Hebrew and Judaic Studies (HBRJD-GA)

This course will give students a foundation in the development of modern Jewish studies from the 19th century to the present in Europe, North America, and Israel. Students will also learn about the current state of the field by examining recent developments in the sub-fields of history, religious studies, Jewish thought, and Jewish literature.

Introduces incoming graduate students to the field of Hebrew and Judaic studies, in its disciplinary, chronological, and geographic diversity. Contemporary issues and innovative approaches in the various areas of Judaic studies are explored.

Summer-specific description: Students in the summer intensive Introductory Biblical Hebrew sequence learn the fundamentals of Hebrew as this language is employed in the Hebrew Bible. Students will master a broad vocabulary that touches on all areas of life, from agriculture and animal husbandry to theology and politics. By means of these approaches, we will equip ourselves with the essential tools for exploring the fascinating and complex literature of the Hebrew Bible and other ancient Hebrew writings. This class will also include several excursions to view Hebrew manuscripts and monumental Hebrew throughout New York City.

Traces the major features of phonology and morphology from the Canaanite language (ca. 1200) to the various stages of biblical Hebrew and then to Hebrew and Mishnah. Includes readings from different states of biblical and inscriptional Hebrew from the Iron, Persian, and Hellenistic periods, as well as Hebrew texts of the Dead Sea Scrolls and later Jewish literature.

Advanced study of Biblical Hebrew syntax, morphology, phonology, and other linguistic phenomena.

Introduction to cuneiform script and to the Akkadian language, with emphasis on grammatical structure.

Introduction to cuneiform script and to the Akkadian language, with emphasis on grammatical structure.

Reading of Akkadian literature.

Reading of Akkadian literature.

This first semester of language training begins with the language type and writing system before moving through an overview of grammar and work through a series of beginning texts, with increasing levels of difficulty.

The second semester of Sumerian turns to reading texts of larger interest, especially from the large corpus of poetic literature.

Introduction to the Ugaritic language and texts, providing important background for further study in the Semitic languages.

Introduction to the Ugaritic language and texts, providing important background for further study in the Semitic languages.

Introduction to the various phases of Aramaic. Readings are selected from early and imperial documents, including Elephantine and inscriptions.

Introduction to Aramaic documents found at Qumran and contemporary sites. This represents the intermediate phase of Aramaic and Bar Kokhba texts.

Introduction to sources preserved by the early Christian communities of the ancient and medieval Near East in Syriac.

Introduction to Galilean and Babylonian Jewish Aramaic and related texts.

Examination of the origin and development of Yiddishism as an international cultural movement and an ingredient of Jewish subcurrents in socialism, anarchism, folkism, and communism.

This course is intended to train students with a strong foundation in Biblical Hebrew to access academic articles in Modern Hebrew. The course will focus on reading material in the students' areas of scholarly interest.The linguistic structure of Biblical and Modern Hebrew will be addressed.

Treats the biblical, archaeological, and comparative ancient Near Eastern evidence for Israelite religion in its origins, change, and conflict. Emphasis is on questions of definition and focus.

Intensive study of the language of Yiddish academic discourse. Students study primary source material in their area of specialization and secondary critical material.

Intensive study of the language of Yiddish academic discourse. Students study primary source material in their area of specialization and secondary critical material.

Traces the interpretation of a central biblical text or theme in the literature of ancient Jewish exegesis. Commentaries are placed in the context of ancient Jewish thought and the history of Jewish biblical interpretation.

A close reading of select philosophical texts.

Intensive study of the language of Hebrew academic discourse. Students study primary source material in their area of specialization and secondary critical material.

Intensive study of the language of Hebrew academic discourse. Students study primary source material in their area of specialization and secondary critical material.

Examination of the origin and development of Yiddishism as an international cultural movement and an ingredient of Jewish subcurrents in socialism, anarchism, folkism, and communism.

Analyzes history of Yiddish-speaking Communist circles in the twentieth century, most notably in the Soviet Union, America, and Poland.

