Ein li esek banistarot: Saul Levi Morteira’s Sermons on Parashat ‘Bereshit’

This chapter focuses on Saul Levi Morteira, rabbi and preacher to the Portuguese community of Amsterdam in the first half of the seventeenth century. This community was at first composed entirely of immigrants who had been born and educated as Christians in Portugal — many of them fourth- or fifth-generation descendants of those who had been subjected to a universal forced baptism in 1497 — and who decided that they wanted to leave the Iberian peninsula for somewhere they could live openly as Jews. Because of their background, they were heavily dependent on rabbinic leadership for guidance about what Jewish living meant, including the limits of acceptable dissent. Morteira's beautifully crafted sermons, delivered in Portuguese over four decades, provided an ongoing programme of higher Jewish learning on a sophisticated level. This chapter follows the preacher as he systematically addresses, year after year, the many intellectual and exegetical problems arising from successive verses in the opening chapter of Genesis.

Attempts to Control the Pulpit: Medieval Judaism and Beyond

This chapter shows the perspective of those Jewish leaders who tried to restrict the freedom of expression of preachers when delivering sermons on controversial issues. Beginning in the thirteenth century, the chapter follows this theme into the modern period and includes the Jewish communities of the United States. It reveals a structural problem of Jewish preaching in the Middle Ages and — to a large extent — in the modern period as well. Unlike the situation in the Catholic Church, where the authority to preach was fairly strictly regulated and preaching without authorization was by its very nature a potentially heretical activity whatever the content of the sermon might be, medieval Jewish communities had no definition of who was permitted to speak from the pulpit. In theory, any male Jew who was respected enough to find a group of Jews willing to listen was entitled to deliver a sermon.

Philosophy and Jewish Society in the Late Middle Ages

This chapter examines the influence of philosophy within Jewish society. It considers the dynamic changes which occurred when philosophical texts begin to penetrate a cultural environment where such texts had never before been studied or even accessible, and what happened when philosophical ideas started to appear in forms intended for the consumption of the ordinary educated Jew. The chapter goes on to seek out whoever paid for the scholars who translated Arabic (or Latin) philosophical texts into the Hebrew language or for the scribes who copied manuscripts of lengthy, specialized, technical works. From there, the chapter finds a setting for this study of philosophy in Jewish society, investigating whether or not philosophy was studied in formal Jewish academies or were merely private arrangements between teacher and student, or provider and consumer. The chapter then turns to a potential correlation between interest in philosophy and socioeconomic status. Finally, it considers whether or not philosophy undermined commitment to traditional beliefs and practices, or was used to rationalize a flagging allegiance to Jewish distinctiveness.

The Conflict over the Ban on Philosophical Study, 1305: A Political Perspective

This chapter suggests a new framework in which to evaluate certain significant events in 1305. Few events of internal Jewish history during the Middle Ages more effectively exemplify diversity and conflict than the so-called ‘Maimonidean conflicts’ — the attempts by certain Jews to control the educational curriculum and public discourse of their communities by banning various philosophical texts and those who taught or studied them. One of the best-known of these episodes, the ban restricting the study of Greek philosophy, promulgated during the summer of 1305 by Solomon ben Adret (Rashba) and his colleagues in Barcelona, has been extensively treated by historians for over a century. The bitter conflict surrounding this ban is extensively documented in Minḥat kena'ot (A Zealous Offering), a collection of letters edited by Abba Mari of Lunel, one of the protagonists of that conflict and an ally of Ben Adret. Yet there is still no consensus among scholars about the proper interpretation of this dramatic episode, and sharp disagreement remains over what was fuelling the antagonism.

‘Arab Chains’ and the ‘Good Things of Spain’: Aspects of Jewish Exile

This chapter analyses three brief, powerful passages, from different environments and different literary genres. These reveal an enduring ambivalence towards Jewish life in ‘exile’, a reluctance to concede that the centuries of Jewish life in foreign lands were devoid of any positive qualities, and even — rather surprisingly — the suggestion that life in exile might have religious advantages for Jews that were not available in the Holy Land. In short, the actual treatment of exile in Jewish literary texts reveals more nuanced and multivalent aspects. The familiar geography of the traditional concept — exile as forced removal from the Land of Israel and the end of exile as return to that land — is occasionally subverted in unexpected ways. Perhaps even more surprising is a revalorization of the concept, in which living in the ancestral homeland is no longer automatically identified as good, and living outside the land as bad. This chapter attempts to illustrate some of the permutations of this central concept through a literary and conceptual analysis of the three pre-modern passages from Jewish literature.

Messianic Leadership in Jewish History: Movements and Personalities

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.

Introduction

This introductory chapter provides a brief look into rabbinic leadership and its relationship to the broader population. Throughout the centuries of diaspora history, rabbinic leadership in the Jewish community has had a Janus-like function. Facing inwards, it has sought to exercise authority in defence of unity and tradition: mediating and communicating the sacred texts, interpreting and applying them in a manner that is both rooted in the past and that refracts them with novel insight; providing guidance and making decisions to address the various internal problems that arise; speaking out or acting to secure any breach in the discipline necessary for Jewish continuity and survival under trying circumstances. Facing outwards, rabbinic leadership (sometimes the same individuals, often others) has been expected to represent the Jewish community before the Gentile world, whether in symbolic rituals that dramatize the Jewish role in the larger society or by active intervention at the highest levels of government to defend Jewish needs. Sometimes the leaders function in solidarity with their own people and the external society; frequently, however, there is tension and conflict with one group or another.

The Preaching of Repentance and the Reforms in Toledo, 1281

This chapter takes a look at the 1281 sermon of Abulafia. Abulafia was apparently one of the few Jews with standing in the court of Alfonso X of Castile who emerged unscathed — a model of traditional, rabbinic leadership blended with prestige in the political realm, and possibly still holding an official position of authority from the Crown. With the Jewish community of Toledo turning towards introspection, Abulafia was a natural figure to provide guidance. The contents of his sermon can be divided into three categories. The first is the condemnation of astrology. Next is the identification of sins. The third category consisted of specific institutional reforms.

Rabbis, Martyrs, and Merchants: Jewish Communal Conflict as Reflected in the Responsa on the Boycott of Ancona

This chapter reviews the rabbinic responsa regarding the Boycott of Ancona. It was written by Ottoman rabbis addressing dramatic issues of international significance that affected both the morale and the economic well-being of many Jews. These texts, grappling with legal issues on the basis of conflicting narratives of what had happened, reveal that the boycott was far more complicated than it originally appears. The boycott of the port of Ancona in 1556 was an unparalleled event in early modern Jewish history, the only attempt before the twentieth century to organize Jewish economic pressure and to wield it in the arena of international affairs for the benefit of Jews persecuted in other lands. Powerful forces converged in this event.

Legal Decision-Making in Fourteenth-Century Toledo: The Responsa of Rabbi Judah ben Asher

This chapter is based on the responsa of Rabbi Judah ben Asher, a member of one of the leading rabbinic families in early fourteenth-century Castile. His responsa often diverges dramatically and explicitly from the principles of classical Jewish legal texts in addressing what the writer saw as the needs of his time. The chapter looks particularly at extra-halakhic aspects of his decision-making — the extent to which his adjudication is explicitly motivated, influenced, or guided by factors other than the interpretation of the classical sources of halakhah — and what this can say about Jewish life in fourteenth-century Castile. The question of takanot, communal legislation inconsistent with the traditional law, is relevant here. So are decisions manifestly said to be not in accordance with Torah law, whether because of urgent immediate needs or because changing historical circumstances seemed to make the talmudic principle no longer applicable.