MEASURING SATISFACTION IN JEWISH “UTOPIA”

As a framework for social analysis, utopia is usually the province of classicists and political theorists. Yet practitioners of Jewish social studies — particularly specialists on the subject of the kibbutz — have much to offer non‐regional specialists of intentional communities and micropolities. Indeed, by applying standard social scientific techniques of survey and analysis, the kibbutz framework re‐emerges as a viable construct within contemporary comparative politics and sociology. Here, two similarly planned communities in the Negev desert, with founding memberships including a core (approximately one‐third) of “progressive” (i.e.Reform) Jewish emigrants from the USA, are analysed and compared statistically along several indices of satisfaction. Significant differences arise in the areas of personal relations, economic security, contentment with children’s education, and standard of living. Contrasting degrees of ideological and theological flexibility — attributable, in these two communities, to middle ageing and child rearing — may also account for different success outcomes. Measurement of satisfaction levels in Israel can help other neo‐utopian movements refine their proposed programmes and quantify their claims to superior socio‐political planning.     

ENVISIONING JEWISH CENTRAL EUROPE: FRIEDRICH TORBERG,THE AUSTRIAN ÉMIGRÉS,AND JEWISH EUROPEAN HISTORY

This essay uses the Viennese remigré writer and journalist, Friedrich Torberg (1908–1979), his Austrian Jewish cohort, and their invented “Central Europe” and “Austrian Literature” to argue for a paradigmatic shift in émigré historiography. The cosmopolitan narrative predominating in émigré historiography has marginalized traditional Judaism. By shifting the focus from the German to the Austrian émigrés, and from the European nation state to the Austrian Empire, historians can reclaim traditional Jewish culture and pluralize the hegemonic narrative. Late imperial Austria, constitutionally federalist and ethnically and culturally diverse, made room for a Jewish national culture in ways that Germany did not. The Austrian émigrés shaped visions of Central Europe that foregrounded Jewishness and provided wider space for Jewish life than comparable visions of leading German émigrés. Yet, even Austrian émigré visions remained largely incognizant of rabbinic culture, the core of traditional Jewish life. To make traditional Jews agents of Jewish European history, European historiography must now move to incorporate rabbinic culture.     

GERSHOM SCHOLEM’S DIALECTIC OF JEWISH HISTORY

Louis Dembitz Brandeis (1856–1941) evolved from a political liberal, committed to free competition, hard money and honest government, to become in his maturity a social liberal chiefly pursuing social justice and free speech. In the Supreme Court (1916–1939) he remained faithful to his liberal and progressive parameters. Since about 1905 he evolved from being a half-assimilated Jew to an identified Jew and a Zionist. His original concept of Zionism was as a mission to achieve higher social goals. However, from about the mid-1920s he intensified his Zionism as a vital goal in itself. His synthesis of Progressivism and Zionism gradually came to be the classic tradition of all major American Zionist and pro-Israel trends.     

TO CATCH THE SKY — THE JEWISH IDENTITY OF ISRAELIS

In the winter of 2000, Israel’s Channel 2 television presented the series To Catch the Sky. This series allows us to learn about the changes in the viewers’ — and especially the secular viewers’ — attitudes to the phenomenon of teshuvah. Studying the intentions of the programme’s creators, the narrative format, the mode of character design and, especially, the reception, reveals that To Catch the Sky is not only a family story, but, like many other Israeli dramas, also a dramatic document that faithfully represents the changes that have intensified among secular Israeli Jews in recent years. It is possible that the sadness expressed by many secular Israeli viewers at the separation of the parents at the end of the series is, perhaps unconsciously, an expression of grief over their weakening ties with Judaism.     

IDENTITY AND IDENTIFICATION: JEWISH YOUTH IN ITALY 1870–1938

The criteria by which Jews identify themselves cover a very wide range and change over time. The aim of this essay is to stress that Italian Jewish identity must be analysed in a historical context, in the larger society in which it is located and with which it interacts. Through the study of the activities of Italian Jewish youth, this article will demonstrate, on the one hand, the integration and uniqueness of the Italian Jews and, on the other, that Italian Jewish identity has been transformed by the political ideology and economics of the surrounding society. The only way to analyse Jewish youth in Italy in their struggle with their Jewish identity should be comparatively, that is, to examine the history of Italian Jews and of Italy as a whole, not as separate but as connected entities.     