The course focuses on main Jewish-related events in Israeli, American, and Soviet life and discusses their interconnection. The topics that will be covered include the impact of the Bolshevik revolution on Jews in the United States and Palestine, the participation of American Jewish organizations in Soviet Jewish projects in the 1920s and 1930s, the international links of the Soviet Jewish Anti-Fascist Committee, and the movement for Soviet Jewish emigration. Special attention will be paid to the Cold War period, particularly to the activities of the “triangle”: Jewish activists in the Soviet Union, Israel, and the United States.

This course reads selections of the major Zionist thinkers of the 19th and early 20th century.

This course provides an academic discussion of the history of Jewish Philanthropy in the 19th and 20th centuries and traces the influence of historical events on the policies of the Jewish organizational world of today.

The course reviews the various attempts to address issues in the Arab-Israeli conflict by negotiations with Israel's Arab neighbors, either directly or through intermediaries. Starting with a review of the history of these negotiations, the course focuses on the main issues negotiated: borders, refugees, water rights, security in the period up to 1967; and the future of the territories occupied in 1967 - Sinai, Gaza, the West Bank and the Golan Heights. We will pay particular attention to the Oslo Accords, negotiated in 1993 and 1994, Camp David II and the Taba Talks (2000).

From Zionist Sabra to Cosmopolitan Israel This seminar addresses some major social, cultural, and political divisions in Israeli society, their historical dynamic and present structure, and their mutual inter-sectionality, as well as their contexts and implications. This course is of sociological orientation, and hence it will focus on structural processes and on analytical conceptualizations.

This course will look at means, goals, and objectives of Jewish education through the 20th Century.

The seminar will focus on the decade prior to the creation of the State, examining the history of the Jewish Community in Palestine (Yishuv) in the light of changes in British colonial policy, military and political developments in the Middle East, and the fate of European Jewry during and after World War II. In the light of these developments, the Yishuv faced radical challenges, in response to which it adopted the objective of statehood and independence, breaking with the gradualist policy of the development of the Jewish National Home under British auspices. The emergence of the United States as a great power in the international arena after World War II, and the evolution of American policy on Jewish issues in Europe and the Middle East played a major role in the deliberations of the Zionist movement. Internally, the Yishuv was seriously divided on the means to advance toward statehood. The course will also examine the Arab responses, in Palestine and in the neighboring states, to the growing radicalization of the Yishuv and the Partition decision of the UN.

Philosophical themes in the writings of Mendelssohn, Cohen, Rosenzweig, Buber, Soloveitchik, Fackenheim, and Levinas.

This doctoral course offers an intensive study of nineteenth century American Judaism. It will involve both exposure to secondary sources and careful reading of primary materials. It is geared to preparing students to conduct doctoral level research.

Study of the ideological origins of the State of Israel, its political history, and the formation of its institutions.

This colloquium will introduce students to some of the classic works, orientations, and approaches in the study of modern Jewish history and to challenges that have been raised to them in response both to historical circumstances and to changing conceptions of the nature, purposes, and sources of validation of historical research and writing

Anti-Semitism has been called the ‘longest hatred’ in the history of the west. Although it can be traced back to Greco-Roman antiquity, anti-Jewish animosity struck fertile soil in Christian theology and practice and has morphed many times over throughout the history of medieval Christendom and modern Europe. In modern times, anti-Semitism has taken on new sinister imagery and political expression, both in Christian and Muslim societies, on the far-right and the far-left of the political spectrum. This course takes a deep dive into the history of anti-Semitism in the West and covers much terrain, from antiquity through the present day. It begins with the current controversies over the definition of anti-Semitism and the crisis of the present moment. We then pay special attention to anti-Jewish rhetoric and imagery in Western Christendom, the new racial turn of anti-Semitism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and the familiar and novel forms it has taken in the United States, up to and including the present day

Examination of kabbalistic and/or Hasidic elements reflected in the thought of modern Jewish existentialists and postmodern philosophers. Thinkers discussed include Franz Rosenzweig, Martin Buber, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Joseph Soloveitchik, Jacques Derrida, and Emmanuel Levinas.

