Judaism Books

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Book SynopsisThe relationship between morality and religion has long been controversial, familiar in its formulation as Euthyphro’s dilemma: Is an act right because God commanded it or did God command it because it is right. In Morality and Religion: The Jewish Story, renowned scholar Avi Sagi marshals the breadth of philosophical and hermeneutical tools to examine this relationship in Judaism from two perspectives. The first considers whether Judaism adopted a thesis widespread in other monotheistic religions known as 'divine command morality,' making morality contingent on God’s command. The second deals with the ways Jewish tradition grapples with conflicts between religious and moral obligations. After examining a broad spectrum of Jewish sources—including Talmudic literature, Halakhah, Aggadah, Jewish philosophy, and liturgy—Sagi concludes that mainstream Jewish tradition consistently refrains from attempts to endorse divine command morality or resolve conflicts by invoking a divine command. Rather, the central strand in Judaism perceives God and humans as inhabiting the same moral community and bound by the same moral obligations. When conflicts emerge between moral and religious instructions, Jewish tradition interprets religious norms so that they ultimately pass the moral test. This mainstream voice is anchored in the meaning of Jewish law, which is founded on human autonomy and rationality, and in the relationship with God that is assumed in this tradition. Table of Contents1. Introduction Part I Morality’s Dependence on Religion in Jewish Tradition2. Between the Duty of Obedience and the Thesis of Dependence3. DCM in Rabbinic Literature 4. DCM in Jewish Thought 5. The Autonomous Perspective in Jewish Thought Part II The Autonomous Perspective in Halakhah6. R. Israel Moses Hazan: Particularism and Universalism7. R. Shimon Shkop: Religious Commands and Legal Obligations8. R. Ben-Zion Meir Hai Uziel: Exclusivity and Moral AutonomyPart III The Conflict Between Morality and Religion9. “You Are Called Men”: Between Jew and Gentile10. “He Slew the Egyptian”: On Moses’ Act and Morality 11. “Her Ways Are Ways of Pleasantness”: Uprooting a Torah Law 12. The Akedah in Jewish TraditionPart IV Theoretical Foundations13. Halakhah and the Dependence Thesis 14. Concluding Reflections

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Book SynopsisChapter 1. Introduction (Harriet Hartman).- Chapter 2. Comparative Historical background (Sergio Della Pergola).- Chapter 3. Latin America (Judit Bokser Liwerant).- Chapter 4. The salutary effects of settings in the lucky country: Jewish families in Australia (Adina Bankier-Karp and David Graham).- Chapter 5. Notions of Agency: Conceptual Paradigms of Gender, Family, and Propriety among Adherents of an Ivorian Neo-Jewish Community (Nathan Paul Devir).- Chapter 6. The Transmutation of the Beta Israel Family in Ethiopia to the Ethiopian Jewish Family in Israel (Shalva Weil).- Chapter 7. Jewish families, Jews and Their Families, Jews in Families in Germany After 1945: Families, Memories, Boundaries, and Love (Dani Krantz).- Chapter 8. Doing Judaism for Family Unity Conversionary in-marriages in the Jewish Community of Helsinki in the 1970s (Mercédesz Czimbalmos).- Chapter 9. Families and (Post) Modernism: Jewish Families in Israel (Sylvie Fogel-Bijaoui and Ruth Katz).- Chapter 10. Single

