Jewish Culture and History
Abstracts
of articles in Issue 8.1
-
Exile and Tradition: Zweig by Momigliano
and Berlin Sean Gaston
- This article examines the relation between exile
and Jewish and European tradition through the different experiences
of Stefan Zweig, Arnaldo
Momigliano and Isaiah Berlin. Zweig illustrates a productive rebellion
against tradition that was entirely incapacitated by the loss of
tradition in exile. Like many of the exiled academics of the 1930s,
it is only
on the margins of Momigliano’s work that his profound dislocation
and loss becomes apparent. Though always marked by his exile, Berlin
suggests that an exile can thrive in a multiplicity of co-existing
traditions. In exile, tradition becomes a kind of dispossession: it is
always at
once behind and in front of the exile.
- The Meaning of Asymmetry in Jewish Art
by Avigdor W.G. Poseq
- One of the stylistic traits of Ancient Jewish art
is an imperfect symmetry of design where in other cultural contexts a
symmetrical pattern would be
expected. The effect is particularly evident in symbolic panels commemorating
the sacred liturgy of the destroyed Temple of Jerusalem, which convey
the yearning for the fulfilment of the Divine Covenant by a restoration
of former
glory. The formal pattern has a dual purpose: on the one hand it conveys
the mystic hope for the rebuilding of the Sanctuary, and on the other
it reminds the beholder of the non-sacred character of the images. Seen
in
such a manner the lack of symmetry assumes the character of a ‘symbolic
form’ which, like all visual symbols (including symmetry), may denote
something which is essentially different from what one actually sees.
The frequent occurrence of this pattern in thematic context, which in the
classical
tradition would normally be associated with symmetry, suggests that
the aesthetic criteria which the West draws from its classical legacy are
not
equally relevant for Jewish art.
- The ‘Distinction of the Beautiful
Jewess’: Rebecca of Ivanhoe and Walter Scott’s Marking of the
Jewish Woman by Judith Lewin
- In Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe, the character
of Rebecca refuses to be circumscribed by the discourses of orientialism,
anti-semitism and idealism. Rebecca’s specifically Jewish female
sexuality escapes the binary oppositions of East/West, past/present,
Christian/alien, subject/object, and pure/tainted that would seek to
contain her. Jewish female desire creates an instability in Scott’s
text that is only temporarily resolved through Rebecca’s expulsion.
This article argues that Scott uses cultural markers such as a yellow
turban, a diamond earring and a silver casket in order to render the
Jewish woman reliably visible in an attempt to relieve the tension created
by a character who defies categories and conventions.
- The Ideology of British Zionism
between the World Wars (1919–39) by Matthew Plen
- This article investigates the fundamental ideological
complexion of British Zionism during the inter-war years (1919–39).
It examines the ways in which Anglo-Zionists framed and negotiated the
tension between
British citizenship and identity and the demands of Jewish nationalist
ideology, and explores the ideological responses of Zionists to
the ideals of pioneering, aliyah [immigration to Palestine] and personal
Zionism.
Analysis of the journals, pamphlets and books published by the
movement and its activists indicates that British Zionism was driven
by its attachment
and desire to contribute to the Jewish National Home in Palestine.
Yet Anglo-Zionist ideology was also driven by local concerns, articulating
a radical new form of anti-assimilationist, nationalist identity
for the
Jews of Britain.