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This paper will explore the origins of the circumcision dress worn by Jewish male infants during their brit millah (ritual circumcision). With no requirements according to Jewish law on what is to be worn during this ceremony, how does early textual evidence point to our understanding and use of the dress? An examination of visual representations of circumcision ceremonies during the Early Modern period in manuscript and print culture points to the adaptation and use of a jacket worn by the infant during this time. This is then paired with extant examples of the period in museum collections. Lastly, as Jews began to assimilate and adapt practices of their host cultures in the nineteenth century, we see the rise of the practice of a dress worn by the infant, with an examination of infant costume and materials of the period. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines mnemonic practices and discursive strategies that structure the past and its relation to the present, drawing on examples from Israeli Jewish culture. The discussion explores the discursive construction of an "event" as a singular development and underscores the significance of its beginning and ending. It analyzes the impact of introducing symbolic bridges connecting separated historical periods, proposing historical analogies that highlight recurrent historical patterns, creating mnemonic bubbles governed by commemorative time, and conflating historical events into multilayered commemorations. These temporal structures, often anchored in mnemonic traditions, continue to influence the understanding of the past. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper was written in 2013 as the faculty of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College (RRC) was considering a policy barring prospective rabbinical students from being partnered with non-Jews. Composed by Rabbi Deborah Waxman, Ph.D., prior to her assuming the presidency of Reconstructing Judaism, it recommends that RRC set aside this policy and replace it with a clearly articulated preference that rabbinical students create for themselves homes with rich Jewish practice, and a requirement that children in the home be raised exclusively in the Jewish tradition. The recommendation emerges from a review of classical Reconstructionist positions as articulated by Mordecai M. Kaplan, the 1968 and 1979 Reconstructionist stands on patrilineal descent, the nature of religious authority, the impact of second-wave feminism on American Jewish life, and consideration of universalism versus particularism. The ultimate conclusion is that RRC's mission is to attract Jews to Jewish living and not to police boundaries and that adopting a more inclusive partner status policy is an affirmation of key Reconstructionist principles, including fostering diverse expressions of Jewish identity and inclusive Jewish communities, and an authentic step in an evolving understanding of the Jewish civilization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Festival of Jewish Arts in Glasgow was the first and largest Jewish festival in Britain, conceived as a response to, and timed to coincide with, the Festival of Britain in 1951. Held at Glasgow's McLellan Galleries on Sauchiehall Street from February 4–25, 1951, the event showcased works from over fifty internationally renowned Jewish artists, antiquities dating back from the thirteenth century, musical performances, films, lectures, a book display, and a run of sell-out performances of S. An-sky's The Dybbuk. In this essay, I offer the first sustained account of the festival by bringing together available documentation and analyzing the "performance of display" and perspectives on Jewish culture the festival offered. As this essay argues, viewing the material and tangible elements of the festival alongside the social and cultural ideals of its organizers reveals a complex negotiation between the historical place and space of the festival, the concerns of the community, and the tensions between minority and mainstream Scottish and British culture. The Festival of Jewish Arts thus provides a rare window through which to view a Jewish community grappling with issues of loss and reconstructing identity in the aftermath of Nazi atrocities, while at the same time trying to transcend the perception of their Otherness and respond to British anxieties about Jewish refugees and the founding of the State of Israel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article deals with the attempt to establish a Jewish-national community in Arab Acre during the Mandate period, and the reasons for the failure of this attempt. This community has eluded Zionist historiography to date, because of its short lifespan and because it ultimately did not have a significant influence on the development of the map of Zionist settlement in the area. The few historiographic references to this community related its failure to survive mainly to the deterioration of relations with the Arabs and the events of 1929 as a turning point. The article adopts an intra-Jewish perspective and seeks explanations of the weakness of the community in its shaky organizational and social structure, and its complicated relationships with the Zionist organizations and their policy. The story of the Acre community serves as a test case for attempts at settlement in Arab cities, particularly those in outlying areas. It also reflects the dwindling of the Sephardic, Non-Zionist communities and organizations in the Yishuv, as well as the complicated relationships of the periphery of the Yishuv with the Zionist organizations and the main Zionist narrative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cultural and religious concepts of space inform contemporary social and political identities, confirming the inherent embeddedness of borders in social life. This study analyzes concepts of borders and bordering processes in socially heterogeneous and politically sensitive environments, as portrayed in classic Jewish texts. Jewish-legal rabbinic writings dated from the first to the fifth century reveal perceptions of both concrete and metaphysical aspects of a territorial homeland and of social-spatial bordering. These perceptions are echoed in contemporary debates of national sovereignty and borders. Like most legal systems, Jewish law prefers clear spatial separations and creates dichotomous spatial-legal distinctions. Yet textual analysis through lenses of geopolitics and law reveals nuanced concepts of borders and surprising perceptions of flexible and permeable borders despite this preference for clarity. This adaptability stands in contrast to widespread presumptions of rigidity of religion. Classic texts enrich social and political discourse in multi-cultural societies, particularly regarding holy territory. Their interpretation offer prospects of de-linking concepts of sanctity from sovereignty, thus presenting innovative channels to perceive and experience one's homeland. Paradoxically, religious texts offer pragmatic geo-political insights, which could enrich contemporary discourse, challenged by over-simplistic perceptions of borders and bordering. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of purity exists in many cultures all over the world. This article investigates the idea of Jewish female purity - niddah. The word "purity" itself suggests its connotation to physical and ritual hygiene. This paper shows that even though the concept of "ritual purity" in Judaism might have started as an ancient form of hygiene, nowadays it functions as sexual restriction and biopower over Jewish women. Rabbinical sexual prohibitions have drastically transformed the initial practice in an effort to control female gendered behavior. Due to the sensitivity of the subject matter, this essay is written using the methodology of digital ethnography. The digital research was conducted in several Facebook groups of mainly English-speaking Orthodox women. The online research provides an insight into Jewish practices related to niddah, which are not traditionally spoken of freely and demonstrates how the contemporary concept of niddah affects women's lives severely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In late-eighteenth century, the three-stage partition (1772, 1793, and 1795) of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth between Russia, Prussia and Austria not only gave the Tsarist Empire control over a great portion of Eastern Europe, it also transformed the largest Jewish community in the world into subjects of the Romanovs. Consequently, the Empress, Catherine II, found herself compelled to solve an unexpected problem, namely, how best to integrate hundreds of thousands of Jews in a nation, Russia, wherefrom the Jews had been expelled just some decades earlier. Taking as a point of departure works by leading historians, such as Simon Dubnow, John D. Klier, Richard Pipes, Michael Aronson, Benjamin Nathans and Hans Rogger, this paper hereby aims at analysing the Jewish policy put into practice by the Russian Government during the reign of Catherine II. More specifically, this work tries to shed new light on how and why the Jewish presence into the Tsarist Empire became a "question" for Russian policymakers. First of all, it explores the religious and social reasons that led Russians to perceive the Jews as an alien element, as well as Catherine II's personal views on this issue. Further, the paper investigates the differences between Russian and Jewish economic cultures and how the latter affected Catherine II's early Jewish policy. Thus, the essay concludes in an examination of the logic beyond the foundation of the Pale of Settlement, namely the area in which Jews were forced to reside and work. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fire and burning are often mentioned in recipes and products of Jewish love magic in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages. This article interprets the motif of fire as a key symbol, exploring its different manifestations. The motif is expressed in three main forms: (a) burning as part of the magical practice, (b) appeal to supernatural entities whose names are related to fire and (c) use of fire metaphors. A comparison between these manifestations and fire symbolism in aggressive spells sheds light on some special characteristics of Jewish love magic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including Jewish women’s ways of dressing in seventeenth- and eighteenth century Central Europe; intersection of Christian and Jewish ideas about Jewish appearance in the wake of the cultural transformations.

