Mediating modernity : challenges and trends in the Jewish encounter with the modern world : essays in honor of Michael A. Meyer / edited by Lauren B. Strauss and Michael Brenner.

Format:

Book

Contributor:

Strauss, Lauren B.

Brenner, Michael, 1964-

Meyer, Michael A.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Jews--Identity--History.

Jews.

Jews--History--1789-1945.

Enlightenment.

Reform Judaism--History.

Reform Judaism.

Meyer, Michael A.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (396 p.)

Edition:

1st ed.

Place of Publication:

Detroit : Wayne State University Press, [2008]

Language Note:

English

Summary:

In Mediating Modernity, contemporary Jewish scholars pay tribute to Michael A. Meyer, scholar of German-Jewish history and the history of Reform Judaism, with a collection of essays that highlight growing diversity within the discipline of Jewish studies. The occasion of Meyer's seventieth birthday has served as motivation for his colleagues Lauren B. Strauss and Michael Brenner to compile this volume, with essays by twenty-four leading academics, representing institutions in five countries. Mediating Modernity is introduced by an overview of modern Jewish historiography, largely drawing on Meyer's work in that field, delineating important connections between the writing of history and the environment in which it is written. Meyer's own areas of specialization are reflected in essays on Moses Mendelssohn, German-Jewish historiography, the religious and social practices of German Jews, Reform Judaism, and various Jewish communities in America. The volume's field of inquiry is broadened by essays that deal with gender issues, literary analysis, and the historical relationship of Israel and the Palestinians. Though other volumes have been compiled to honor Jewish historians, Mediating Modernity is unique in the personal and intellectual relationships shared by its contributors and Michael A. Meyer. Scholars of Jewish studies, German history, and religious history will appreciate this timely volume.

Contents:

Modernity through the eyes of its chroniclers: the scholar as interpreter and shaper of modern Jewish life / Lauren B. Strauss

Michael A. Meyer: an appreciation / Ismar Schorsch

Michael A. Meyer and his vision of Reform Judaism and the Reform rabbinate: a lifetime of devotion and concern / David Ellenson

Michael A. Meyer's periodization of modern Jewish history: revisiting a seminal essay / David B. Ruderman

When does the modern period of the Jewish calendar begin? / Elisheva Carlebach

The controversy over the salvation of the Jews, Turks, and heathens in the second half of the eighteenth century: a theological path to tolerance? / Ernst-Peter Wieckenberg

The Merchant of Venice and the theological construction of Christian Europe / Susannah Heschel

Toward the popular religion of Ashkenazic Jews: Yiddish-Hebrew texts on sex and circumcision / Michael Stanislawski

Analyzing the zeitgeist: Ludwig Philippson as historian of the modern era / Christhard Hoffmann

German historians and the Jews / Peter Pulzer

The "return of the Jews to history": considerations about an ideological concept / Evyatar Friesel

Simon Rawidowicz on the Arab question: a prescient gaze into the "new history?" / David N. Myers

Jewish religion and capitalism / Avraham Barkai

The mystical world of colonial American Jews / Jonathan D. Sarna

Public faith and private virtue: Cincinnati's American Israelites / Karla Goldman

Gender, antisemitism, and Jewish identity in the fin de siècle / Paula E. Hyman

Apprenticeships in work and love: Jewish youth growing up in Imperial Germany / Marion Kaplan

Lukewarm establishment or militant religious ideology?: German liberal Judaism in the 1920s / Steven M. Lowenstein

Moses Mendelssohn's dreams and nightmares / Shmuel Feiner

The construction and deconstruction of a Jewish hero: Moses Mendelssohn's afterlife in early-twentieth-century Germany / Michael Brenner

Singing new songs: translation as a metaphor for modernity / Richard N. Levy

Reflections on Jewish nostalgia in the era of globalization / Richard I. Cohen

From Klausner to Oz and back / Arnold J. Band

Stumbling stones: marks of Holocaust memory on German streets / Monika Richarz

Is literary history possible?: reflections on literary history / Gershon Shaked.

Notes:

Description based upon print version of record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on print version record.

ISBN:

9780814339930

081433993X

OCLC:

608885314