Judaism in Practice

by Fine, Lawrence

• ISBN13: 9780691057873
• ISBN10: 0691057877
• Edition: Reprint
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2001-10-29
• Publisher: Princeton Univ Pr

Summary

This collection of original materials provides a sweeping view of medieval and early modern Jewish ritual and religious practice. Including such diverse texts as ritual manuals, legal codes, mystical books, autobiographical writings, folk literature, and liturgical poetry, it testifies to the enormous variety of practices that characterized Judaism in the twelve hundred years between 600 and 1800 C.E. Its focus on religious practice and experience--how Judaism was actually lived by people from day to day--makes this anthology unique among the few sourcebooks available. The volume encompasses the broad scope and complex texture of Jewish religious practice, taking into account many aspects of Jewish culture that have hitherto been relatively neglected: the religious life of ordinary people, the role and status of women, art and aesthetics, and marginalized as well as remote Jewish communities. It introduces such remarkable personalities as Moses Maimonides, Leon Modena, and Gluckel of Hameln, and presents extraordinary texts on festival practice, Torah study, mystical communities, meditation, exorcism, the practice of charity, and folk rites marking birth and death. Representing state-of-the-art scholarship by distinguished academics from around the world, the volume includes many materials never before translated into English. Each text is preceded by an accessible introduction, making this book suitable for college and university students as well as a general audience. Whether read as a deliberate course of study or dipped into selectively for a glimpse into fascinating Jewish lives and places,Judaism in Practiceholds rich rewards for any reader.

Table of Contents

Princeton Readings in Religions	vii
Note on Transliteration and Acknowledgments	ix
Contributors	xv
Introduction	1	(38)
Lawrence Fine
Rituals of Daily and Festival Practice
Communal Prayer and Liturgical Poetry	39	(13)
Raymond P. Scheindlin
Italian Jewish Women at Prayer	52	(9)
Howard Tzvi Adelman
Measuring Graves and Laying Wicks	61	(13)
Chava Weissler
Adorning the ``Bride'' on the Eve of the Feast of Weeks	74	(7)
Daniel C. Matt
New Year's Day for Fruit of the Tree	81	(18)
Miles Krassen
Rituals of the Life Cycle
The Role of Women at Rituals of Their Infant Children	99	(16)
Lawrence A. Hoffman
Honey Cakes and Torah: A Jewish Boy Learns His Letters	115	(16)
Ivan G. Marcus
Women and Ritual Immersion in Medieval Ashkenaz: The Sexual Politics of Piety	131	(12)
Judith R. Baskin
Life-Cycle Rituals of Spanish Crypto-Jewish Women	143	(12)
Renee Levine Melammed
Ritualizing Death and Dying: The Ethical Will of Naphtali Ha-Kohen Katz	155	(16)
Avriel Bar-Levav
Torah, Learning, and Ethics
Moses Maimonides' Laws of the Study of Torah	171	(15)
Lawrence Kaplan
An Egyptian Woman Seeks to Rescue Her Husband from a Sufi Monastery	186	(5)
S.D. Goitein
A Monastic-like Setting for the Study of Torah	191	(12)
Ephraim Kanarfogel
Religious Practice among Italian Jewish Women	203	(7)
Howard Tzvi Adelman
A Mystical Fellowship in Jerusalem	210	(5)
Lawrence Fine
The Love of Learning among Polish Jews	215	(14)
Gershon David Hundert
Religious Sectarianism and Communities on the Margins
Jewish Sectarianism in the Near East: A Muslim's Account	229	(8)
Steven M. Wasserstrom
Travel in the Land of Israel	237	(11)
Lawrence Fine
Karaite Ritual	248	(17)
Daniel Frank
Living Judaism in Confucian Culture: Being Jewish and Being Chinese	265	(16)
Jonathan N. Lipman
Art and Aesthetics
Defending, Enjoying, and Regulating the Visual	281	(17)
Kalman P. Bland
Illustrating History and Illuminating Identity in the Art of the Passover Haggadah	298	(20)
Marc Michael Epstein
The Arts of Calligraphy and Composition, and the Love of Books	318	(7)
Lawrence Fine
Jewish Preaching in Fifteenth-Century Spain	325	(16)
Marc Saperstein
Magic and Mysticism
The Book of the Great Name	341	(7)
Michael D. Swartz
Visionary Experiences among Spanish Crypto-Jewish Women	348	(5)
Renee Levine Melammed
Mystical Eating and Food Practices in the Zohar	353	(11)
Joel Hecker
Devotional Rites in a Sufi Mode	364	(11)
Paul B. Fenton
Pietistic Customs from Safed	375	(11)
Lawrence Fine
Jewish Exorcism: Early Modern Traditions and Transformations	386	(13)
J.H. Chajes
Rabbi Menahem Nahum of Chernobyl: Personal Practices of a Hasdic Master	399	(14)
Arthur Green
Remarkable Lives
The Life of Moses ben Maimon	413	(16)
Joel L. Kraemer
Dolce of Worms: The Lives and Deaths of an Exemplary Medieval Jewish Woman and Her Daughters	429	(9)
Judith R. Baskin
The Earliest Hebrew First-Crusade Narrative	438	(15)
Robert Chazan
Leon Modena's Autobiography	453	(17)
Mark R. Cohen
The Early Messianic Career of Shabbatai Zvi	470	(13)
Matt Goldish
The Life of Glikl of Hameln	483	(15)
Paula E. Hyman
Israel ben Eliezer, the Baal Shem Tov	498	(15)
Dan Ben-Amos
The Scholarly Life of the Gaon of Vilna	513	(8)
Allan Nadler
Appendix. The Jewish Holidays	521	(2)
Index	523