Religious Norms, Human Capital, and Money Lending in Jewish European History

2011 ◽  
pp. 56-80 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maristella Botticini ◽  
Zvi Eckstein
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Southern Italy ◽  
European History ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Common View ◽  
Jewish Diaspora ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
History Of ◽  
Muslim Spain

Circa 1000, the main occupations of the large Jewish community in Muslim Spain and of the small Jewish communities in southern Italy, France, and Germany were local trade and long-distance commerce, as well as handicrafts. A common view states that the usury ban on Christians segregated European Jews into money lending. A similar view contends that the Jews were forced to become money lenders because they were not permitted to own land, and therefore, they were banned from farming. This article offers an alternative argument which is consistent with the main features that mark the history of the Jews: the Jews in medieval Europe voluntarily selected themselves into money lending because they had the key assets for being successful players in credit markets. After providing an overview of Jewish history during 70–1492, it discusses religious norms and human capital in Jewish European history, Jews in the Talmud era, the massive transition of the Jews from farming to crafts and trade, the golden age of the Jewish diaspora (ca. 800–ca. 1250), and the legacy of Judaism.

Creating a Historical Narrative for a Spiritual Nation: Simon Dubnow and the Politics of the Jewish Past

2012 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 98-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roni Gechtman
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Historical Narrative ◽  
East European ◽  
Jewish Diaspora ◽  
Political Views ◽  
History Of ◽  
Diaspora Nationalism ◽  
Intellectual Leader ◽  
Second World

Simon Dubnow (1860–1941) was a towering intellectual figure in the history of East European Jewry in the half-century before the Second World War. His influence was manifested mostly in two areas: as the preeminent Jewish historian of his generation and as the main theorist of Jewish diaspora nationalism (Folkism) and intellectual leader of the Folkspartey in Russia (1907-1917). This article examines the relation between the two aspects of Dubnow’s career and legacy. As a historian, Dubnow developed a method for the study of Jewish history he called ‘historism’. Politically, Dubnow was an atypical nationalist, in that he did not demand territorial independence for his people but only the recognition of Jews as a nation with autonomous status within the states where they already lived. I show how Dubnow’s Jewish nationalism and his political views derived, to a large extent, from his historical theory and analysis, and in turn, how his historical interpretations were often informed by his ideological preconceptions. By analyzing and juxtaposing his historical and theoretical works, I argue that the writing of history was for Dubnow a means to achieve his more ambitious goal: to change the future of Jewish society and, by extension, the countries where the Jews lived.

scholarly journals Eropa Berdasarkan Tiga Novel Umberto Eco: Pembelajaran Sejarah Bagi Pembaca Indonesia

ATAVISME ◽  
2013 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-41
Author(s):  
Dian Swandayani ◽  
Imam Santoso ◽  
Ari Nurhayati ◽  
Nurhadi Nurhadi
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
European History ◽  
Umberto Eco ◽  
Learning History ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
History Of ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
The Rose ◽  
Foucault’S Pendulum ◽  
The Middle Ages

Tiga novel Umberto Eco, The Name of The Rose, Baudolino, dan Foucault’s Pendulum, dengan lingkup latar masing-masing yang dikisahkannya, membantu pembaca Indonesia guna lebih mengenal kondisi Eropa, khususnya kondisi Eropa pada abad pertengahan, suatu rentang waktu dalam sejarah Eropa yang panjang dengan berbagai peristiwa historis lainnya. Meskipun berupa novel, informasi faktual yang disampaikan lewat ketiga novel tersebut dapat memperkaya wawasan pembaca guna mengetahui situasi Eropa pada masa abad pertengahan, meliputi rentangan teritorial yang melampaui kawasan Eropa sekarang, bahkan juga mengisahkan suatu kelompok sosial yang memegang peran penting dalam perjalanan sejarah Eropa. Novel‐novel Eco tampaknya tidak mudah dipahami oleh pembaca Indonesia, apalagi tentang detail yang dipaparkan mengenai sejarah Eropa abad pertengahan, terkait dengan detail situs-­‐situs geografis dan tokoh-tokoh utama yang menjadi titik penting dalam perjalanan sejarah Eropa. Meskipun demikian, hal ini bisa dimanfaatkan sebagai wahana pembelajaran sejarah, khususnya sejarah Eropa abad pertengahan. Abstract: Umberto Eco’s novels, The Name of The Rose, Baudolino, and Foucault’s Pendulum, with each specific setting, can help Indonesian readers to understand Europe, particularly in the Middle Ages, a long period in the European history which has various other historical events. Although the works are imaginary, the factual information in the novels can enrich the readers’ knowledge about the situation of Europe in the period of time, including the territorial extent which exceeded the present European territory. The works, in fact, tell aboutthe social group which played significant roles in the history of Europe. For Indonesian readers, it is not easy to understand the novels, let alone the details related to the history of Europe in the Middle Ages, the geographical sites, and the important people who played significant roles in the European history. However, the novels can be used as a medium for learning history, particularly the Medieval Europe. Key Words: history of Europe; novels; setting; learning; Indonesian readers

