Urke Nachalnik: A Voice from the Underworld

2003 ◽  
pp. 381-388
Author(s):  
Gwido Zlatkes
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Bank Robbery

This chapter focuses on Urke Nachalnik, who began an eight-year sentence in Rawicz Prison in 1927 for a bank robbery in Warsaw. Urke Nachalnik belongs to the underworld, perhaps even more so today than in his own time in Poland between the wars. Equally out of place in the sentimentalized shtetl and among the heroes and heralds of progress, he belongs to the unwritten part of the Jewish past that has nearly faded from collective memory. However, there is very little written about the Jewish underworld or Jewish criminals in Poland. Two reference works, a new dictionary of Polish Jewish history and culture and an essential monograph on Jewish literature between the wars, do not mention Nachalnik at all. There are two accounts of Nachalnik's life, an apologetic one by Abram Karpinowicz and a critical one by Stanisław Milewski. Both, however, are literary in character. They lack sources, they differ in significant details, and they are inconsistent with other sources, including Nachalnik's own autobiography. Even Nachalnik's real name differs in the accounts of his life.

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.

Jewish National Decline and Biblical Figures as Classical Exempla: Moses, Aaron, Joshua, David, and Elisha in De Excidio 5.2.1

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 167-204
Author(s):  
Carson Bay
Keyword(s):  
Late Antiquity ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
Classical Antiquity ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Early Christian ◽  
Anti Jewish ◽  
National Decline ◽  
Common Era ◽  
Biblical Figures

AbstractThe fourth century of the Common Era was a period significant for witnessing the effective birth of Christian historiography and the (putatively) definitive separation of ‘Jew’ and ‘Christian’ as distinctive identities. A text emerged, known as Pseudo-Hegesippus or De Excidio Hierosolymitano (On the Destruction of Jerusalem). This text illustrates how Christian historiography and Christian anti-Jewish ideology at that time could engage with the traditions of classical antiquity. In particular, this article argues that Pseudo-Hegesippus deploys figures from the Hebrew Bible in the mode of classical exempla and that it does so within the largely classical conceptual framework of national decline. For Pseudo-Hegesippus, biblical figures presented as classical exempla serve to illustrate the historical decline of the Jews until their effective end in 70 CE (when the Romans destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple). One passage, De Excidio 5.2.1, and its enlistment of five Hebrew heroes illustrates this point particularly well. The use of exemplarity and the theme of national decline employed there help us appreciate De Excidio as a distinctive contribution to early Christian historiography and anti-Jewish literature in late antiquity; this expands our ability to imagine the ways in which fourth-century Christian authors could conceive of and articulate Jewish history in classical terms.

scholarly journals Placed Upon the Landscape, Casting Shadows: Jewish Canadian Monuments and Other Forms of Memory

2021 ◽  
Vol 31 ◽  
pp. 104-114
Author(s):  
Norman Ravvin
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Leonard Cohen ◽  
National Monument ◽  
Holocaust Memorial

This essay explores monuments, including the National Holocaust Monument in Ottawa, and gravestones in Jewish cemeteries in Montreal and Vancouver. Alongside these sites it considers how Canadian Jewish literature presents possibilities for Jewish history and language to mark the Canadian landscape though a consideration of Leonard Cohen and Eli Mandel. A discussion of Canadian monuments is relevant in light of recent demonstrations focused on removing statues and monuments from parks and government buildings. The essay contrasts community-inspired projects like Vancouver’s Holocaust memorial with Ottawa’s “National”monument, whose unveiling prompted a discussion about appropriate ways to represent history.Cet essai explore les monuments, y compris le monument national de l’Holocauste à Ottawa, et les pierres tombales des cimetières juifs de Montréal et de Vancouver. Parallèlement à ces sites, il examine comment la littérature juive canadienne, notamment les écrits de Leonard Cohen et Eli Mandel, offre des opportunités pour l’histoire et la langue juives de marquer le paysage canadien. Une discussion sur les monuments canadiens est pertinente à la lumière des récentes manifestations visant à retirer les statues et les monuments des parcs et des édifices gouvernementaux. L’essai met en contraste des projets d’inspiration communautaire comme le mémorial de l’Holocauste de Vancouver et le monument « national » d’Ottawa, dont le dévoilement a suscité une discussion sur les moyens appropriés de représenter l’histoire.

