Modern Jewish Thought
Spring 2021
THEO2260/GERM 2160: MW, 3-4:15 PM
Syllabus
Class Notes
📖 Simon Noveck, ed., Contemporary Jewish Thought: A Reader, 2007. First Ben Yehuda Press Edition. ISBN 9780978998066
📖 Martin Buber, I and Thou, ISBN 9780684717258
📖 Theodor Herzl, The Jewish State, ISBN 9780486258492
📖 Other readings at Canvas to be printed and brought to class
Modern Jewish Thought
| 📖 Primary Literature (read as homework) 📌 Secondary material to be covered in class (Students will be responsible for citing the material on exams. If citing in essays, students should cite more precisely with author and page number.) ✎ 1-2 page critical response (write) 📥 3-4 page essay (write) 👓 speaker |
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| Date | Assignments are due on the date to the left. |
| Week 1 | INTRODUCTION, SPINOZA |
| Mon, February 1 | 📌 Spinoza's excommunication (herem) |
| Wed, February 3 | 📖 Spinoza, Tractatus Theologico-Politicus (excerpts, Preface, Ch. 3, Ch. 17 + skim selection of your choosing p. 19-30, 71-88, 287-315 (56 pages)) 📌 Willi Goetschel, Spinoza’s Modernity: Mendelssohn, Lessing, and Heine (2004, excerpt) |
| Week 2 | Shabbtai Zvi & False Messiahs of the 17th century |
| Mon, February 8 | 📖 Gershom Scholem, Redemption through Sin (1936 [1971]), 78-141, (63 pages) |
| Wed, February 10 | 📖 The Memoirs of Glückel of Hameln, transl. Marvin Lowenthal (Ch. 3, 40-65) ✎ 1-2 page critical response (write) |
| Woche 3 | Mendelssohn & 18th-19th century Emancipation |
| Mon, February 15 | 📖 David Sorkin, Moses Mendelssohn and the Religious Enlightenment (1996) Intro, Ch. 8-9 (41 pages) 📖 Primary documents: Frederick II, Charter Decreed for the Jews of Prussia (1750) + Mendelssohn on Michaelis (7 pages) 👓 Tomer Mangoubi, Karaite Judaism |
| Wed, February 17 | 📖 Moses Mendelssohn, Jerusalem (1783), Ch. 2, 50-103 (53 pages) |
| Week 4 | Reform Judaism, 19th century |
| Mon, February 22 | 📖 Susannah Heschel, Abraham Geiger and the Jewish Jesus (1998) Ch. 1, 23-49 (27 pages) 📖 Reform Judaism primary documents (The Jew in the Modern World, 1980) 145-168 (24 pages) |
| Wed, February 24 | Orientalism 📖 John M. Efron, German Jewry and the Allure of the Sephardic (2015) Ch. 3, 112-160 (49 pages) 📌 Pittsburgh Reform Platform, 1885 📌 Ivan Davidson Kalmar and Derek J. Penslar, Orientalism and the Jews, (2005, Intro.) ✎ 1-2 page critical response (write) |
| Week 5 | Zionism, 20th century |
| Mon, March 1 | 📖 Theodor Herzl, The Jewish State (1896), Preface - Ch. 3, 67-122 (54 pages) |
| 🚫 Mid-Semester Break—no class | |
| Thurs, March 4 | Mid-Semester Make-Up 📖 Theodor Herzl, The Jewish State (1896), Ch.4 - Conclusion, 123-157 (35 pages) 📌 Michael Löwy, Redemption and Utopia: Jewish Libertarian Thought in Central Europe (1992, excerpts) |
| Week 6 | |
| Mon, March 8 | 📖 Abraham Isaac Kuk, including "The Land of Israel," "The Rebirth of Israel," "The Experience of Mysticism" (Noveck, 95-128) 34 pages 📖 Todd Presner, “Clear Heads, Solid Stomachs, and Hard Muscles” (2003, 28 pages) |
| Wed, March 10 | Messianism in Secular Thought 📖 Walter Benjamin, “Task of the Translator,” “Theses on the Philosophy of History” (Illuminations, 1968) 69-82, ,255-266 (26 pages) 📖 Walter Benjamin, “Theologico-Political Fragment,” 312-313 (2 pages) |
