Jewish Enlightenment in an English Key: Anglo-Jewry's Construction of Modern Jewish Thought

David B. Ruderman

Published by Princeton University Press 2000

Jewish Enlightenment in an English Key

Anglo-Jewry's Construction of Modern Jewish Thought

David B. Ruderman

https://doi.org/10.1515/9780691187488

Overview
Contents

About this book

Historians of the European Jewish experience have long marginalized the intellectual achievement of Jews in England, where it was assumed no seminal figures contributed to the development of modern Jewish thought. In this first comprehensive account of the emergence of Anglo-Jewish thought in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, David Ruderman impels a reconsideration of the formative beginnings of modern European Jewish culture. He uncovers a vibrant Jewish intellectual life in England during the Enlightenment era by examining a small but fascinating group of hitherto neglected Jewish thinkers in the process of transforming their traditional Hebraic culture into a modern English one. This lively portrait of English Jews reformulating their tradition in light of Enlightenment categories illuminates an overlooked corner in the history of Jewish culture in England and Jewish thought during the Enlightenment.

Ruderman overturns the conventional view that the origins of modern Jewish consciousness are located exclusively within the German-Jewish experience, particularly Moses Mendelssohn's circle. Independent of the better-known German experience, the encounter between Jewish and English thought was incubated amid the unprecedented freedom enjoyed by Jews in England. This resulted in a less inhibited defense of Jews and Judaism. In addition to the original and prolific thinkers David Levi and Abraham Tang, Ruderman introduces Abraham and Joshua Van Oven, Mordechai Shnaber Levison, Samuel Falk, Isaac Delgado, Solomon Bennett, Hyman Hurwitz, Emanuel Mendes da Costa, Ralph Shomberg, and others. Of obvious appeal and import to students of Jewish and English history, this study depicts the challenge of defining a religious identity in the modern age.

Author / Editor information

David B. Ruderman is the Joseph Meyerhoff Professor of Modern Jewish History and Director of the Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania.

Reviews

Winner of the 2001 Koret Jewish Book Award, History of the National Foundation for Jewish Culture

David B. Ruderman's cleverly conceived and well executed study won [the] Koret Jewish Book Award in History. The book richly merits this recognition. This is a good and important book.---Eugene C. Black, American Historical Review

Topics

Frontmatter Publicly Available Download PDF	i
Contents Publicly Available Download PDF	vii
Illustrations Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	viii
Preface and Acknowledgments Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	xi
Introduction Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	1
One. "The Scripture Correcting Maniae":1 Benjamin Kennicott and His Hutchinsonian and Anglo-Jewish Detractors Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	23
Two. The New and "Metrical5 5 English Bible: Robert Lowth and His Jewish Critic, David Levi Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	57
Three. Deism and Its Reverberations in English Jewish Thought: Abraham Ben Naphtali Tang and Some of His Contemporaries Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	89
Four. Between Rational and Irrational Dissent: Political Radicalism in Anglo-Jewish Thought Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	135
Five. Science and Newtonianism in the Culture of Anglo-Jewry Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	184
Six. Translation and Transformation: The Englishing of Jewish Culture Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	215
Afterword Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	269
Appendix. Moses Mendelssohn through Anglo-Jewish Eyes Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	275
Index Requires Authentication Unlicensed Licensed Download PDF	287