Esther Benbassa's Books

Suffering as Identity

The Jewish Paradigm

By: Esther Benbassa

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Reaching from biblical times to the present day, Esther Benbassa's prize-winning exploration of Jewish identity is both epic and comprehensive. She shows how in the Jewish world, the representation and ritualization of suffering have shaped the history of both the people and the religion. Benbassa argues that the nineteenth century gave rise to a Jewish 'lachrymose' historiography, and that Jewish history was increasingly seen to be a 'vale of tears'-a development that has become even more pronounced since the Holocaust. The treatment of the Holocaust in the State of Israel now has the form of a civil religion. In principle within reach of everyone, the 'duty of memory' and the uniqueness of the genocide have mitigated for many Jews the loss of other traditions. The Israeli government invokes the memory of the Holocaust to neutralize threats to its interests-ensuring that suffering continues to be a central part of Jewish identity and positioning the State of Israeli as a redemptive force.

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Page Count

335

Publisher

Verso Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1789600758

ISBN 13

9781789600759

The Jew and the Other

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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The Jew and the Other

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

Esther Benbassa and Jean-Christophe Attias show that alterity is a useful and morally compelling notion with which to structure Judaism's historically specific and politically charged encounters with deity, femininity, Christianity, and Islam.

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Page Count

178

Publisher

Cornell University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0801489466

ISBN 13

9780801489464

The Jews and Their Future

A Conversation on Judaism and Jewish Identities

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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The Jews and Their Future

A Conversation on Judaism and Jewish Identities

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

Esther Benbassa and Jean-Christophe Attias pose a number of controversial questions that challenge prevailing myths and attitudes about Judaism, upsetting conformist discourses and received ideas. What if the Jews were not the "descendants" of the Hebrews? What if the Jewish Book was more the Talmud than the Bible? What if medieval judeophobia could not be identified with modern anti-Semitism? What if orthodoxy was not a return to cultural origins but a new creation? What if Zionism had succeeded precisely thanks to its failures? What if the time had come to stop denying the tensions between Israel and the Diaspora? Between Ashkenazis and Sephardis? Between fundamentalists and liberals? And what if, in particular, the transformation of the memory of the Holocaust into a civil religion was now the main barrier to the universalism that, with exile and the celebration of life, has always been the heart of Jewish experience? This provocative and illuminating dialogue explores the very foundations of Jewish culture, with the spirit of inquiry and freedom of thought the authors believe will invigorate current debates.

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228

Publisher

Zed Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1842773917

ISBN 13

9781842773918

The Jews of France

A History from Antiquity to the Present

By: Esther Benbassa

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The Jews of France

A History from Antiquity to the Present

By: Esther Benbassa

In the first English-language edition of a general, synthetic history of French Jewry from antiquity to the present, Esther Benbassa tells the intriguing tale of the social, economic, and cultural vicissitudes of a people in diaspora. With verve and insight, she reveals the diversity of Jewish life throughout France's regions, while showing how Jewish identity has constantly redefined itself in a country known for both the Rights of Man and the Dreyfus affair. Beginning with late antiquity, she charts the migrations of Jews into France and traces their fortunes through the making of the French kingdom, the Revolution, the rise of modern anti-Semitism, and the current renewal of interest in Judaism. As early as the fourth century, Jews inhabited Roman Gaul, and by the reign of Charlemagne, some figured prominently at court. The perception of Jewish influence on France's rulers contributed to a clash between church and monarchy that would culminate in the mass expulsion of Jews in the fourteenth century. The book examines the re-entry of small numbers of Jews as New Christians in the Southwest and the emergence of a new French Jewish population with the country's acquisition of Alsace and Lorraine. The saga of modernity comes next, beginning with the French Revolution and the granting of citizenship to French Jews. Detailed yet quick-paced discussions of key episodes follow: progress made toward social and political integration, the shifting social and demographic profiles of Jews in the 1800s, Jewish participation in the economy and the arts, the mass migrations from Eastern Europe at the turn of the twentieth century, the Dreyfus affair, persecution under Vichy, the Holocaust, and the postwar arrival of North African Jews. Reinterpreting such themes as assimilation, acculturation, and pluralism, Benbassa finds that French Jews have integrated successfully without always risking loss of identity. Published to great acclaim in France, this book brings important current issues to bear on the study of Judaism in general, while making for dramatic reading.

