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For some twenty years from the late 1960s, and thereafter following a brief pause, representatives of British Jewry's religious orientations held closed-door meetings at the Chief Rabbi's residence in attempts to bridge their communal and halachic differences. So secret were they that barely a word broke through, and until now the details of their often fiery disputations - both verbally and in writing - have never been revealed. In an exclusive glimpse into this shrouded arena, "Closed Doors, Open Minds" presents an important new chapter in Meir Persoff's acclaimed series on the British Chief Rabbinate, deftly unraveling the manifold theological and ideological strands of its multi-hued tapestry.
The first book-length study of contemporary British Jewry , Turbulent Times: The British Jewish Community Today examines the changing nature of the British Jewish community and its leadership since 1990. Keith Kahn-Harris and Ben Gidley contend that there has been a shift within Jewish communal discourse from a strategy of security, which emphasized Anglo-Jewry's secure British belonging and citizenship, to a strategy of insecurity, which emphasizes the dangers and threats Jews face individually and communally. This shift is part of a process of renewal in the community that has led to something of a 'Jewish renaissance' in Britain. Addressing key questions on the transitions in the history of Anglo-Jewish community and leadership, and tackling the concept of the 'new antisemitism', this important and timely study addresses the question: how has UK Jewry adapted from a shift from monoculturalism to multiculturalism?
`[Persoff] has been able to deploy his material against the background of an extensive knowledge of the inner world of British Jewry, gathered over a lifetime reporting and commenting upon it without fear and without favour. Another Way, Another Time will certainly not be the last word on Jonathan Sacks. But all who write on this subject hereafter will need to measure their efforts against the yardstick Dr Persoff has fashioned, and which he now sets before us.'-Geoffrey Alderman, Michael Gross Professor of Politics and Contemporary History at the Univeristy of Buckingham --
Nineteenth-century Europe saw an unprecedented rise in the number of synagogues. Building a Public Judaism considers what their architecture and the circumstances surrounding their construction reveal about the social progress of modern European Jews. Looking at synagogues in four important centers of Jewish life—London, Amsterdam, Paris, and Berlin—Saskia Coenen Snyder argues that the process of claiming a Jewish space in European cities was a marker of acculturation but not of full acceptance. Whether modest or spectacular, these new edifices most often revealed the limits of European Jewish integration. Debates over building initiatives provide Coenen Snyder with a vehicle for gauging...
A Jewish Heart: A Struggle for Status and Identity in Asia is at once the saga of a modest charitable grant in 1903, an unimagined windfall ninety years later, and a history of Progressive Judaism in Asia. Enriched with profiles of key players, the author rootsthe narratives in the entrepreneurial and philanthropic activities of two legendary Baghdadi families, the Sassoons and the Kadoories, beginning in mid-nineteenth century Bombay, Shanghai, and Hong Kong and unfolding against the backdrop of worldwide waves of Jewish arrivals. The story gains currency when challenges are raised over community funding, facilities, preserving or replacing the aging synagogue, and accommodating Reform Juda...
A close study of three of Soloveitchik's most influential disciples in Jewish thought and philosophy
Chaim Bermant called him 'far and away the greatest Chief Rabbi Britain has had'. Margaret Thatcher described him as 'one of the most remarkable spiritual leaders of the twentieth century'. And Jonathan Sacks lauded him as 'a prince of God in our midst'. From his first (and controversial) ministerial appointment, as a 20-year-old German refugee, to his elevation to the peerage, Immanuel Jakobovits spoke out fearlessly for the values of justice, compassion, morality and moderation that characterised his faith and moulded his rabbinate. The Life and Legacy of Immanuel Jakobovits offers a fascinating kaleidoscope of his life and achievements as mirrored in his writings, speeches and activities, draws on his private papers and scrapbooks, and includes previously unpublished autobiographical chapters and specially written contributions by Nobel Peace Laureate Elie Wiesel and British Chief Rabbi Jonathan Sacks. The book marks the establishment of Beit Harav Jakobovits for the Study of Philosophy, Ethics and Jewish Thought at Bar-Ilan University, Israel.
Jews acculturated to Scotland within one generation and quickly inflected Jewish culture in a Scottish idiom. This book analyses the religious aspects of this transition through a transnational perspective on migration in the first three decades of the twentieth century.
This authoritative and comprehensive guide to key people and events in Anglo-Jewish history stretches from Cromwell's re-admittance of the Jews in 1656 to the present day and contains nearly 3000 entries, the vast majority of which are not featured in any other sources.