| Week 7 | |
| Mon, March 15 | 📖 Martin Buber, including The Word “God,” God and the World’s Evil, Jewish Renaissance (Noveck, 243-275) 33 pages 📥 Essay on Messianism. |
| Wed, March 17 | 📖 Martin Buber, I and Thou (1923) First Part, 51-85, 33 pages |
| Week 8 | Buber |
| Mon, March 22 | 📖 Martin Buber, I and Thou (1923), Second - Third Part 87-144, 58 pages |
| Wed, March 24 | 📖 Martin Buber, I and Thou (1923), Third Part 144-168, 25 pages ✎ 1-2 page critical response |
| Week 9 | |
| 🚫 Passover—no class 📖 Passover Haggadah. Focus on the section of Magid ("The Telling") |
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| Wed, March 31 | 📖 Franz Rosenzweig, including On Jewish Learning, Hebrew Language, The Builders: Concerning the Law (Noveck, 213-236) 24 pages 📖 Margarete Susman, "God the creator". In: Nahum N. Glatzer (Ed.), The Dimensions of Job: A Study and Selected Readings. Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2002 (originally published by Schocken Books, 1969). ISBN 9781592440061. p. 86-92 (7 pages) |
| Woche 10 | |
| Mon, April 5 | 📖 Franz Rosenzweig, Star of Redemption (1921, Part 3, Book 1), 317-369. Read for the theme of blood |
| Wed, April 7 | 📖 Susanne Hillman, “'A Germ So Tiny': Margarete Susman's Messianism of Small Steps," Soundings: An Interdisciplinary Journal, Vol. 96, No. 1 (2013), pp. 40-84. |
| Week 11 | |
| Mon, April 12 | 📥 Essay on Jewish Statism, peoplehood. 📖 Hannah Arendt, Eichmann in Jerusalem (Penguin, Ch. 2 and Epilogue), 21-35, 270-279 (25 pages) 📖 Hannah Arendt & Gershom Scholem, "Eichmann in Jerusalem - An Exchange of Letters." Encounter 22:1 (January 1964), 51-56 (6 pages) |
| Wed, April 14 | Reform Judaism in the US 📖 Solomon Breibart, Exploration in Charleston's Jewish History, "A Neglected Figure in American Jewish Reform: The Reverend Mr. Gustavus Poznanski" (55-60) 6 pages 📖 Kaufmann Kohler, including "Evolution and Religion," "The Nature and Purpose of Prayer," "Mission of Israel" (Noveck, 293-326) 34 pages |
| Week 12 | |
| Mon, April 19 | Reconstructionist Judaism 📖 Mordechai Kaplan, including "An Approach to Jewish Religion," "A Conception of God," "The Social Structure of American Jewish Life" (Noveck, 329-368) 40 pages |
| Wed, April 21 | Feminist Jewish Theology 📖 Susannah Heschel, Introduction, On Being a Jewish Feminist, 1983. xiii-xxxvi (20 pages) 📖 Susannah Heschel, The Orange on the Seder Plate (1 page) 📖 Rachel Adler, The Jew Who Wasn't There: Halakha and the Jewish Woman, In: On Being a Jewish Feminist, 1983. [1973], 12-18 (6 pages) 📖 Aviva Cantor, The Lilith Question, In: On Being a Jewish Feminist, 1983. 40-50 (11 pages) |
| Week 13 | |
| Mon, April 26 | 📖 Passover haggadot (Course Reserves, Handout) ✎ Prepare for Essay 3 by completing handout (Canvas) |
| Wed, April 28 | Hasidism, 18th century to Today 📖 Sue Fishkoff, The Rebbe's Army: Inside the World of Chabad-Lubavitch (Ch. 4 & 14, 66-87, 261-284, 46 pages) ✎ 1-2 page critical response (write) |
| Week 14 | |
| Mon, May 3 | 📖 Sue Fishkoff, The Rebbe's Army: Inside the World of Chabad-Lubavitch (Prologue, Ch. 1. Ch. 5, 3-32, 88-106) |
| Wed, May 5 | No reading, only ✎ 1 page of the final essay or an outline (write) |
| Fri, May 14 | 📥 Essay 3 on Passover haggadot. Essay and makeup work due by 12pm noon. |