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Book SynopsisPart 1. Reflections on Jewish Identification.- Chapter 1. Studying Jewish Identity.- Chapter 2. The Place of Jewish Education in American Jewish Identity.- Chapter 3. US Jews and Israel: Distancing, Yet One.- Chapter 4. The Structure of Jewish Identification in the United States: 2001 Revisited.- Chapter 5. Jewish Identification Differentials in the United States and in Israel: A Structural Analysis.- Chapter 6. Demographic and Religious Dimensions of Jewish Identification in the US and in Israel: Millennials in Generational Perspective.- Chapter 7. Jewish Identification in the US and in Other Countries.- Part 2. Reflections on Jewish Demography.- Chapter 8. The Changing Conventional Jewish Family.- Chapter 9. Trends, Coherence and Inconsistencies in Intermarriage.- Chapter 10. The 52 Percent Statistics: Thoughts on Jewish Intermarriage in America.- Chapter 11. End of Jewish/Non-Jewish Dichotomy? Evidence from the 2013 Pew Survey.- Chapter 12. American Jewish Fertility.- Chapter 13. Migration and Aliya from North America.- Chapter 14. How Many Jews in the US? Was It the Demography? A Reassessment.- Chapter 15. How to Read the Pew: A US Jewish Population Estimate for 2023.- Part 3. Reflections on Particularism, Exceptionalism, Conformity.- Chapter 16. Jewish Women in Transition.- Chapter 17. American Orthodox Jews: Demographic Trends and Scenarios.- Chapter 18. Sociodemographic Aspects of Jews of Sephardi and Asian-African Origin in the United States.- Chapter 19. Two Observations on Political Choices, 1980-2020.- Chapter 20. Jews of Color: An American Dilemma.- Chapter 21. Jewish Populations, Migrations, and Identities in the Americas: The Shared and the Particular.- Chapter 22. E Pluribus Unum? E Uno Plures?.

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Book SynopsisPart I: Identity, Community, and Continuity Among American Jews.- Chapter 1 The Transformation of Jewish Identity (the nature of Jewish identity over the sweep of world history).- Chapter 2 The American Jewish Experience in Historical and Contemporary Context (the nature of Jewish identity over the sweep of American history).- Chapter 3 A Geographic, Demographic, and Religious Profile of American Jews (some basic background on the geography, demography, and religiosity of American Jews).- Chapter 4 Jewish Identity in the American Context (an overview of the assimilation of American Jews. Sets forth the framework for the book in terms of a liberal premise and a social contract about what it means to be an American Jew, presents the basic options. Table 4-1 is the theoretical framework of our argument).- Part II: Jewish Options in the United States.- Chapter 5 Reform Judaism: From Left to Right? (traces the history of the institutions of the Reform movement and the opinions of its leaders, examines the opinions of the Reform Jewish laity from 2000 to the present).- Chapter 6 Orthodox Judaism: From Declining to Rising? (traces the history of the institutions of the Orthodox movement and the opinions of its leaders, examines the opinions of the Orthodox Jewish laity from 2000 to the present).- Chapter 7 Zionism: From Classical Zionism to Pro-Israelism? (traces the history of Zionism and how Zionism among American Jews differs from the historical philosophy. examines the opinions of the Zionist Jews from 2000 to the present. For the first time in any research, we are able to distinguish Zionist Jews who are secular from those who are non-secular--that is, identify with one of the denominations in addition to their Zionism.).- Chapter 8 Involvement in Secular Politics: From Left to Center to Right? (examines Jews who express their identity through political involvement in the Democratic Party (for the most part) and liberal causes (for the most part).- Chapter 9 Conservative Judaism: From Right to Left? (traces the history of the institutions of the Conservative movement and the opinions of its leaders, examines the opinions of the Conservative Jewish laity from 2000 to the present).- Chapter 10 The Just Jewish: Opting Out? (examines Jews who do not identify as Orthodox, Conservative and Reform (or other minority denominations, but who still identify as Jewish. For the first time in any research, we are able to distinguish Jews who call themselves "Just Jewish" because their identity as Jews is a peripheral part of their lives to those who call themselves Just Jewish because they simply do not like labels or belonging to specific groups).- Part III: Twenty-first Century Jewish Options and Challenges.- Chapter 11 American Jewry: Past, Present, and Future Challenges to the Continuity of Community and Identity (A summary of the book and some thoughts on the nature of Jewish identity and the future of the American Jewish community.

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