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304

Publisher

Princeton University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

1400823145

ISBN 13

9781400823147

Israel, the Impossible Land

By: Jean-Christophe Attias,Esther Benbassa

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Israel, the Impossible Land

By: Jean-Christophe Attias,Esther Benbassa

What has the land of Israel meant for the Jewish imagination? This book provides a lively and readable answer, covering Biblical times to the present. Its aim is to pierce the mystery of the images of Israel, to grasp their meaning and function, to trace their origins and history, and to resituate in historical terms the fertile mythology that has peopled and continues to people the Jewish imagination, interposing a screen between a people and their land. Describing the real, however, is not sufficient to disqualify the myths. The authors believe, with the famous French historian Pierre Vidal-Naquet, that: “Things are not so simple. Myth is not opposed to the real as the false to the true; myth accompanies the real.” Today, Israel is an undeniable fact and no longer has to legitimize its existence. It is in the midst of living through the crises of adulthood. The authors simply want to reconstitute and trace the genealogies of these contemporary crises. Only upon a clear understanding of this present and this past can a future be constructed.

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308

Publisher

Stanford University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0804741662

ISBN 13

9780804741668

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

The Autobiography and Journals of Gabriel Arié, 1863-1939

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

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A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

The Autobiography and Journals of Gabriel Arié, 1863-1939

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

Autobiographical texts are rare in the Sephardi world. Gabriel Arié’s writings provide a special perspective on the political, economic, and cultural changes undergone by the Eastern Sephardi community in the decades before its dissolution, in regions where it had been constituted since the expulsion from Spain in 1492. His history is a fascinating memoir of the Sephardi and Levantine bourgeoisie of the time. For his entire life, Arié—teacher, historian, community leader, and businessman—was caught between East and West. Born in a small provincial town in Ottoman Bulgaria in 1863, he witnessed the disappearance of a social and political order that had lasted for centuries and its replacement by new ideas and new ways of life, which would irreversibly transform Jewish existence. A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe publishes in full the autobiography (covering the years 1863-1906) and journal (1906-39) of Gabriel Arié, along with selections from his letters to the Alliance Israélite Universelle. An introduction by Esther Benbassa and Aron Rodrigue analyzes his life and examines the general and the Jewish contexts of the Levant at the end of the nineteenth and the beginning of the twentieth centuries.

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334

Publisher

University of Washington Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0295998571

ISBN 13

9780295998572

Suffering as Identity

The Jewish Paradigm

By: Esther Benbassa

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Suffering as Identity

The Jewish Paradigm

By: Esther Benbassa

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335

Publisher

Verso Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1789600758

ISBN 13

9781789600759

Israel, the Impossible Land

By: Jean-Christophe Attias,Esther Benbassa

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Israel, the Impossible Land

By: Jean-Christophe Attias,Esther Benbassa

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294

Publisher

Stanford Studies in Jewish His

Published Date

ISBN 10

0804741123

ISBN 13

9780804741125

Sephardi Jewry

A History of the Judeo-Spanish Community, 14th-20th Centuries

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

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Sephardi Jewry

A History of the Judeo-Spanish Community, 14th-20th Centuries

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

Modified and updated version of a book that first appeared in Paris in 1993 under the title Juifs des Balkans ... (Editions La Decouverte)"--Acknowledgments, p. [xi].

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Page Count

386

Publisher

Univ of California Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0520218221

ISBN 13

9780520218222

The Jews and Their Future

A Conversation on Judaism and Jewish Identities

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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The Jews and Their Future

A Conversation on Judaism and Jewish Identities

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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Page Count

228

Publisher

Zed Books

Published Date

ISBN 10

1842773917

ISBN 13

9781842773918

The Jew and the Other

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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The Jew and the Other

By: Esther Benbassa,Jean-Christophe Attias

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184

Publisher

Cornell University Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0801442478

ISBN 13

9780801442476

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

The Autobiography and Journals of Gabriel Arié, 1863-1939

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

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A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

The Autobiography and Journals of Gabriel Arié, 1863-1939

By: Esther Benbassa,Aron Rodrigue

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Solve jigsaw puzzle

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Page Count

334

Publisher

University of Washington Press

Published Date

ISBN 10

0295998571

ISBN 13

9780295998572

Book's by Esther Benbassa

Suffering as Identity

Suffering as Identity

The Jew and the Other

The Jew and the Other

The Jews and Their Future

The Jews and Their Future

The Jews of France

The Jews of France

Israel, the Impossible Land

Israel, the Impossible Land

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

Suffering as Identity

Suffering as Identity

Israel, the Impossible Land

Israel, the Impossible Land

Sephardi Jewry

Sephardi Jewry

The Jews and Their Future

The Jews and Their Future

The Jew and the Other

The Jew and the Other

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

A Sephardi Life in Southeastern Europe

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