Menachem Kellner : Jewish universalism /
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Menachem Kellner is an American-born scholar of Jewish philosophy, an educator, and a public intellectual who lives in Israel. For over three decades he taught at the University of Haifa, where he held the Sir Isaac and Lady Edith Wolfson Chair of Jewish Religious Thought as well as several high-level administrative positions. Currently he teaches Jewish philosophy at Shalem College, Israel's first liberal arts college, which seeks to integrate Western and Jewish texts. Trained in ethics and political philosophy, Kellner specializes in medieval Jewish philosophy, arguing that Maimonides' rationalist universalism should serve as the ideal for contemporary Jewish life. Creatively fusing Zionism, modern Orthodoxy, and democracy, his vision of Judaism is open to and engaged with the modern world.
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1 online resource (xvi, 196 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references. :
9789004298286 :
2213-6010 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The future of Jewish philosophy /
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This anthology of original essays reflects on the future of Jewish philosophy in light of the Library of Contemporary Jewish Philosophers (Brill, 2013-2018). The volume assesses the strengths of Jewish philosophy, explores the place of Jewish philosophy within the Western academy as a critique of and contribution to the discipline of philosophy, and showcases the relevance of Jewish philosophy to contemporary Jewish culture. The volume argues that Jewish philosophy is more vibrant, diverse, and culturally significant than its public image implies. Special attention is paid to the interdisciplinary nature of Jewish philosophy, the institutional settings for generating Jewish philosophy, and the contribution of philosophizing to contemporary Jewish self-understanding.
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Includes index. :
1 online resource. :
9789004381216 :
2213-6010 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Emil L. Fackenheim : philosopher, theologian, Jew /
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Emil L. Fackenheim: Philosopher, Theologian, Jew is a scholarly tribute to Fackenheim's memory. Fackenheim's combination of erudition and generosity served to inspire a lifetime of philosophical inquiry, and a number of his students are represented in this volume. The volume, in order to provide a forum through which to introduce his thought to a broader audience, covers a wide spectrum of Fackenheim's work including biographical, philosophical, and theological aspects of his thought that have not been addressed adequately in the past. Elie Wiesel, a close personal friend to Fackenheim for over 30 years, has provided the Foreword for the volume.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical (p. [323]-330) and references and indexes. :
9789047429340 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Tradition vs. traditionalism : contemporary perspectives in Jewish thought.
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This book is a first attempt to examine the thought of key contemporary Jewish thinkers on the meaning of tradition in the context of two models. The classic model assumes that tradition reflects lack of dynamism and reflectiveness, and the present's unqualified submission to the past. This view, however, is an image that the modernist ethos has ascribed to the tradition so as to remove it from modern existence. In the alternative model, a living tradition emerges as open and dynamic, developing through an ongoing dialogue between present and past. The Jewish philosophers discussed in this work-Joseph B. Soloveitchik, Yeshayahu Leibowitz, David Hartman, and Eliezer Goldman-ascribe compelling canonic status to the tradition, and the analysis of their thought discloses the tension between these two models. The book carefully traces the course they have plotted along the various interpretations of tradition through their approach to Scripture and to Halakhah.
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1 online resource (235 pages) :
9789401206426 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Tamar Ross : constructing faith /
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Tamar Ross is Professor of Jewish Philosophy (Emerita) at Bar-Ilan University. She has written extensively on the Musar movement, the thought of Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook, the ideology of Mitnagedism, and the relationship of Orthodoxy and feminism. Conversant with classical rabbinic sources and analytic philosophy, she champions the notion of cumulative revelation in pursuit of a non-foundationalist notion of truth, both religious and scientific. Responding to the feminist critique, she articulates an original and constructive Jewish theology sympathetic to the later stages of Wittgenstein's philosophy of language and to complementary motifs in Jewish mysticism. Her philosophy of halakha similarly builds on post-positivist legal theory, demonstrating the transformative influence of women's direct input on a legal system previously managed exclusively by men.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and index. :
9789004317376 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
David R. Blumenthal /
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David R. Blumenthal is Jay and Leslie Cohen Professor of Judaic Studies at Emory University. He has contributed greatly to the growth of Jewish Studies, the place of Judaism in Religious Studies, interreligious dialogue, and the reframing of Judaism in light of the Holocaust, postmodernism, and poststructuralism. For Blumenthal, theology is an ongoing reflection about everything we believe and do in the context of the living tradition.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references. :
9789004279759 :
2213-6010 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Zwischen Philosophie und Gesetz : Jüdische philosophie und theologie von 1933 bis 1938 /
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Despite the revival of intellectual history in recent years, there is still relatively little research into German-Jewish intellectual history between 1933 and 1938. The present work studies for the first time the important discussions of the period from the debate between Leo Strauss and Julius Guttmann, Alexander Altmann's contribution to "Jewish theology," to the reception of the work of Franz Rosenzweig and Martin Heidegger as well as the works of David Baumgardt and Fritz Heinemann. Many now forgotten texts of those discussions have been made accessible here. All the leading figures presented in this study were sooner or later forced to choose between "philosophy" and "law."