scholarly journals Contemporary Jewish Prose in the USA

2021 ◽  
pp. 100-134
Author(s):  
Olga B. Karasik-Updike
Keyword(s):  
American Literature ◽  
Collective Memory ◽  
Multicultural Literature ◽  
The United States ◽  
Young Generation ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Jewish American ◽  
Two Generations ◽  
The Usa ◽  
Definition Of

The essay presents an overview of Jewish American prose of the second half of the 20th — first two decades of the 21st century within the context of multicultural literature of the USA. The definition of Jewish literature remains a matter of debate. The author of the essay based on the opinions of critics concludes on the criterion for assigning a writer to Jewish literature. It is the artistic embodiment of the personal Jewish experience and identity in the works of literature, the view “from inside,” the perspective of collective memory and the connection to history and culture. Jewish literature today is one of the most developed ethnic segments of multicultural American literature. Writers under study are recognized throughout the world, their works have been translated into many languages, including Russian, they are known to readers and have already become the subject of study by literary scholars. Today, Jewish American literature is represented by two generations of writers. “Senior” generation includes the authors born in the 1920s–30s who began their literary careers in the 60s when there was a generational change in national literature. “Young” generation is represented by the writers who began their literary careers in the 2000s. On the example of the works of the most famous authors of both generations, the author of the essay talks about the factors determining the specific features of Jewish American prose and its characteristic themes, problems, and motives: the search for identity and roots, the representation and rethinking of the Holocaust, ethnic stereotypes, the image of the Jewish family, and the traditions of Jewish humor. The study of the works of modern Jewish writers in the United States allows us to draw conclusions about the display of border consciousness, national and ethnic identity, and collective memory in fiction.

scholarly journals Political Influence on Theatre Historiography

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 37-48
Author(s):  
Ina Pukelytė
Keyword(s):  
Collective Memory ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Research Field ◽  
World War ◽  
Political Debates ◽  
Cultural Life ◽  
Theatre Historiography ◽  
Second World

The article discusses the question of the memory of Jewish history and culture in Lithuania in regard to the cultural and political debates that are actually taking place in Lithuanian society. Historical facts, concerning Jewish cultural life in Lithuania before the Second World War, were eliminated from the research field conducted by historiographers during the Soviet and the early post Soviet times. The article argues that this was due to political aspirations of the country; they play the crucial role in defining what type of memories the society would carry on and defend. In regard to the research done by sociologists Maurice Halbwachs, Jan and Aleida Assmanns notions of collective memory, functional and stored memory are discussed. Examples of the recent media persecutions of cultural personas such as Rūta Vanagaitė and Marius Ivaškevičius are discussed in order to illustrate the memory war that is still taking place in the actual Lithuanian society.

Mediterranean Regionalism in Hebrew Panegyric Poetry

2018 ◽  
pp. 193-220
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Group Cohesion ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Jewish Culture ◽  
Factual Data

This chapter discusses the Hebrew panegyric corpus as a recognized, yet under-appreciated, resource for studying Jewish culture in the medieval Mediterranean. It considers the anathema to the tastes of scholars of Jewish literature and ungenerous source for scholars of Jewish history. It also describes Hebrew panegyrics that have largely been discounted as mere sycophantic dedications which occasionally yield titbits of factual data. The chapter looks at surviving Hebrew panegyrics that illuminate medieval Mediterranean Jews' most essential notions of group cohesion, human virtue, leadership, and politics. It includes Hebrew panegyrics that were composed for men who held transregional positions of power for their appointees and supporters in satellite communities.

scholarly journals Biblical women – Jewish literary and religious ideals

1987 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 149-157
Author(s):  
Karmela Bélinki
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
New Wave ◽  
Jewish Women ◽  
The Past ◽  
Biblical Women ◽  
Revolutionary Movements ◽  
Religious Ideals ◽  
Double Minority

