Abstract
The Israelites, Hebrews, Jews, have existed with a defined specific religious and national culture for over 3000 years. Initially, their religion was a state religion where the monarchy, the priesthood, and the Judiciary were all part of a unitary system. Over time, conquests and exiles saw a shift in emphasis away from the national to what is now often called a faith community. Under the Persian, Greek, and Roman worlds this presented no existential problems. There was indeed social and commercial competition and rivalry, but not ideological pressure. With the rise of Christianity and Islam, Jews not only lost control over their world but were also marginalized. This had a profound effect on the Jewish psyche and their relation to others, as well as to the universal. This chapter charts the different ways in which the Jewish people adjusted to changing circumstances. They accepted non-Jewish and secular civil values while preserving their internal, spiritual identity. Now they struggle to reintegrate the two in a new Israel. This chapter describes the various stages in the evolution of this process.
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Notes
- 1.
For an excellent overview of the development of Jewish law from the Talmud onward see Chapter 1 of Michael Broyde and Shlomo Pill. An Introduction to the Jurisprudence of Arukh HaShulhan. Academic Studies Press.
- 2.
Medieval European commentaries on the Talmud in the generations after Rashi (op cit).
- 3.
Typically R. Yechezkel Landau (1713–1792) in the foreword to Noda Biyehuda.
- 4.
Rabbi.Y.Landau, Introduction to Responsa Nodah Biyehudah.
- 5.
Edward Jenner (1749–1823).
- 6.
Not Sir Francis Drake. He means Sir Walter Raleigh (1554–1618) who discovered potatoes and tobacco in the New World.
- 7.
Johannes Gutenberg (1400–1468).
- 8.
Johannes Reuchlin (1455–1522).
- 9.
Rabbi Abraham Isaac Kook (1865–1935).
- 10.
R. A.I. Kook Orot Hakodesh II, p. 444.
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Rosen, J. (2021). Judaism and Other Peoples: A Kaleidoscope of Responses. In: Raudino, S., Ashraf Barton, U. (eds) Abraham and the Secular. Interreligious Studies in Theory and Practice. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73053-6_4
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