Messianic Leadership in Jewish History: Movements and Personalities

2014 ◽  
pp. 291-318
Author(s):  
Marc Saperstein
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Jewish Life ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
Difficult Situation ◽  
Jewish Diaspora ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
Incipient Movement ◽  
The Individual

This chapter is a survey of the dynamics of messianic movements over a period of some two millennia. The most dramatic tests of leadership in the history of the Jewish diaspora have come when an individual presented himself as playing a central role in the process that would bring an end to the exile of the diaspora. The messianic figure — whether claiming to be the actual messiah from the line of David or a prophet or forerunner of the messiah — transcended the accepted categories by which authority has been asserted and expressed in post-biblical Jewish life. However, rooted in traditional texts and expectations, the ideology of the incipient movement may have been, for the individual at its core this claim was by its very nature a radical departure from the norms, a revolutionary challenge to the status quo. This placed the more traditional Jewish leadership, especially the rabbinic authorities, who were structurally bound to a conservative position in society, in a difficult situation.

Child Care and Human Development: Insights from Jewish History in Central and Eastern Europe, 1500–1930*

2019 ◽  
Vol 129 (623) ◽  
pp. 2637-2690 ◽  
Author(s):  
Maristella Botticini ◽  
Zvi Eckstein ◽  
Anat Vaturi
Keyword(s):  
Human Capital ◽  
Eastern Europe ◽  
Cultural Transmission ◽  
Central And Eastern Europe ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Health Knowledge ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Human Capital Formation ◽  
Infant And Child Mortality ◽  
History Of

AbstractEconomists increasingly highlight the role that human capital formation, institutions and cultural transmission may play in shaping health, knowledge and wealth. We study one of the most remarkable instances in which religious norms and childcare practices had a major impact: the history of the Jews in central and eastern Europe from 1500 to 1930. We show that while birth rates were about the same, infant and child mortality among Jews was much lower and accounted for the main difference in Jewish versus non-Jewish natural population growth. Jewish families routinely adopted childcare practices that recent medical research has shown as enhancing children's well-being.

Recasting Bourgeois Europe

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles S. Maier ◽  
Charles S. Maier
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Social Vulnerability ◽  
Group Representation ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
European History ◽  
World War ◽  
History Of ◽  
Country Analysis ◽  
Economic Stabilization

The author, one of the most prominent contemporary scholars of European history, published this, his first book, in 1975. Based on extensive archival research, the book examines how European societies progressed from a moment of social vulnerability to one of political and economic stabilization. Arguing that a common trajectory calls for a multi country analysis, the book provides a comparative history of three European nations—France, Germany, and Italy—and argues that they did not simply return to a prewar status quo, but achieved a new balance of state authority and interest group representation. While most previous accounts presented the decade as a prelude to the Depression and dictatorships, the author suggests that the stabilization of the 1920s, vulnerable as it was, foreshadowed the more enduring political stability achieved after World War II. The immense and ambitious scope of this book, its ability to follow diverse histories in detail, and its effort to explain stabilization—and not just revolution or breakdown—have made it a classic of European history.

Muslim Contributions to the History of Religions

1991 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 409-421
Author(s):  
Ghulam-Haider Aasi
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Comparative History ◽  
History Of Religions ◽  
History Of ◽  
Muslim Spain ◽  
Muslim Scholars ◽  
The Middle Ages

History of Religions in the WestA universal, comparative history of the study of religions is still far frombeing written. Indeed, such a history is even hr from being conceived, becauseits components among the legacies of non-Western scholars have hardly beendiscovered. One such component, perhaps the most significant one, is thecontributions made by Muslim scholars during the Middle Ages to thisdiscipline. What is generally known and what has been documented in thisfield consists entirely of the contribution of Westdm scholars of religion.Even these Western scholars belong to the post-Enlightenment era of Wsternhistory.There is little work dealing with the history of religions which does notclaim the middle of the nineteenth century CE as the beginning of thisdiscipline. This may not be due only to the zeitgeist of the modem Wstthat entails aversion, downgrading, and undermining of everything stemmingfrom the Middie Ages; its justification may also be found in the intellectualpoverty of the Christian West (Muslim Spain excluded) that spans that historicalperiod.Although most works dealing with this field include some incidentalreferences, paragraphs, pages, or short chapters on the contribution of thepast, according to each author’s estimation, all of these studies are categorizedunder one of the two approaches to religion: philosophical or cubic. All ofthe reflective, speculative, philosophical, psychological, historical, andethnological theories of the Greeks about the nature of the gods and goddessesand their origins, about the nature of humanity’s religion, its mison dsttre,and its function in society are described as philosophical quests for truth.It is maintained that the Greeks’ contribution to the study of religion showedtheir openness of mind and their curiosity about other religions and cultures ...