This article focuses on Jewish women's experiences of the amen meal ritual. The central intention of this meal is to achieve many recitations of the word "amen" in response to benedictions recited for different sorts of food. The women's voices and experiences, reflected in in-depth interviews with participants and participant observations, facilitate our understanding and conceptions of how some contemporary Jewish women experience lived religion. The amen meal experience is characterized by continuity, relationships and activeness, and it creates a safe place for Jewish women to develop their self- and communal-religious identities. The multiplicity of independent and united communities of women helps them connect to themselves, their community and their identity as Jewish women, and it gives them a sense of empowerment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposes to identify a Jewish political tradition in the area of international politics and foreign policy. The concept of Jewish foreign policy tradition encompasses the interaction between Jews and external groups during times of Jewish sovereignty as well as times of Jewish Diaspora. The article analyzes patterns of Jewish foreign policy behavior drawn from both various sources of Biblical or Halakhic literature as well as from the empirical Jewish political behavior in foreign affairs. It is concluded that a Jewish foreign policy tradition is relevant to understanding current Jewish international affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study proposes to identify a Jewish political tradition in the area of international politics and foreign policy. The concept of Jewish foreign policy tradition encompasses the interaction between Jews and external groups during times of Jewish sovereignty as well as times of Jewish Diaspora. The article analyzes patterns of Jewish foreign policy behavior drawn from both various sources of Biblical or Halakhic literature as well as from the empirical Jewish political behavior in foreign affairs. It is concluded that a Jewish foreign policy tradition is relevant to understanding current Jewish international affairs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Being home to a majority of Jews before the Iranian Islamic Revolution of 1979, Udlajan is one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Tehran. Through interviews with a select group of its past Jewish and Muslim residents, this research considers Udlajan's past soundscape and its former residents' sonic recollections in order to examine the role of sounds and silences in the social construction of space. By narrating sound memories together with other ones, Udlajan former residents express their understanding of space, communications with others, sense of identity, self and otherness, and norms of inclusion and exclusion. This paper illustrates how the Jewish residents, despite aspects of their everyday lives being circumscribed, are not mute victims but exercise agency in appropriating, negotiating and using public space. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An introduction is presented in which the editor discusses articles in the issue on topics including the etiquette of the Ottoman Palestinians, the documentation of Jewish communities and the socio-political context in the Ottoman and Middle East.