AN URGENT SOCIAL PROBLEM? JEWISH JUVENILE DELINQUENTS IN TURN-OF-TWENTIETH-CENTURY LONDON

This article examines the phenomenon of Jewish juvenile delinquency in turn-of-the-century London and the developments leading up to the Jewish community's decision to establish its own Industrial Schools. The reactions of English society, as well as parts of the Anglo-Jewish community, to the problem of Jewish juvenile delinquency were out of proportion. The public attention was not necessarily linked to the numbers prosecuted and cannot be understood from the statistical data alone. The article proposes two explanations for the view of Jewish juvenile delinquency as an urgent, serious social problem at the start of the twentieth century. One relates to the refusal of the Anglo-Jewish community to establish its own institutions to take in the delinquent children. The second relates to the public atmosphere of suspicion and fear of the poor, of adolescents and of foreigners (all of which defined these Jewish boys) prevalent in English society at that time.     

JEWISH CINEMATIC SELF‐REPRESENTATIONS IN CONTEMPORARY ARGENTINE AND BRAZILIAN FILMS

In recent years, young Latin American‐Jewish film directors have produced films that portray the Jewish communities in both Argentina and Brazil. While Argentine‐Jewish filmmakers have been prominent since the beginning of the film industry in Argentina, it is the first time a group of contemporary directors share the depiction of Jewish life and culture. For his part, Brazilian‐Jewish director Cao Hamburger also chooses to present the Jewish community of São Paulo in his award‐nominated film, O ano em que meus pais saíram de férias [The year my parents went on vacation (2007)]. This article explores what this self‐representation entails for Argentine‐Jewish and Brazilian‐Jewish filmmakers, as well as on the commonalities of Jewish characters presented in the films of Daniel Burman, Gabriel Lichtmann, Ariel Winograd and Cao Hamburger.     

THE BRESLAU JEWISH MUSEUM: “DISINTEGRATION OF THE MANIFEST WORLD”

The Breslau Jewish Museum's brief history mirrors the changing identity German Jews held in the national community between 1928 and 1938. The Museum was initially founded by an optimistic group of prominent Breslau Jews who wished to both chronicle and celebrate the place Jews had in Weimar era Silesian and Breslau culture. But the group's ambitions soon had to be reassessed. After Hitler's assumption of power in 1933 it became increasingly clear that Jewishness was not to be flaunted or celebrated publicly, much less institutionally. As Jews came under attack, the Jewish Museum assumed the defensive role of guardian of Jewish heritage, objects and culture. Its new isolation from the non-Jewish Silesian and Breslau communities paralleled the growing marginalization of German Jews generally. The Museum's closure just days before Kristallnacht in 1938 seems prescient; both events signalled the end of Jewish life in Germany and the abrogation of German Jewish identity.     

“JEWISH TRAFFICKING” AND LONDON JEWS IN THE AGE OF MIGRATION

There are excellent accounts of the Jewish response to “trafficking” in women for prostitution during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but recent analyses of the white slavery phenomenon have raised new questions. This article concerns the response of Jews in England, and specifically the motivations and activities of those who founded the Jewish Association for the Protection of Girls and Women (JAPGW). The JAPGW set the model for initiatives carried out by Jewish communities throughout the British Empire and was a primary contributor to internationalisation of the issue on the part of the League of Nations after the First World War. The JAPGW’s motivations were complex: they involved a particular religious outlook, the response to antisemitism and assumptions along lines of class and gender. In addressing “Jewish trafficking”, Britain’s established Jewish community sought to take ownership of what it meant to be a Jew in British society.     