The course presents a macro-sociological, historical, comparative and critical approach to selected areas of life in Israeli society. It aims to problematize the stock answers to and stimulate discussion on the questions whether Israel is small, unique, deeply divided, multicultural, militaristic, colonial, secular, democratic, and Western.

Drawing on new evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls as well as recent research in Classics on the Hellenistic Near East, this seminar will explore what we know of Jewish literature and cultural history in the period between the conquests of Alexander the Great and the Maccabean Revolt.

During the early first millennium BCE, we find increasing quantities of written finds in the greater Levant, in varieties of ancient Hebrew, Aramaic, and Phoenician, the "Northwest Semitic" languages. This seminar addresses basic skills for recognizing script types and development and for reconstructing the shape of each language in this period, when the texts are only partly vocalized, at best. The semester concludes with selected readings that have larger historical and cultural interest.

Explores ways Jewish thinkers interpret the Bible in light of different trends in modern thought. Attention will be paid to historical criticism, aesthetics, and post-critcial linguistic theory. Thinkers to be studied include: Spinoza, Moses Mendelssohn, S.R. Hirsch, Martin Buber, Franz Rosenzweig, Leo Strauss, and Emmanuel Levinas.

The main focus of this course will be on the history of diplomatic relations between the United States and Israel and the emergence of the “special relationship” and “strategic alliance.” This course will also examine Israel-American relations at other levels, including the role of Israel in the American Jewish Community and American Jewish philanthropy’s relationship with Israeli politics.

This is a research seminar, not an overview. Each meeting addresses some item or set of primary evidence, which together represent a cross-section of important content and questions for the study of ancient Israel in its land. Evidence may be written or otherwise material-cultural, as often as possible from excavation, and the Bible only makes an appearance at moments when it either frames a historical question of requires consideration on its own terms. Specific focus will vary with different versions of the course, concentrated mainly on the Bronze and Iron Ages.

This course is intended to provide a general introduction to classic rabbinic literature, the documents compiled by the rabbis between 200-600CE, including the Mishna, Tosefta, Halakhic (Tannaitic) Midrashim, Amoraic Midrashim, and the two Talmuds. It covers both the primary sources themselves and the main scholarly questions and debates concerning these compilations. Class time will be divided between the reading and analysis of the primary texts and the discussion of the secondary readings and the status questionis. This class in intended for M.A. and Ph.D. students. All primary texts will be provided in both the original Hebrew/Aramaic and in translation. Ph.D. students will be expected to prepare the originals; M.A. students the translations.

Study of the interrelationships of the Mishnah, Tosefta, and Talmuds with one another and the midrashic corpus. Emphasizes the issues that arise from Rabbinic intertexuality from both literary and historical points of view.

Selected Hebrew and Aramaic texts from the Apocrypha. Emphasis is on the biblical background and the place of this literature in the early history of Judaism.

One of the most common phrases articulated about the Dead Sea Scrolls is that theyhave revolutionized our understanding of the development of the text and canon of the HebrewBible. The goal of this course is to explore these contributions through close readings of selectedDead Sea Scrolls manuscripts and modern scholarship.

Selected texts are read and analyzed in order to reconstruct the Judaism of the Qumran sect and other groups of Second Temple period Jews. Students are trained in the use of Qumran manuscript sources and paleography.

Reading of documents from the Judean Desert, including letters of Bar-Kokhba and his officials and legal documents from the Judean desert caves. The texts will be analyzed from both philological and historical points of view.

This course examines the major issues relating to the critical study of the Babylonian Talmud and surveys different critical methodologies. Topics include the stability of the text, the transmission process of amoraic material, technical terminology, and the editing of the Talmud. The different methodologies include form criticism, source criticism, redaction criticism and literary criticism.

Introduction to geonic halakhic (legal) literature, especially the main post-talmudic halakhic codes. Topics include: the stabilization of the Talmudic text, methods of geonic adjudication, anti-Karaite polemics, and the struggle between Babylonian and Palestinian geonim. Attention will also be given to the major works of geonic historiography, the Epistle of Rav Sherira Gaon and Seder Tannaim ve-Amoraim.

Study of a selected chapter of the Babylonian Talmud, paying attention to textual, linguistic, and historical matters. Emphasis is on the reconstruction of the history of the traditions preserved in the Talmud.

