Suchergebnisse

Abstract
This essay aims at exploring Zionist currents that resisted the establishment of a Jewish nation-state, their non-statist vision of Zionism and its roots in Jewish conditions and political traditions, as well as in European anti-statist ideologies and national patterns. First, the non-Zionist diaspora nationalism of Simon Dubnow will be examined, as an important point of reference of non-statist Zionisms; then, the reservations of Ahad Ha'am, founder of "spiritual Zionism", from the vision of a nation-state and the Marxian anti-statism of Ber Borochov and his socialist followers will be observed.
Thereafter, the anarchism of Martin Buber and his followers in the binational factions "Brit Shalom and Ihud" will be discussed; here anti-statism is manifestly theological. Lastly, the current manifestations of non-statist Jewish nationalism will be succinctly explored, focusing on two religious-Zionist rabbis, the late Menachem Fruman and Shimon Gershon Rosenberg, and the American historian David N. Myers.

AbstractMore than seventy years after its publication, Hans Kohn's 1944 The Idea of Nationalism is still regarded as a ground‐breaking contribution to the study of nationalism. This essay is aimed to highlight a significant theme in this work which has largely gone unnoticed, namely, the pivotal role of religion and secularism in Kohn's account of nationalism, and especially, in his persistent struggle for a 'perfect' nationalism. Kohn's conception – and personal experience – of the relationship of nationalism and religion will be examined through several stages of his turbulent life. First, as a young Zionist in Prague, when he parlayed Martin Buber's Zionist creed into an ethnic concept of nationalism. Then, in Kohn's journalistic writing in the 1920s and in his first theoretical works on nationalism in the years 1929–1942. Finally, Kohn's more mature and crystallized account of nationalism in his 1944 book will be revisited from the perspective of the nationalism–religion relationship.

Highlighting the seminal role of German Jewish intellectuals and ideologues in forming and transforming the modern Jewish world, this volume analyzes the political roads taken by German Jewish thinkers; the impact of the Holocaust on the Central and East European Jewish intelligentsia; and the conundrum of modern Jewish identity. Several of German Jewry's most outstanding figures such as Scholem, Strauss, and Kohn are discussed. Inspired by Steven E. Aschheim's work, several contributors focus on the fraught relationship between German and East European Jews (the so-called Ostjuden) and between German Jews and their non-Jewish neighbors. More generally, this book examines how Central European Jewish thinkers reacted to the terrible crises of the twentieth century—to war, genocide, and the existential threat to the very existence of the Jewish people. It is essential reading for those interested in the triumphs and tragedies of modern European Jewry