Michael L. Satlow is associate professor of religious studies and Judaic studies at Brown University
Review
"An excellent, highly readable book laying out brilliantly the problematics of establishing the continuity, age by major age, of the Jewish tradition from the Bible to the present. Drawing on a broad range of recent scholarship, Micael Satlow's insightful, lucid, and often daring account locates each period of Jewish history in its larger immediate context yet linked in complex, unforeseen ways to antecedent Jewish collective identities, sacred texts, and ritual practices. Judicious, erudite, and speaking in his own personal voice, Satlow adroitly describes how the Jewish heritage has repeatedly remolded itself -- and what that flexibility signifies nowadays. A book of great value to sophisticated novices and informed academics alike." -- Robert M. Seltzer, professor of Jewish history, Hunter College and The City University of New York, and the author of Jewish People, Jewish Thought: The Jewish Experience in History, etc.
Summary
How can we define "Judaism," and what are the common threads uniting ancient rabbis, Maimonides, the authors of the Zohar, and modern secular Jews in Israel? Michael L. Satlow offers a fresh perspective on Judaism that recognizes both its similarities and its immense diversity. Presenting snapshots of Judaism from around the globe and throughout history, Satlow explores the links between vastly different communities and their Jewish traditions. He studies the geonim, rabbinical scholars who lived in Iraq from the ninth to twelfth centuries; the intellectual flourishing of Jews in medieval Spain; how the Hasidim of nineteenth-century Eastern Europe confronted modernity; and the post-World War II development of distinct American and Israeli Jewish identities. Satlow pays close attention to how communities define themselves, their relationship to biblical and rabbinic texts, and their ritual practices. His fascinating portraits reveal the amazingly creative ways Jews have adapted over time to social and political challenges and continue to remain a "Jewish family."
Table of Contents
Acknowledgments
Chronology
Introduction
1. Promised Lands
2. Creating Judaism
3. Between Athens and Jerusalem
4. The Rabbis
5. Rabbinic Concepts
6. Mitzvot
7. The Rise of Reason
8. From Moses to Moses
9. Seeing God
10. East and West Epilogue: Whither Judaism?
Glossary
Bibliographical
Notes
Index