Selected readings from the Jerusalem Talmud and its commentaries, emphasizing the literary and historical development of the text, its relation to the Babylonian Talmud and other rabbinic texts, methods of legal analysis, and the problems in establishing the correct text. Extenseive reading and discussion of modern scholarship on the Jerusalem Talmud.

This course is devoted to the study of narratives of the Babylonian Talmud combining literary approaches with methods of critical Talmud study including source-criticism and form-criticism. Other topics include the relationship to earlier versions in Palestinian rabbinic compilations, the legal and redactional context of stories, and the contribution of the Talmudic redactors.

Focuses on the midrashim Genesis Rabbah, the classic exegetical midrash, and Leviticus Rabbah, the classical midrash homiletical. Close textual study is combined with theoretical issues such as defining midrash, intertextuality, form-criticism, hermeneutics, the documentary approach, and the social context of midrash.

This course provides an in-depth introduction to the major themes and genres of medieval Hebrew poetry. It covers both the sacred compositions of the liturgy and the secular realm of belletristic and entertainment literature. The readings begin with the earliest development of Hebrew liturgical verse in Late Antiquity (known as piyyut), trace the continuation of that tradition in medieval Germany (Ashkenaz), examine the new aesthetic culture and secular spirit of Hebrew poetry during the Andalusian period, and culminate with the rise of novel literary genres beginning in the thirteenth century, from poetic prose to humorous satire to moral fables.

Intensive study of the sources of Maimonides? thought in both the Jewish and non-Jewish worlds. Analysis of part I of The Guide from this perspective.

This course examines Moses Maimonides’ monumental code of Jewish law, known as the Mishneh Torah, the only complete synthesis of Jewish tradition to date and a masterpiece of medieval Hebrew literature. We will investigate questions of composition and classification, law and philosophy, language and scope, vision and reception. The course will additionally expose students to the history of Mishneh Torah commentary and criticism and to a range of divergent approaches adopted by modern scholarship on the Maimonidean code. Ability to read the text in the original Hebrew is required.

This seminar focuses on critical theory of multilingualism, translation, and world literature, engaging in a diverse range of scholarship, literary theory, and a selection of literary texts, juxtaposing early twentieth-century debates on Jewish languages and diaspora with political discussions on language, translation, and the nation-state in Israel/Palestine today.

Investigates the diverse impingements of the Church on medieval Jewish life; the evolution of Church thinking, doctrine, and popular impact; and the responses of medieval Jews to their circumstances.

Begins by sketching the broad chronological outlines of the medieval Jewish experience; then focuses on a set of key challenges faced by medieval Jews and by the major lines of Jewish response to these challenges.

This course introduces students to the ways that scholars of ancient Judaism employ critical theory. Students engage with the work of notable theorists and thereby gain knowledge in postmodern approaches and their application in Biblical and Jewish Studies. Particular attention is paid to literary studies, gender studies, and postcolonialism. The course examines how these theoretical approaches compare in their methods and results with historical-philological approaches to ancient texts and material culture.

This course explores various ways in which the issue of gender has informed the shaping of religious imagination in the course of Jewish history from the biblical period to the present.

A survey of landmark modern treatments of medieval Jewish history, concentrating on Western Europe and the Jewish communities of Ashkenaz and Sefarad. In acquiring a grounding in the foundational texts of this field, students will gain a familiarity with the different disciplinary and explanatory approaches adopted by its historians. Exposure to disparate treatments of the available source materials will afford students an opportunity to reflect on their own choices of methodology and approach, as well as on the application of theory to historical narrative.

Examination of the esoteric theosophy and mystical practices of the Rhineland Jewish Pietists of the 12th and 13th centuries, with particular attention to the place of the Pietists in the history of ancient and medieval Jewish mysticismExamination of the esoteric theosophy and mystical practices of the Rhineland Jewish Pietists of the 12th and 13th centuries, with particular attention to the place of the Pietists in the history of ancient and medieval Jewish mysticism.

