Encountering the medieval in modern Jewish thought / edited by James A. Diamond and Aaron W. Hughes.

• TeilnehmendeR: Diamond, James Arthur.; Hughes, Aaron W., 1968-
• Year of Publication: 2012
• Language: English
• Series: Supplements to The Journal of Jewish Thought and Philosophy 17.
• Physical Description: 1 online resource (345 p.)
• Notes: Includes index.

The term “medieval” performs a great deal more intellectual work in modern Jewish Thought than simply acting as a referent to a particular historical era. During the nineteenth century, often for Jews who were increasingly alienated from their own tradition, the “medieval” functioned primarily as a bearer of identity in a rapidly changing and secular world. Each chapter in Encountering the Medieval in Modern Jewish Thought addresses a different return to the medieval, ranging from the Enlightenment to the contemporary period, that clothed itself in the language of renewal and of retrieval. The volume engages the full complexity and range of meaning the term “medieval” carries for modern Jewish Thought.

Table of Contents

Preliminary Material -- Introduction Encountering the Medieval in Modern Jewish Thought / James A. Diamond and Aaron W. Hughes -- Chapter One “Medieval” and the Politics of Nostalgia: Ideology, Scholarship, and the Creation of the Rational Jew / Aaron W. Hughes -- Chapter Two On the Possibility of a Hidden Christian Will: Methodological Pitfalls in the Study of Medieval Jewish Philosophy / Sarah Pessin -- Chapter Three Lessing in Jerusalem: Modern Religion, Medieval Orientalism, and the Idea of Perfection / Zachary Braiterman -- Chapter Four R. Abraham Isaac Kook and Maimonides: A Contemporary Mystic’s Embrace of Medieval Rationalism / James A. Diamond -- Chapter Five On Myth, History, and the Study of Hasidism: Martin Buber and Gershom Scholem / Claire E. Sufrin -- Chapter Six What S. Y. Agnon Taught Gershom Scholem About Jewish History / Kenneth Hart Green -- Chapter Seven Constructed and Denied: “The Talmud” from the Brisker Rav to the Mishneh Torah / Sergey Dolgopolski -- Chapter Eight Escaping the Scholastic Paradigm: The Dispute Between Strauss and His Contemporaries About How to Approach Islamic and Jewish Medieval Philosophy / Joshua Parens -- Chapter Nine Justifying Philosophy and Restoring Revelation: Assessing Strauss’s Medieval Return / Randi L. Rashkover -- Chapter Ten Echo of the Otherwise: Ethics of Transcendence and the Lure of Theolatry / Elliot R. Wolfson -- Index.