The article talks about the Jewish ritual of using the mikvah in the late 19th century in New York City, stating that mikvah is associated with women's bodies and sexual relations.

This essay investigates the appearance in the Dutch Purim productions of such contemporary political issues as the poverty and the unproductivity of the Ashkenazi Jews. At the end of the eighteenth century, pejorative images of the Jew and maskilic reform, as well as enlightened ideals, interacted within these writings. As a result, the focus of the Purim productions shifted from absurd humor to the hardships of Jewish life. This essay analyzes how maskilim employed the Ashkenazi Purim productions to cope with and address the 'Jewish Question.' As such, it demonstrates that humor became an ideological motor for Jewish cultural change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In response to the main papers in this volume eight main arguments are presented: 1. National vs. global perspectives underlying the quantitative and qualitative fundamentals; 2. Problems in assessing Jewish populations; 3. Queries about local survey quality and comparability; 4. Socio-cultural drivers; 5. Socialstructural drivers; 6. A more transnational American Jewry; 7. Let's look forward: the missing longitudinal approach; 8. Some policy implications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the role of the federations in interpreting Jewish community studies in the U.S. Topics include the call of Sidney Vincent of the Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland for a shift from federations' focus on Jewish survival to the survival of Judaism, the increase of interfaith marriage, and the interpretation data on the institutional engagement of American Jews.