Exploration of two typologies of contemplative union and ecstasy in medieval Jewish mysticism: the Neoplatonic typology evident in the theosophic kabbalah of Isaac the Blind and his Geronese disciples, Ezra, Azriel, and Jacob ben Sheshet, and the Aristotelian typology of the ecstatic kabbalah of Abraham Abulafia and other members of his school, Shem Tov ibn Gaon, Isaac ben Samuel of Acre, and the anonymous author of Sha?are Zedeq.

Intensive study of selections from the classic text of medieval Spanish kabbalah, the Zohar. Attention to hermeneutical and exegetical methods employed by the author of the Zohar.

Study of the main texts of Lurianic kabbalah through a close reading of the works of R. Isaac Luria and his two disciples, R. Hayyim Vital and R. Israel Saruq.

How does the maternal figure in language? Is “mother” a contained otherness that operates within the symbolic order? Is it a biological fiction that perpetuates nationalist exclusions? Does it bear a generative capacity? Mother tongue, a metaphorical notion of the national imagination, is a deeply charged ethnocentric concept. At the same time, the range of affects and attachments that the mother tongue entails cannot be denied. This interdisciplinary seminar navigates between changing conceptualizations of mother tongue from a range of theoretical and cultural perspectives. Considering the maternal in language through the lens of psychoanalytic, feminist, and queer thinking, it asks whether mother tongue can be at once the product of ethnocentric ideologies and a form of resistance to cultural hegemonies. The course examines a diverse selection of critical theory alongside works of literature, cinema and art. Class discussions will trace the rise of the mother as a mark of a biological link between nation and language; explore the sexual politics of language; and focus on a set of accounts of diasporic and postcolonial linguistic experiences, in which the mother tongue appears to be fleeting and its “possession” is repeatedly questioned.

Study of the history of Jewish thought, literature, law, and ritual in the formative years in which the classical tradition was coming to fruition in Talmudic literature. Emphasizes the development of the major ideas and institutions of Judaism in the Second Temple and Rabbinic periods and the factors, both internal and external, that contributed to it.

This course explores the Jewish world of Ashkenaz, from its beginnings in the Rhineland in the middle ages through its eventual expansion throughout Western Europe, Central Europe, and Northern Italy, and eventually into Eastern Europe by the early modern period. Ashkenaz is among the most important centers of Jewish life in this period. It was the locus for important rabbinic scholarship, unique pietistic practices, and a vibrant popular culture that took place amidst complex relationships with the non-Jewish environment, ranging from friendly interactions and influence to intense violence and persecution. We will read primary texts from Ashkenazic Jewry and important historical research on this world to analyze its social, cultural, intellectual, political, religious, and material history. Doing so, special attention will be paid to the intersections between these fields and the different methods used by historians to extract various types of historical information from their sources.

The Bible as an object, whether in the form of scrolls or later in the codex, has served as a central object in Judaism, both from a religious and cultural point of view. This course aims to trace the history of the Hebrew Scriptures concentrating both on the development of the Hebrew text and the physical form.

Does the historic Jewish tradition, founded in part on its opposition to idolatry, have a place for the visual arts? Marc Chagall, icon of modern Jewish art, once declared that “Judaism struggled with ancient idolatry…, so that it remained with no share in the treasures of graphic art.” This course takes a close look at the approaches to the visual arts in the Jewish tradition, from antiquity through modernity, reflecting a spectrum of positions and perspectives far more nuanced than Chagall’s statement would warrant. It also explores the rich and creative treasures of what historians identify as uniquely Jewish art. Our survey in this course encompasses synagogue and ceremonial art, manuscript illumination, micrography, and new developments by Jewish artists from the nineteenth century to the present

Explores the complex interactions of Jews and Germans and their perceptions of each other in Imperial Germany (1871-1918), exposing some of the internal social dynamics in Jewish history and in German history. Begins with era of emancipation and examines the developments among German Jews.

The history of Russo-Polish Jewry from earliest times to the present, with a focus on modern conditions and problems.

