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Hasidism, a movement of religious awakening and social reform, originated in the mid-eighteenth century. After two and a half centuries of crisis, upheaval, and renewal, it remains a vibrant way of life and a compelling aspect of Jewish experience. This book explores the profound intellectual and religious issues that the hasidic masters raised in their Torah commentary, and brings to the fore the living qualities of their sermons.
One of the most radically innovative of Hasidic masters, Reb Nahman of Bratslav transformed images and concepts basic to Jewish thought into new and compelling forms. Tradition and Fantasy in the Tales of Reb Nahman of Bratslav uses comparative literary criticism, a range of Hasidic commentary, and original exegesis of the source texts to bring the complex artistry of Reb Nahman's thought to light making it accessible to a wider audience.
The homiletical literature of hasidism is an innovative contribution to the Jewish hermeneutical tradition and an important element of the intellectual and social history of Judaism. In their sermons (derashot), the hasidic masters contemplate the nature and meaning of existence and provide guidance to disciples in their quest for self-transformation. Ora Wiskind-Elper's original study explores 200 years of hasidic commentary, from the Ba'al Shem Tov to Kalonymus Kalman Shapira, placing a hitherto neglected subject on the map of scholarly enquiry. Drawing creatively on contemporary philosophy and literary theory, she paints a portrait of hasidism by reflecting on the purpose and methods of its biblical exegesis. Among her central themes is the role of external historical forces in shaping the hasidic world-view as it is manifested in original interpretations of Torah.
A collection of essays and teachings developed from years of Bible and Jewish study by women Torah scholars and educators.
Until 1806, Rabbi Nahman of Bratslav (1772–1810) disseminated his thoughts on redemption through homilies. In 1806, however, Nahman chose the genre of tales as an additional and innovative means of religious discourse. An academic close reading of all of the tales, known as Sippurey Ma’asiyot, has not yet been undertaken. As the first comprehensive scholarly work on the whole selection of tales and contrary to previous scholarship, this book does not reduce the tales to biographical expressions of Nahman’s tormented soul and messianic aspirations. Instead, it treats them as religious literature where the concept of “intertextuality” is considered essential to explain how Nahman defines his theology of redemption and invites his listeners and readers to appropriate his religious world-view.
These memories, written by R. Hayyim Simhah Leiner, preface the family history he compiled and first published in 1909. The grandfather of his childhood is Rabbi Ya°akov Leiner, whose teachings are the subject of this book. R. Ya°akov (1818-1878) was the rebbe and spiritual leader of a community of Hasidim in Izbica and then in Radzyn, located in the Podalski region of Congress Poland for over 24 years ... The discourses and insights he shared throughout his life were gathered by his sons and grandson in four large volumes entitled Beit Ya°akov (The House of Jacob.))
Jewish Contiguities and the Soundtrack of Israeli History revolutionizes the study of modern Israeli art music by tracking the surprising itineraries of Jewish art music in the move from Europe to Mandatory Palestine and Israel. Leaving behind clichés about East and West, Arab and Jew, this book provocatively exposes the legacies of European antisemitism and religious Judaism in the making of Israeli art music.
Memoirs of Jewish life in the east European shtetl often recall the hekdesh (town poorhouse) and its residents: beggars, madmen and madwomen, disabled people, and poor orphans. Stepchildren of the Shtetl tells the story of these marginalized figures from the dawn of modernity to the eve of the Holocaust. Combining archival research with analysis of literary, cultural, and religious texts, Natan M. Meir recovers the lived experience of Jewish society's outcasts and reveals the central role that they came to play in the drama of modernization. Those on the margins were often made to bear the burden of the nation as a whole, whether as scapegoats in moments of crisis or as symbols of degenerati...
Theology, Fantasy, and the Imagination offers analyses of the theological, philosophical, and religious imagination found in fantasy literature, the theological imagination, and table-top games. Part I offers an invocation to the study through a theological reflection of the “old magic.” Part II analyzes classical Christian fantasy—ranging from dogmatic theological reflection on the fantastic imagination to analyses of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien. Part III analyzes the post-Christian turn in fantasy after about 1960 through today—featuring methodological, theological, and philosophical essays that reflect a movement beyond Christianity in the fantasy literature and writings of Rabbi Shagar, Ursula le Guin, Terry Pratchett, Robert Jordan and David Eddings, and Brandon Sanderson and Orson Scott Card. Part IV closes with two analyses of the religious and philosophical dimensions of table-top games, including Dungeons and Dragons and Magic: the Gathering. Theology, Fantasy, and the Imagination offers astute analyses of how theological fantasy actually is by articulating the religious, philosophical, and theological dimensions of the fantastic imagination.