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [317]-334). :
9789047442745 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
A history of modern Jewish religious philosophy.
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The culmination of Eliezer Schweid's life-work as a Jewish intellectual historian, this five-volume work provides a comprehensive, interdisciplinary account of the major thinkers and movements in modern Jewish thought, in the context of general philosophy and Jewish social-political historical developments, with extensive primary source excerpts. Volume Two, \'The Birth of the Jewish Historical Studies and the Modern Jewish Religious Movements,\' discusses the major Jewish thinkers of central and eastern Europe before 1881, in connection with the movements they fostered: German-Jewish Wissenschaft (Zunz), Reform (Formstecher, Samuel Hirsch, Geiger), Neo-Orthodoxy (S. D. Luzzatto, Steinheim, Samson Raphael Hirsch), Positive-Historical (Frankel, Graetz), and Neo-Haredi (Kalischer, Malbim, Hayyim Volozhiner, Salanter). In addition, extensive attention is given to the thinkers of the east-European Haskalah, both earlier (Levinsohn, Rubin, Schorr, Mieses, Abraham Krochmal) and later proto-Zionist thinkers (Zweifel, Smolenskin, Pines, Lilienblum).
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1 online resource (xii, 330 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references. :
9789004290372 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The cultures of Maimonideanism : new approaches to the history of Jewish thought /
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In the history of Jewish thought, no individual scholar has exercised more influence than Maimonides (1138-1204) - philosopher and physician, legal scholar and communal leader. This collection of papers, originating at the 2007 EAJS colloquium, places primary emphasis on this influence - not on Maimonides himself but the many movements he inspired. Using Maimonideanism as an interpretive lens, the authors of this volume - representing a variety of fields and disciplines - develop new approaches to and fresh perspectives on the peculiar dynamic of Judaism and philosophy. Focusing on social and cultural processes as well as philosophical ideas and arguments, they point toward an original reconceptualization of Jewish thought.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [409]-436) and index. :
9789047427964 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Knowledge of God and the development of early Kabbalah /
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In Knowledge of God and the Development of Early Kabbalah , Jonathan Dauber offers a fresh consideration of the emergence and early development of Kabbalah against the backdrop of a re-evaluation of the relationship between early Kabbalistic and philosophic discourse. He argues that the first Kabbalists adopted a philosophic ethos that was foreign to traditional Rabbinic Judaism but had taken root in Languedoc and Catalonia under the influence of newly available philosophical materials. In this ethos, the act of investigating God was accorded great religious significance, and it was its adoption by the first Kabbalists that helped spur them to engage in their investigations of God and, in so doing, develop Kabbalah.
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1 online resource (x, 275 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p.[253]-268 ) and index. :
9789004234277 :
1873-9008 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Philo of Alexandria : an exegete for his time /
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Philo's writings are a comprehensive and important source of late Second Temple Judaism. This volume gives important insights into his exegetical works. The structure of the books and their exegetical ideas are seen here as being closely connected and his writings are analysed against the background of the history, variety and outlook of Alexandrian Jewry. Philo's exegesis is a meeting place between Jewish and Greek notions and ideas; tensions are reflected, such as those between particularism and universalism, between specific biblical and historical earthly events and general macro- and micro-cosmic principles, and between heavenly ascents and interpreted history and eschatology. In addition, glimpses are gained of community life in a Hellenistic Jewish community, especially of issues on the borderline between Jews and their non-Jewish surroundings. New Testament material illuminates Philo's broader Jewish context, and in turn Philo throws light on New Testament backgrounds.
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1 online resource (x, 332 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 291-300) and indexes. :
9789004267329 :
0167-9732 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Seeing with both eyes : Ephraim Luntshitz and the Polish-Jewish renaissance /
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This is an integrated study of the revival of philosophical studies in 16th-century central-European Jewry focusing on seven major thinkers and especially on the intellectual development of Ephraim Luntshitz (1550-1619). Preoccupation with philosophy is traced through Moses Isserles, Solomon Luria, Mordecai Jaffe, Abraham Horowitz, Eliezer Ashkenazi, Maharal of Prague, and Ephraim Luntshitz. Analysis of these thinkers' intellectual affiliations is based on close analysis of their primary texts, of which a generous selection is provided in translation for the first time. This work advances the scholarly study of 16th-century Polish-Jewish culture, the Polish Jewish Renaissance, the philosophical interests of Ashkenazic Jewry, Jewish responses to Renaissance humanism and the Reformation, and the early-modern background for the 18th-century Jewish Enlightenment.