This course begins with the cataclysmic end of World War I, the feelings of hurt nationalism and revenge, and examines the political, economic, and social changes in German society as well as parallel developments among German Jews. Readings on the Weimar Republic discuss increasing German-Jewish involvement in culture and society as well as the increasing issue of anti-Semitism. The course focuses on the rise of Nazism, the social insiders and outsiders in Nazi Germany, the persecutions and reactions of Jews within Germany, and the role persecutors and bystanders.

This course explores the interactions of Jews and Germans after World War II, noting their interlocking histories and memories even after the Holocaust. We will learn about the immediate postwar turmoil, the displaced persons, Allied occupation, and ?denazification,? and will analyze how Germans ? East and West ? did or did not come to terms with Nazi past over time. Further, we will read Jewish perspectives on their lives in West and East Germany, why they remained, how they experienced their citizenship, how they interacted with Germans, and how re-unification (in 1990) affected them.

Examination of major figures, works, and trends in the academic study of modern Jewish history in the 19th and 20th centuries.

This course attempts to follow and analyze the contribution of several major Jewish thinkers, who exerted a significant impact on the course of Jewish history or on Jewish and western thought in general. The focus is on varieties of Jewish nationalism and resistance to it, beginning in the late 19th century and continuing up through the middle of the 20th century.

Readings of memoirs and diaries written by European Jewish women and men from the 18th century through the Holocaust. Students read memoirs with several issues in mind: (1) the history we can learn from them and how to use them critically, (2) the relationship between personal viewpoints and collective experiences, (3) the ways in which Jewish and European societies cultivated memory, (4) the question of why individuals wrote and how they framed and fashioned their lives for their readers, (5) how gender, class, and European context influenced memoirists, (6) how audience (or lack of an intended audience) influenced writers.

This course will examine Nazi policies towards the Jewish people and how the “racial state” dealt with others it also deemed “racially unfit” to belong to the German Volk, an invented category. It will look at the heritage of racial thought that came before 1933, especially from the United States, and the ways in which the Nazis sought to create a nation based on “blood and race.”

This course examines the image of Islam and Christianity, and of Muslims and Christians, in medieval Jewish literature and culture. We will cover a range of literary genres, including poetry and prose narrative, biblical and talmudic commentary, responsa and codes, philosophy and polemic, and historical documents. Our emphasis will be a close examination and discussion of the original sources and the history of their interpretation.

The course is a research seminar, making extensive use of primary sources (diplomatic documents from American and Israeli archives, and memoir literature) as well as the recognized secondary research literature. The seminar will explore the issues of war and peace in the Middle East during the 1970s – from the aftermath of the 1967 war; the death of Nasser and the rise of Sadat; the Yom Kippur/October War of 1973; Camp David and the Israel-Egypt Peace Treaty, the Israeli withdrawal from Sinai and the start of the talks on Palestinian autonomy. The focus will be on diplomatic history of the period and the transition from war to peace in relations between Israel and Egypt. Students will prepare their research papers using the large number of recently released documents.

This class explores the experiences of Jewish women over the course of three centuries of Jewish communal existence in America. It will examine how Jewish women have had a history that makes their experiences unique when compared to Jewish women elsewhere, to other American women, and Jewish men. The course as such asserts –and questions the premise—that Jewish women in America had a distinctive history, worthy of analysis in its own terms. That history includes the role of Jewish women in building Jewish communal institutions in America, their participation in the immigration process, their impact upon their families, and the ways in which they engaged with the larger American public. It will examine a few individual lives through scholarly biographies. The course, which will fit under the rubric of social history, will balance the lived experiences of Jewish women in America with the expectations which limited or enabled them to take advantage of American opportunities. It makes no claim to studying the full sweep of that history but rather uses selected moments in it and examines the formative works of scholarship which have shaped the field. As such it will not proceed in a chronological but rather a topical arc.

