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Haskalah and Beyond: The Reception of the Hebrew Enlightenment and the Emergence of Haskalah Judaism
Author(s): Moshe Pelli (Author)
- Publisher: UPA
- Publication Date: 30 Aug. 2010
- Language: English
- Print length: 268 pages
- ISBN-10: 0761852034
- ISBN-13: 9780761852032
Book Description
Haskalah and Beyond deals with the Hebrew Haskalah (Enlightenment) — the literary, cultural, and social movement in the 18th and 19th centuries in Europe.
It represents the emergence of modernism and perhaps the budding of some aspects of secularism in Jewish society, following the efforts of the Hebrew and Jewish enlighteners to introduce changes into Jewish culture and Jewish life, and to revitalize the Hebrew language and literature.
The author classifies these activities as a cultural revolution. In effect, the Haskalah was a counter-culture intended to modify or replace some of the contemporary rabbinic cultural framework, institutions, and practices and adopt them for its own envisioned Judaism of the Haskalah.
The pioneering work of the founding fathers of the early Haskalah had greatly impacted the later developments of the Haskalah in the 19th century. Its reception in that century is studied as is the reception of one of the major figures of the early Haskalah, Isaac Euchel, and of one of the important German Enlightenment poets and philosophers, Johann Gottfried Herder, in the 19th-century Haskalah.
The study of reception continues on the language of the sublime and the poetic imagery used in Haskalah, melitzah, as well as on the three major journals of Haskalah as instruments of change and of disseminating the Haskalah ideology. Finally, the aftermath of the Haskalah is addressed.
It represents the emergence of modernism and perhaps the budding of some aspects of secularism in Jewish society, following the efforts of the Hebrew and Jewish enlighteners to introduce changes into Jewish culture and Jewish life, and to revitalize the Hebrew language and literature.
The author classifies these activities as a cultural revolution. In effect, the Haskalah was a counter-culture intended to modify or replace some of the contemporary rabbinic cultural framework, institutions, and practices and adopt them for its own envisioned Judaism of the Haskalah.
The pioneering work of the founding fathers of the early Haskalah had greatly impacted the later developments of the Haskalah in the 19th century. Its reception in that century is studied as is the reception of one of the major figures of the early Haskalah, Isaac Euchel, and of one of the important German Enlightenment poets and philosophers, Johann Gottfried Herder, in the 19th-century Haskalah.
The study of reception continues on the language of the sublime and the poetic imagery used in Haskalah, melitzah, as well as on the three major journals of Haskalah as instruments of change and of disseminating the Haskalah ideology. Finally, the aftermath of the Haskalah is addressed.
Editorial Reviews
Review
…A remarkably compelling work of literary scholarship….Pelli plausibly displays a profound knowledge and understanding of the Hebrew Enlightenment literature while studying its evolution and reception in much detail without compromising a comprehensive perspective of the latter….this book is a considerably paramount and praiseworthy contribution to the book shelf of the study of modern Hebrew literature. — Yair Mazor, Ph.D., Professor, University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee
About the Author
Moshe Pelli is director of the Interdisciplinary Program in Judaic Studies and Abe and Tess Wise Endowed Professor of Judaic Studies at the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Fl. Pelli is a leading authority on the Hebrew Enlightenment. He has written extensively on the subject and has published eleven scholarly books and numerous research papers. He was honored with several awards for his teaching, research, and contributions to Jewish studies and to Hebrew culture, including the 1991 Friedman Prize for Hebrew Culture in America and the Distinguished Researcher of the Year Award for 1996 and 2006 at the University of Central Florida. He was president of the National Association of Professors of Hebrew in the U.S.A. (2007-2009).