Holiness in Jewish Thought

2018 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Religious Discourse ◽  
Jewish Tradition ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Religious Thought ◽  
Philosophical Reflection ◽  
Jewish Thought ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ways Of Life

Holiness is a challenge for contemporary Jewish thought. The concept of holiness is crucial to religious discourse in general and to Jewish discourse in particular. “Holiness” seems to express an important feature of religious thought and of religious ways of life. Yet the concept is ill defined. This collection explores what concepts of holiness were operative in different periods of Jewish history and bodies of Jewish literature. It offers preliminary reflections on their theological and philosophical import today. The contributors illumine some of the major episodes concerning holiness in the history of the development of the Jewish tradition. They think about the problems and potential implicit in Judaic concepts of holiness, to make them explicit, and to try to retrieve the concepts for contemporary theological and philosophical reflection. Holiness is elusive but it need not be opaque. This volume makes Jewish concepts of holiness lucid, accessible, and intellectually engaging.

At the Edge of Reformation

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Linehan
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Fourteenth Century ◽  
Black Death ◽  
The West ◽  
Late Medieval ◽  
Medieval Europe ◽  
History Of ◽  
Portuguese Society ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The Church

This book springs from its author’s continuing interest in the history of Spain and Portugal—on this occasion in the first half of the fourteenth century between the recovery of each kingdom from widespread anarchy and civil war and the onset of the Black Death. Focussing on ecclesiastical aspects of the period in that region (Galicia in particular) and secular attitudes to the privatization of the Church, it raises inter alios the question why developments there did not lead to a permanent sundering of the relationship with Rome (or Avignon) two centuries ahead of that outcome elsewhere in the West. In addressing such issues, as well as of neglected material in Spanish and Portuguese archives, use is made of the also unpublished so-called ‘secret’ registers of the popes of the period. The issues it raises concern not only Spanish and Portuguese society in general but also the developing relationship further afield of the components of the eternal quadrilateral (pope, king, episcopate, and secular nobility) in late medieval Europe, as well as of the activity in that period of those caterpillars of the commonwealth, the secular-minded sapientes. In this context, attention is given to the hitherto neglected attempt of Afonso IV of Portugal to appropriate the privileges of the primatial church of his kingdom and to advance the glorification of his Castilian son-in-law, Alfonso XI, as God’s vicegerent in his.

COMBINING ORAL TRADITIONS AND BAYESIAN CHRONOLOGICAL MODELING TO UNDERSTAND VILLAGE DEVELOPMENT IN THE GULF OF PAPUA (PAPUA NEW GUINEA)

Radiocarbon ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Chris Urwin ◽  
Quan Hua ◽  
Henry Arifeae
Keyword(s):  
Papua New Guinea ◽  
New Guinea ◽  
Oral Traditions ◽  
Long Distance ◽  
Spatial History ◽  
The Past ◽  
History Of ◽  
Gulf Of Papua ◽  
The Village

ABSTRACT When European colonists arrived in the late 19th century, large villages dotted the coastline of the Gulf of Papua (southern Papua New Guinea). These central places sustained long-distance exchange and decade-spanning ceremonial cycles. Besides ethnohistoric records, little is known of the villages’ antiquity, spatiality, or development. Here we combine oral traditional and 14C chronological evidence to investigate the spatial history of two ancestral village sites in Orokolo Bay: Popo and Mirimua Mapoe. A Bayesian model composed of 35 14C assays from seven excavations, alongside the oral traditional accounts, demonstrates that people lived at Popo from 765–575 cal BP until 220–40 cal BP, at which time they moved southwards to Mirimua Mapoe. The village of Popo spanned ca. 34 ha and was composed of various estates, each occupied by a different tribe. Through time, the inhabitants of Popo transformed (e.g., expanded, contracted, and shifted) the village to manage social and ceremonial priorities, long-distance exchange opportunities and changing marine environments. Ours is a crucial case study of how oral traditional ways of understanding the past interrelate with the information generated by Bayesian 14C analyses. We conclude by reflecting on the limitations, strengths, and uncertainties inherent to these forms of chronological knowledge.

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