This class explores the experiences of Jewish women over the course of three centuries of Jewish communal existence in America. It will examine how Jewish women have had a history that makes their experiences unique when compared to Jewish women elsewhere, to other American women, and Jewish men. The course as such asserts –and questions the premise—that Jewish women in America had a distinctive history, worthy of analysis in its own terms. That history includes the role of Jewish women in building Jewish communal institutions in America, their participation in the immigration process, their impact upon their families, and the ways in which they engaged with the larger American public. It will examine a few individual lives through scholarly biographies. The course, which will fit under the rubric of social history, will balance the lived experiences of Jewish women in America with the expectations which limited or enabled them to take advantage of American opportunities. It makes no claim to studying the full sweep of that history but rather uses selected moments in it and examines the formative works of scholarship which have shaped the field. As such it will not proceed in a chronological but rather a topical arc.

After the Ceasefire Agreements which followed the war of 1948, Israel faced the challenge of creating the political, administrative and legal institutions necessary for statehood. While many of these institutions evolved from the pre-State Yishuv, new challenges were now confronted. The population doubled within three years following mass immigration and the society became more heterogeneous. Issues of state and religion; the Right of Return; the rights of Arab citizens; foreign policy orientation and the attempt to adopt a written constitution were all on the agenda. Security issues, the boarder war culminated in the Sinai Campaign fo 1956 determined Israel?s relations with the neighboring states.

This class explores the origins of Jewish denominations in Europe and their migration to America, empahsizing the development of the Reform, Reconstructionist, Conservative and Orthodox movements.

Close reading of primary texts in Hebrew related to central debates in modern Jewish intellectual life, including those over religious reform, the nature of Jewish identity, Haskalah, nationalism, and the role of general humanistic ideas in modern Jewish thought.

Directed research for the Masters Thesis

Since the end of the fifteenth century, Jews have been involved in an ongoing process of shifting their places of residence. They have moved from rural to urban and at times from urban to rural areas, from east to west, and from west to east. Jews have migrated extensively within the borders single nation states and crossed many national and continental boundaries. They have relocated themselves in the modern period from Europe and the Moslem lands to places themselves throughout the Atlantic and Mediterranean worlds, occasionally moving in alongside older Jewish communities, more often planting Jewish outposts where none had existed before. Carrying out these migrations required weighting and negotiation a variety of factors involving the countries of departure and destination, the mechanisms by which migration could be accomplished, state policies of emigration and immigration, and the demands of the Jews’ own particular cultural repertoire.

Discussion of the fundamental institutions of Jewish community and social organization as expressed in Jewish thought and as evidenced in Jewish history in all periods, up to the present. Emphasis is on primary sources regarding varying conceptions of group solidarity and mechanisms for attaining it, including the role of the individual, the family, the community, the state, and the Jewish people as a whole.

Independent study of a topic in Hebrew Literature

Study of a topic in Ancient Near East religion, material culture, language or text.

Study of a selected biblical book, with careful attention to literary and historical problems.

Study of a selected biblical book, with careful attention to literary and historical problems.

This course is intended to train students in the skills necessary for decipherment and analysis of Dead Sea Scrolls manuscripts. This involves gaining expertise in paleography, materiality, philology, scribal practices, and material reconstruction. Particular emphasis will be placed on utilizing the most current digital tools developed by scholars and identifying additional digital resources that can aid in manuscript analysis.

The impact of the past, both recent and distant, and authors' wrestling with the issues it raises, will be studied through short units of modern Hebrew prose and poetry to fit the capacity of MA/PhD Jewish Studies students.

Exploration of the various ways that Christianity has been represented in Jewish sources from late antiquity through the Middle Ages, with particular interest on the complex interface of the two traditions and the polemical attempts to draw sharp lines distinguishing them.

History of the Jewish community in Mesopotamia from the Assyrian and Babylonian exiles through the Achaemenid, Parthian, and Sassanian eras and up through the Islamic conquest. Draws on Jewish, Babylonian, Iranian, and Arabic sources and emphasizes the interplay between Jewish history and that of the surrounding cultures of ancient Iraq.

Exploration of the diverse roles played by the Hebrew Bible in constructions of Jewish identity and in cultural productions by Jews through the centuries.

The Jewish tradition is marked by a high degree of internal diversity, while Jewish history is replete with cases of intra-communal division and sectarianism. This course offers a sustained inquiry into the tolerance or intolerance of dissent both in the pages of Jewish tradition and on the stage of Jewish history.