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1 online resource. :
"English and Hebrew titles of primary works": pages [xv]-xvi.
Includes bibliographical references (p. [215]-220) and index. :
9789047432746 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The significance of Sinai : traditions about Sinai and divine revelation in Judaism and Christianity /
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This volume of essays is concerned with ancient and modern Jewish and Christian views of the revelation at Sinai. The theme is highlighted in studies on the Dead Sea Scrolls, Paul, Josephus, rabbinic literature, art and philosophy. The contributions demonstrate that Sinai, as the location of the revelation, soon became less significant than the narratives that developed about what happened there. Those narratives were themselves transformed, not least to explain problems regarding the text's plain sense. Miraculous theophany, anthropomorphisms, the role of Moses, and the response of Israel were all handled with exegetical skills mustered by each new generation of readers. Furthermore, the content of the revelation, especially the covenant, was rethought in philosophical, political, and theological ways. This collection of studies is especially useful in showing something of the complexity of how scriptural traditions remain authoritative and lively for those who appeal to them from very different contexts.
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1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references and indexes. :
9789047443476 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Jonathan Sacks : universalizing particularity /
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This volume features the thought and writings of Jonathan Sacks, one of today's leading Jewish public thinkers. It brings together an intellectual portrait, four of his most original and influential philosophical essays, and an interview with him. This volume showcases the work of Sacks, a philosopher who seeks to confront and offer solutions to the numerous problems besetting Judaism and its confrontation with modernity. In addition, the reader will also encounter an important social philosopher and proponent of interfaith dialogue, who articulates how it is possible to cultivate a culture of civility based on the twin notions of the dignity of difference and the ethic of responsibility. Jonathan Sacks has been Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth from September 1991 to September 2013 and a member of the House of Lords since 2009.
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1 online resource (xiii, 147 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 141-147). :
9789004249813 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Avi Sagi : existentialism, pluralism, and identity /
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Avi Sagi is Professor of Philosophy at Bar Ilan University in Ramat Gan, Israel, and Senior Fellow at the Shalom Hartman Institute in Jerusalem, Israel. A philosopher, literary critic, scholar of cultural studies, historian and philosopher of halakhah, public intellectual, social critic, and educator, Sagi has written most lucidly on the challenges that face humanity, Judaism, and Israeli society today. As an intertextual thinker, Sagi integrates numerous strands within contemporary philosophy, while critically engaging Jewish and non-Jewish philosophers. Offering an insightful defense of pluralism and multiculturalism, his numerous writings integrate philosophy, religion, theology, jurisprudence, psychology, art, literature, and politics, charting a new path for Jewish thought in the twenty-first century.
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1 online resource (xv, 193 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references (p. 185-193). :
9789004280816 :
2213-6010 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
Eliezer Schweid : the responsibility of Jewish philosophy /
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This volume features Eliezer Schweid's philosophy of Judaism for a secular age. The volume brings together four of Schweid's most original and influential philosophical essays and an interview with him that together express his fundamental outlook: the faith of a secular Jew, freely choosing loyalty to his or her national culture and drawing on Jewish heritage to inform how to act responsibly toward one's neighbor, one's people, the world, and God. The themes span the gamut of Schweid's life work: the existential loneliness of the modern Jew; Judaism as a culture; faith in light of the Holocaust; and appreciation for secular humanism with awareness of its shortcomings, given the enduring legacy of the Jewish biblical heritage.
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Title from PDF title page (viewed on July 26, 2013). :
1 online resource (xiii, 256 pages) :
Includes bibliographical references. :
9789004249790 :
2213-6010 ; :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.
The classic Jewish philosophers : from Saadia through the Renaissance /
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This book provides a standard reference of the major medieval Jewish philosophers, as well as an eminently readable narrative of the course of medieval Jewish philosophical thought, presented as a response to the spiritual-intellectual challenges facing Judaism in that period. The accounts of Saadia, Bahya, Halevi, Maimonides, and Crescas are among the fullest available in English. Other thinkers discussed in depth include Israeli, Ibn Gabirol, Gersonides, and Albo; the work also includes capsule summaries of Bar Hiyya, Falaquera, Albalag, Duran, Abravanel and others. All of the summaries place the philosophical thought of these important thinkers in the context of the historical challenges and religious concerns of their age. This book is also available in paperback.
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Originally published as ha-Filosofim ha-gedolim shelanu, Miskal/Yediot Aharonot Books, 1999. :
1 online resource. :
Includes bibliographical references (p. [469]-474) and indexes. :
9789047423522 :
Available to subscribing member institutions only.