Normative Judaism? Jews, Judaism and Jewish Identity

This collection of short case studies considers the issue of normatively in Judaism and Jewish identity. The questions of how and why certain aspects of Jewish life and thought come to be regarded as authoritative or normative, rather than inauthentic or marginal, have been and continue to be contentious ones. Topics include the philosopher Moses Maimonides, the composer Felix Mendelssohn, the self-perception of communal leadership in Manchester during the nineteenth- and twentieth-centuries, sermons of Jewish Reform rabbis during the Second World War, Orthodox rabbinic debate about war in general, representations of Jews in photographic exhibitions, the idea of Jewish music, and the academic study of Judaism itself.

Contenu

• Table of Contents (page 5)
• Preface (page 7)
• IN DEFENCE OF NORMATIVITY IN THE STUDY OF JUDAISM by Philip Alexander (page 9)
• MAIMONIDEAN MARGINS by Daniel Davies (page 21)
• THEORETICAL APPROACHES TO DEFINING JEWISH IDENTITY, AND THE CASE OF FELIX MENDELSSOHN by Daniel R. Langton (page 34)
• THE ORDINARINESS OF BEING JEWISH: JEWISH ?NORMALITY' IN MANCHESTER, 1830 ...1880 by Bill Williams (page 49)
• ?NORMATIVE JUDAISM' IN THE CRISIS OF WAR: SERMONS BY ABRAHAM COHEN AND ISRAEL MATTUCK by Marc Saperstein (page 58)
• AMBIVALENT NORMATIVITY: REASONS FOR CONTEMPORARY JEWISH DEBATE OVER THE LAWS OF WAR by George R. Wilkes (page 72)
• WHOSE MUSIC? OWNERSHIP AND IDENTITY IN JEWISH MUSIC by Ruth Rosenfelder (page 88)
• ARE HOLOCAUST VICTIMS JEWISH? LOOKING AT PHOTOGRAPHS IN THE IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM HOLOCAUST EXHIBITION by K. Hannah Holtschneider (page 97)