Research into school choice has generally explored both the processes by which choices are made and the considerations that parents explore when making this important decision on behalf of their children. This article examines the secondary school choices of Jewish parents in the United Kingdom. It explores parents’ reasons for choosing to select Jewish faith secondary schools. We frame our arguments against the backdrop of the wider faith-school phenomenon in the UK, and as with the Christian communities, we find a disconnect between the small number of Jewish adults attending places of worship regularly and the growing number of Jewish children attending Jewish faith schools. We show that for many parents, schooling is synonymous with Jewish socialization, or enculturation; developing networks of Jewish friends, providing sufficient cultural resources to enable participation in Jewish life, and nurturing distinctive values. We show how Jewish schools have become more than places for academic advancement for these families; they have become the primary locus of Jewish community. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This essay reflects on the adaptation in seventeenth-century China and India in relation to the practice of Jesuit missionaries Matteo Ricci and Roberto de Nobili, especially their adaptation to indigenous social customs. By comparing their praxis, it concludes that their experiments are insightful for today's comparative theologians in that they embody the commitment to one's own tradition and creative openness to other traditions. Their stress on friendship as a religious virtue is also evident. A parallel study of the two missionaries illuminates and enriches how we understand them and their adaptation methodology. The first part is an overview of Ricci's and de Nobili's missionary activities. The second turns to Ricci's adaptation in China: the change of clothes, writing as a way of evangelization, and the controversial concubinage issue. The third part reflects upon de Nobili's praxis in India, specifically the opposition to and defense of his conversion method, which highlights problems in interreligious learning. An evaluation of the adaptation and concerns for future praxis in comparative theology conclude the essay. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is commonly believed that women were the preparers of food and drink in the Iron Age (ca. 1200-586 b.c .e .) Israelite household while men were primarily responsible for agricultural field activities. Various lines of evidence suggest, however, that this indoor female/outdoor male dichotomy as related to food production was not always the reality, especially during the crucial harvest seasons. The Hebrew Bible and other textual sources, iconography, and Middle Eastern ethnography suggest that women not only took part in the cereal grain, grape, and olive harvests, they were also valued for their participation in these seasonal field activities and the festivals that celebrated them. In this article, I shall examine the evidence for male and female participation in ancient Israelite harvests and challenge popular assumptions about how men and women contributed to the production of food and drink in ancient Israel. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

On a superficial level, the differentiation between “Jews” and “non-Jews” functions as one of the best-known lines of demarcation in the representation of Jewish culture and religion. It draws on a hermeneutical boundary between “insiders” and “outsiders” with regard to the understanding of specific “Jewish experiences.” In this article, I add that this division, often supported by theologians and scholars in the scientific study of religion\s, influences the organizational structure of academic institutions as well, bestowing more “authenticity” on the research of Jewish scholars than on that of non-Jewish scholars. I furthermore assert that, from a methodological point of view, this form of insider–outsider distinction can be seen as part of the discourse on first-order essentialism in Jewish Studies, which includes significant regional differences. Whereas many European scholars are oriented toward mono-cultural images of Jewish religions, scholars from the United States are often eager to explore the plurality of the increasingly diverse religious field. In Israel the insider–outsider distinction occurs on quite a different level, since more and more Israeli scholars criticize ethnicized patterns in Jewish studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines some ways affecting the dispute of critic Northrop Frye on the works of poet William Blake. Topics discussed include the assessment of the influence of Frye in the literary work, the mistreatment of Frye on the archetype of Blake, the esoteric context of the work, and the occurrence of the Jewish community.

The article discusses the book "Motl the Cantor's Son," by Sholem Aleichem and its application as a born-translated literature. Topics discussed include the European reading tours of Aleichem in Antwerp, Belgium, the social life and customs of Jewish migrants, and the study and teaching of world literature.