BRITISH JEWISH PREACHERS IN TIME OF WAR (1800–1918)

Beginning in the eighteenth century, occasions related to war became a significant new venue for Jewish preaching. The declaration of war or its conclusion, a government‐proclaimed Day of National Fasting and Prayer or of Thanksgiving, a major victory or defeat of the nation’s armed forces – all generated sermons by Jewish preachers, who not infrequently publicized what they said beyond the synagogue walls. These sermons reflect the patriotic identification of Jews with the nation where they resided, the desire to demonstrate this loyalty to the larger society, the homiletical application of classical texts and historical precedents to new situations, the challenge presented by war to assumptions about human progress, the theological conundrum of enemy nations praying for victory to the same God, the poignant agony of Jews fighting against other Jews. This article reviews Jewish sermons delivered by British preachers mobilizing the rhetorical resources of Jewish and general literatures to express absolute identification with the Crown, the Government and the Empire, as well as sermons that express deep discouragement about the devastating cost of war in material, cultural, psychological and religious terms.     

HOLOCAUST COMMEMORATIONS IN LONDON AND ANGLO‐JEWISH (DIS‐)UNITY

This study of selected episodes of Holocaust commemorations in London (UK) sheds light on the tense and ambiguous relationship between commemoration of the Holocaust and Anglo‐Jewish unity. Many have shared the aspiration for Anglo‐Jewish unity at Holocaust commemorations, but a narrow definition of “unity”, as taken to mean centralization, uniformity and consensus, has been restrictive and has not served the desired end. As these case studies demonstrate, despite the high level of cohesion achieved by the rituals of the ceremony and the collective mourning, Holocaust commemorations have also been occasions of conflict and disunity. It is the recent proliferation of commemorations in the 1990s, taking place in a diverse range of Jewish organizations and institutions rather than one combined memorial gathering, that has led to Anglo‐Jewry’s uniting in common moments of remembrance. These differing approaches to the nature, form and content of Holocaust commemorations should be perceived not only as a positive development for the future of Holocaust remembrance in Britain but also an indication of an increasingly healthy Anglo‐Jewry.     

MAINTAINING AMBIVALENCE: RELIGIOUS PRACTICE AND JEWISH IDENTITY AMONG ISRAELI TRADITIONISTS—A POST-SECULAR PERSPECTIVE

Based on personal interviews with 102 Israeli Jews who identify themselves as “traditionists” (I shall argue below on the merits of this neologism as the proper translation of the Hebrew noun masorti), the paper studies the meanings traditionists associate with their Jewish practice, and endeavours to decipher and reconstruct the unwritten (and often unformulated) code guiding traditionist practice. This code, the paper argues, revolves around the preservation of a valid, “thick” sense of modern, ethnonational Jewish identity. The first part of the paper examines the tendency to present traditionism as lacking a consistent guiding logic, and addresses the question of whether it should be dismissed as the simple preference of “comfortableness” and easiness over the demanding observance of strict Orthodoxy. The second part enquires into the issue of the guilt arising from the supposed inconsistency between traditionists’ ideas of the role of religious practice and their “selective” attitude towards it. The paper thus argues against the (mis-) understanding of traditionism as deficient religiosity. Arguing that such dismissal is nurtured on the dichotomous world view propagated by the secularization thesis, the paper suggests that a post-secular epistemology is better suited for the interpretive understanding of this phenomenon.     

“MASTERY REGAINED”—ISRAELI JEWISH SOVEREIGNTY AND SPACE IN THE ISRAELI NOVEL 1967–1973

This article identifies key characteristics of sovereign Israeli Jewish identity and its relationship with space in Israeli novels and novellas published between 1967 and 1973, in the context of the complicated dialogue between these texts and Israeli public discourse. Interacting with their contemporary public discourse, the canonical novels and novellas of the period—Michael Sheli [My Michael] by Amos Oz (1968), Nemalim [Ants] by Yitzhak Orpaz (1968), and Hapardes [The Orchard] by Benjamin Tammuz (1972), create an Israeli space in which a Jewish sovereign is surrounded and threatened by an Arab enemy, and as a precondition to his survival, must renew his sovereignty and declare a state of emergency to confirm it. As opposed to the besieged space constructed in contemporary discourse and in these canonical novels, David Shahar's novels of the period construct a fluid space in which contrasting identities can shift and replace each other with no existential threat.     