During the past two decades the new awareness of women has developed from a diffuse protest to conscientious and ambitious research. The fact that the new wave of awareness at least to some extent was initiated by Jewish women is not a unique phenomenon in Jewish history. On account on their position Jews have always strongly identified with different revolutionary movements and stood up for leadership in them. Jewish women have experienced themselves as a double minority because their international Jewish world has not developed from patriarchalism to wider perspectives as rapidly as their external non-Jewish society. From a literary and feminist point of view it is obvious that Tanach has undergone the same process as all other Jewish literature. The scriptures that we today consider authorized are a selection, the result of a process and in order to understand them we must accept that they reflect development both in culture and society.

Textual Transmission in Contemporary Jewish Cultures

2020 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Jewish History ◽  
The United States ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Jewish Culture ◽  
Modes Of Transmission ◽  
Jewish Music ◽  
Isaac Bashevis Singer ◽  
Textual Transmission ◽  
Means Of Transmission ◽  
Print Cultures

Jewish culture places a great deal of emphasis on texts and their means of transmission. At various points in Jewish history, the primary mode of transmission has changed in response to political, geographical, technological, and cultural shifts. Contemporary textual transmission in Jewish culture has been influenced by secularization, the return to Hebrew and the emergence of modern Yiddish, and the new centers of Jewish life in the United States and in Israel, as well as by advancements in print technology and the invention of the Internet. Volume XXXI of Studies in Contemporary Jewry deals with various aspects of textual transmission in Jewish culture in the last two centuries. Essays in this volume examine old and new kinds of media and their meanings; new modes of transmission in fields such as Jewish music; and the struggle to continue transmitting texts under difficult political circumstances. Two essays analyze textual transmission in the works of giants of modern Jewish literature: S.Y. Agnon, in Hebrew, and Isaac Bashevis Singer, in Yiddish. Other essays discuss paratexts in the East, print cultures in the West, and the organization of knowledge in libraries and encyclopedias.

scholarly journals INTRODUCTION: RE-MAPPING ANGLO-JEWISH LITERARY HISTORY

1999 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 115-124 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cynthia Scheinberg
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
Literary History ◽  
Victorian Literature ◽  
Jewish History ◽  
English Literature ◽  
Jewish People ◽  
Jewish Literature ◽  
Victorian England ◽  
The Many ◽  
The Right

[I]t is not enough to make the Jew respected, but to have JUDAISM rightly reverenced; and to do this, there must be a JEWISH LITERATURE, or the Jewish people will not advance one step. — Grace Aguilar, The Jewish Faith (1846)THE ESSAYS COLLECTED in this issue of Victorian Literature and Culture seek to introduce Victorianists to some of the many Anglo-Jewish writers of nineteenth-century England. What differentiates this moment in Anglo-Jewish scholarship from most previous considerations is that we do not purport to fill a falsely constructed “void” of Anglo-Jewish literary silence; on the contrary, this collection seeks to amplify the fullness of nineteenth century Anglo-Jewish literary life. In 1846, Grace Aguilar, the important Anglo-Jewish writer and theologian, called out for the production of a “Jewish literature” that would aid the “right reverence[e] of Judaism,” and “advance” the Jewish people in Victorian England. All too aware of the way exclusion from Hebrew literary and religious texts often precipitated assimilation, conversion, and more generalized alienation from Jewish religious life, Aguilar sought new tools to combat Jewish religious apathy. Detailing the subtle conversionary and theological assumptions that so-called secular — yet clearly Christian — literature often performed, Aguilar reasoned that a Jewish literature could provide Jewish readers — and especially Jewish women — with literary pleasure and a simultaneous sense of Jewish values and ethics; likewise, such a literature could recast the generally negative images of Jewish people and Judaism which pervade the long history of English literature.1 With her emphasis on a Jewish literature, then, Aguilar sought to claim the cultural and ideological power literature held in Victorian England for specifically Jewish uses. Significantly, Aguilar’s tone in the statement above suggests that she saw no such Jewish literature in past moments of Anglo-Jewish history; Aguilar’s intensive production of such a literature in a variety of genres was her own response to this desire for Jewish literature.

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