This article introduces the cortijos of İzmir and discusses them as heterotopic places. Originally belonging to the Sephardi Jewish residents of İzmir during the Ottoman times, cortijos were one or two-storey buildings organised around a courtyard, with shared facilities such as toilets and kitchen. The Sephardi inhabitants of cortijos were among the poorest in their community and each family lived in a small single room opening out onto a courtyard. After the immigration of the majority of the Sephardis to Israel in the 1950s, these buildings started to be occupied by equally poor migrants from Eastern Anatolia. In time the demographics of the inhabitants changed even more, replacing families with single, aged and unemployed individuals. Despite changes in the resident profiles, the heterotopic features of cortijos were neither changed nor challenged and only oscillated between heterotopias of crisis and heterotopias of deviation. With a special focus on a documentary photography exhibit on cortijos, titled Kortejo/Aile Evleri, this article discusses their heterotopic features, both in relation to their history and to their current condition. The article concludes by highlighting the new-found public and municipal interest in these buildings after their aestheticisation through photographic images. This new interest suggests an appropriation of the cortijo into the needs and expectations of the consumer society. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

School-wide positive behavioral support (SWPBS) is an evidence-based strategy to alter the school environment by improving procedures to promote appropriate behaviors of all students. Although research has indicated that SWPBS is an empirically supported and effective intervention in reducing disruptive behaviors in most students, results have found that it is not as effective in students from historically disadvantaged racial and ethnic groups. Therefore, it is important that SWPBS be culturally responsive to the ethnic groups served at the school. Cultural responsiveness refers to using the knowledge of that culture or performance styles of ethnically diverse students to make learning more relevant and effective. The purpose of this article is to describe the details, implementation, and results of the first 5 years of the Mensch Project, a culturally responsive SWPBS implemented in an urban Jewish community day school. Cultural adaptations were successful in providing a structured social-emotional support system for the school. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The film Der ewige Jude has received a considerable amount of scholarship, but never solely in the context of its representations of Jewish food practices. This paper addresses this void arguing that the representations are used to de-civilize and dehumanize the Jewish people in the minds of the viewers. The representation of Jewish home life around the dinner table is done in such a way as to emphasize filth and bugs. Similarly the conditions of street food are naturalized and used as "evidence" that the Jewish people are a lower race. Later, as the film describes Jewish cultural practices it completely subverts the meaning of Purim in such a way as to access the longstanding prejudices of Jews as "bloodsuckers". Finally, kosher slaughter is used to separate Jewish people from both a sense of Germanness and a European identity altogether. In fact, I argue this representation served as an argument to deny European Jews their humanity altogether. In all of these ways the film creates a cinematic argument that attempts to justify what would become the mass-murder and genocide of the European Jews. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the Jewish communities in Limpopo also known as Northern Transvaal in South Africa. Topics mention including the pioneer settlers in the area such as Louis Trichardt and Andries Hendrik Potgieter, South African Jewish community which served as the example of a structured power and the three largest families who came from Latvia.

The author relates the influence of Deborah Dash Moore's "At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews" on her study of small-town Jewish life. Topics covered include the attempt to rebalance American Jewish historical knowledge about the adaptation processes of immigrants and their children outside of New York City, the search for a place that is radically contrasted with New York City and the collection of data on the occupational distribution of Johnstown's Jews.

The article presents a comparison between Los Angeles and New York, along with the commonalities between the cities that boasted the largest Jewish populations in postwar U.S. Topics covered include the role of professor Deborah Dash Moore in bringing Los Angeles into focus as a historical subject, the analysis of whether the history of Jews in New York can help explain the experience of Jews elsewhere and the argument that second-generation Jews devised a synthesis of Jewish values.

The article explores how the Yiddish culture of interwar Vilna was reflected in the topography of the city. Particular focus is given to Deborah Dash Moore's "At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews" which looked at the concrete aspects of Jewish life in New York. Topics covered include the comparison of the images of the Lower East Side and the Vilna ghettos and the failure of Moore to place her study in a larger context that would link it to a more Jewish attraction to city life.

The article explores Deborah Dash Moore's novel "At Home in America: Second Generation New York Jews" which stressed the importance of institutions in the second generation's reconstruction of modern Jewish life. Topics covered include the difference of the book from most American religious histories, the representation of the early 20th-century city as a historical laboratory for Jewish culture and religion and the principal analytical difficulty posed by the book.