Intensive readings of primary source material in medieval Jewish history

The medieval encounter between Judaism and Islam had a profound impact on the identity and development of both traditions. This course explores the religious dimensions of this encounter, rather than the broad cultural connections between Muslims and Jews in Islamicate society. On the one hand, the historical encounter with Arabian Jewry left a clear imprint in the Qur’an and early Islamic tradition. Out of this encounter, Judaism came to occupy an important place in Islamic legal and theological discourse. On the other hand, the rise of Islam both as political power and religious rival inaugurated a rich period of engagement that ranged from messianic anticipation and theological accommodation to legal dispute over the status of Islam and polemical discourse on the prophet and scripture of Islam.

This course is designed to introduce students to Judeo-Arabic, a religiolect that has been written and spoken in various forms by Jews throughout the Arabic-speaking world, which was the vast majority of the world’s Jews during the Middle Ages. Judeo-Arabic can be examined through different disciplines such as philology, linguistics, history, philosophy, law, literature and more.

Analysis of major texts and issues in Jewish philosophy. Topic changes annually.

Advanced seminar on specialized topics that change annually (e.g., major authors; critical and theoretical surveys).

Advanced seminar on specialized topics that change annually (e.g., major poets; critical and theoretical issues).

Students taking this course work under the supervision of a faculty member to pursue independent research on a topic in the field of Ancient Near Eastern and Egyptian Studies. The research would normally result in periodic oral or written critical reports on the resources found on the topic as well as a written term paper on the results of the research. The course may be taken for between 1 and 4 points.

Study of a topic in American Jewish History, culture or society

Students will explore the interlocking histories of Jews and non-Jewish Western Europeans after the Holocaust using Germany, Italy, and France as case studies. They will analyze how Jewish and non-Jewish populations coped with "difference" and with political uncertainty in their post-Holocaust landscapes and how these fraught relationships have evolved over the past 60 years.

In-depth study of a specific problem related to the history of the Jews under Nazi impact, with emphasis on training in research methods. Topics may include examination of the history of a specific Jewish community under Nazi rule, the evolution of Nazi Jewish policy, the Jewish councils, armed resistance, relations between Jews and non-Jews undIn-depth study of a specific problem related to the history of the Jews under Nazi impact, with emphasis on training in research methods. Topics may include examination of the history of a specific Jewish community under Nazi rule, the evolution of Nazi Jewish policy, the Jewish councils, armed resistance, relations between Jews and non-Jews under Nazi occupation, the Allied governments and the Holocaust, and free-world Jewry and the Holocaust.

Exploration of a selected problem in the history of the Jews in Eastern Europe, emphasizing primarily, but not necessarily limited to, Russia and Poland.

This course will analyze the history of Jews in Western Europe, focusing on three major sites of Jewish integration (usually France, Germany and Italy). This course will examine how Jewis worked for and achieved citizenship in the 19th century, felt patriotism and loyalty to their nations during World War I, and later faced repression from Nazi Germany and its allies. Still Jewish experiences differed, depending on the country in which they lived. Students will examine government policies, Jewish reactions, and the behavior of perpetrators and bystanders.

Independent Study with a professor in the department

Independent Study of a topic of Jewish History

Independent study of Hebrew manuscripts, paleography, and codicology with a professor in the department

Independent study of a topic of Jewish philosophy and thought

Dissertation research with a faculty member

Dissertation research with a faculty member

This seminar explores modern responses to the moral and gender implications of two different constructions of human sacrifice/martyrdom which western culture has inherited from antiquity: the Bible and Greek myth and drama. Factoring in the male-centeredness of the core sacrificial narrative of all 3 monotheistic traditions, and the female-centeredness of Greek sacrificial narratives, the seminar focuses on the continuities and discontinuities between the pre-modern precursors of contemporary sacrificial discourse, exploring the gendered constructions of old/new/inter- and post-Testamental rewritings of Isaac, Iphigenia, and Jephthah’s daughter [with special emphasis on female “Abrahams” and “Isaacs”].

Intensive study of the language of Yiddish academic discourse. Students study primary source material in their area of specialization and secondary critical material.

Independent study with a faculty member