TO MAKE SPANISH A SACRED LANGUAGE: WRITING AND THE CRYPTO‐JEWISH ALLEGORY IN SABINA BERMAN’S LA BOBE

The prominent Jewish‐Mexican author Sabina Berman explores her relationship to Judaism in the semi‐autobiographical novel La Bobe (1990; Bubbeh, 1998) via a loving portrait her grandmother. Undeterred by her Ashkenazi background, Berman employs a Crypto‐Jewish allegory in her portrayal of the grandmother. Through this allegory, Berman is able to restructure Jewish identity as female centered and mouldable. The allegory also opens up a tradition of women’s religious knowledge and prayer that becomes the foundation of the narrator’s future as a Jewish‐Mexican writer. In her narrative, Berman argues for a spiritual identity based not on strict observance of ritual form but on the devotion with which the rituals are undertaken, be they the transmission of a sacred text, the performance of domestic chores, or the writing of stories and plays.     

THE CONTRIBUTION OF WORLD JEWISH ORGANIZATIONS TO THE ESTABLISHMENT OF RIGHTS FOR JEWS IN MOROCCO (1956–1961)

The history of the Jewish community during the early years of Moroccan independence is a story of continuous and constant worries regarding an unclear future—as well as fears of possible impending disaster. During this period, the Jewish community was forced to deal with several critical questions, the answers to which would ultimately determine the future of Moroccan Jewry, as well as the future of individual Jews in the community. While the struggle for independence had been waged without much involvement on the part of the Jewish community, the removal of the yoke of colonialism presented each Moroccan Jew with various options, and the choice to be made between them was a fateful one—whether to seek personal and communal success within a democratic progressive country or to escape from the country out of fear of a possible disaster.     

BETWEEN LIBERATION(S) AND OCCUPATION(S): RECONSIDERING THE EMERGENCE OF MAGHREBI JEWISH COMMUNISM, 1942–1945

From the fall of France in 1940 to the Anglo-American liberation of North Africa from Vichy rule (in Morocco and Algeria) and German occupation (in Tunisia), from November 1942 to May 1943, the Second World War profoundly transformed North African youth. For young French-educated Jews living in urban colonial spaces, disillusionment with Vichy France's betrayal of democracy and equality led them to a search for new political models, including Communism.

Through the memoirs of three North African Jews that came to politics through local Communist parties, Abraham Serfaty, Daniel Timsit and Gilbert Naccache, Communism in its wartime form (allied with Western democracies) provided an ideal mediating force. For a generation that wanted to fight against the anti-Jewish measures of the Vichy and Nazi regimes, as well as to abolish colonial distinctions between indigenous Jews and Muslims and Europeans, Communism proposed radical equality in a supra-national framework. As the authors/activists look back on the failures of decolonization, they attempt to make sense of their political commitments by gesturing to a utopian moment when Jews could be grounded in local struggles while looking to the US, the Soviet Union, and Popular Front France as models for equality.     

“FROM THE UTTER DEPTH OF DEGRADATION TO THE APOGEE OF BLISS”: THE GENDERINGS OF DIASPORIC ZIONISM AND JEWISH HOLOCAUST EDUCATION

This article examines some of the memories of the Holocaust produced in Holocaust education in a selection of Jewish high schools in Melbourne and New York at the beginning of the twenty-first century. It is being suggested here that the narratives about the Holocaust being taught in these schools are in part shaped by a gendered Zionist outlook. This article takes up the question of why this is, and in doing so provides an explanation of these types of narratives. In particular, this article explores the ways that this pedagogy places the story of the creation of the sovereign Jewish State of Israel at the end of a unit of study on the Holocaust, thus linking these two “events” in an important way. This article also explores what it is that makes these narratives gendered, and what work such narratives, and collective memories, do in the formulation of particular notions of diasporic Zionist thinking.