established a non-denominational rabbinical seminary in New York City. Having already founded the thriving Free Synagogue movement and the American Jewish Congress, he now turned his energy toward opening the Jewish Institute of Religion (JIR) with the same ambitious aim: revolutionizing American liberal Judaism. He believed mainstream American Jewish institutions had become outdated, refusing to relinquish a nineteenth-century mindset. In championing the new Jewish nationalism and fighting alongside America's leading proponents of social and economic justice, Wise had developed a mass following. But he recognized that he alone could not bring about the change he sought; he needed a new cadre of young rabbis who shared his outlook and could spread his vision. We Shall Build Anew tells the little-known story of how Wise changed the trajectory of American Judaism for the next century. By opening the Jewish Institute of Religion, he began to train that new cadre of young rabbis, charged them with invigorating and reshaping Jewish life, and launched them into positions of leadership across the country. We Shall Build Anew explores Wise's vision for the Jewish Institute of Religion and the central role it would play in shaping twentieth-century American liberal Judaism. Conflict lies at the heart of this story. Wise faced hostility from across the denominational landscape, including attempts to quash the school before it ever opened. The national Reform leadership, weary of Wise's unceasing criticism and worried that a new rabbinical school would create competition for their own seminary, Hebrew Union College (HUC), opposed the endeavor. There were weaknesses in the JIR model and in Wise's leadership, too. Faculty fought bitterly, and the discord contributed to a constant rotation of scholars. Some eventually moved to more prestigious secular institutions, like Harvard and Columbia, which established the first two academic chairs in Jewish studies in the nation in the 1920s. And the students fought. From a wide range of backgrounds, they fiercely debated their Zionist, political, and cultural ideals. JIR also admitted several highly accomplished women, designated as "special students" who could sit in on classes but were barred entry into the rabbinical program. Despite years working on behalf of women's suffrage and civil rights, Wise would not be party to women's entry into the rabbinate. Finally, Wise's failure to generate a sustainable funding model created further instability for the school. Still, the JIR flourished and sent rabbis to congregations throughout the United States. JIR's non-denominationalism did not last, though. In the late 1940s, JIR's fiscal problems became insurmountable, and as Wise approached his death he reluctantly agreed to merge the Institute with Hebrew Union College, forfeiting the school's independence and bringing it under the umbrella of the Reform movement. And despite Wise's early aim to break down barriers between American Jewry's various factions, the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements continued to carve out separate identities. In the early 21st century, however, Wise's vision for liberal Judaism and non-denominationalism has gained traction, and distinctions between the non-Orthodox denominations have begun to collapse. Whether or not Wise's ideas about non-denominationalism will continue to flourish remains to be seen. But it is clear that his blend of Jewish nationalism and American progressivism, which made him and his congregation objects of contempt within the world they sought to change, took hold. Today, it is impossible to think of the Reform, Conservative and Reconstructionist movements without their core commitments to Zionism, Jewish peoplehood (now called klal yisrael), and social and economic justice (commonly referred to as tikkun olam). The story of We Shall Build Anew has greater importance now than ever. With Orthodox Jewry moving increasingly to the right on the political spectrum, and a growing number of secular Jews joining the left in challenging the legitimacy of Zionism and the idea of a Jewish state, the Conservative and Reconstructionist movements in the middle are grappling with significant contraction. This leaves the Reform movement, the most direct heir to Stephen S. Wise's legacy, as American Jewry's hub of resistance to the radical right, and a stronghold of support for progressive forces in Israel. In creating JIR, Stephen S. Wise acted on his convictions-and thanks to his prescience as well as his efforts, ultimately the American Jewish community came around to his ideas, fulfilling Wise's most ambitious goal: A reinvention of modern American liberal Judaism"--
Download or read book Our Jewish Neighbors written by and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 518 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The National Jewish Monthly written by and published by . This book was released on 1928 with total page 426 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Cambridge History of Judaism Volume 2 The Hellenistic Age written by William David Davies and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1984 with total page 766 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Vol. 4 covers the late Roman period to the rise of Islam. Focuses especially on the growth and development of rabbinic Judaism and of the major classical rabbinic sources such as the Mishnah, Jerusalem Talmud, Babylonian Talmud and various Midrashic collections.
Download or read book Affirmations of Judaism written by Joseph Herman Hertz and published by London : Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1927 with total page 198 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Catalogue of Title entries of Books and Other Articles Entered in the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington Under the Copyright Law Wherein the Copyright Has Been Completed by the Deposit of Two Copies in the Office written by Library of Congress. Copyright Office and published by . This book was released on 1925 with total page 1752 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book International Journal of Religious Education written by and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 532 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book B nai B rith Magazine written by and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 544 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Bookseller Stationer and Office Equipment Journal written by and published by . This book was released on 1924 with total page 838 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
