Conversion to Judaism

Legal pluralism is a useful framework for analysing church-state relationships. Often overlooked, legal diversity also exists within religions. This article examines the interactions between the two. It discusses how church-state arrangements influence the internal legal pluralism of religious systems: how religious actors' depictions of church-state arrangements impact their self-perception of internal legal diversity. Understanding these often-overlooked nuanced and complex influences has descriptive and normative significance. This argument is demonstrated by analysing a case study: the modern transformations of a hyper-pluralistic doctrine in Jewish law, named 'Kim-Li'. Modern legal centralism rendered rabbinical reluctance towards its application. The article reveals the correlation between rabbinical interpretations of the doctrine and particular assumptions and aspirations regarding church-state structures. By employing legal pluralism/law and religion classifications, the article suggests that reactions to the 'shadow of the state' are more diverse and nuanced than the current literature foresees, and concludes by suggesting its rectification.

Many of us are familiar with the Talmudic saying by Rava, a 4 th generation Talmudic sage, "Rava said: A person is obligated to become intoxicated with wine on Purim until he is so intoxicated 1 that he does not know how to distinguish between 'cursed is Haman' and 'blessed is Mordecai.'" However, less are familiar with the Talmud and Rabbis's push-back against this bacchanalibus, a licentious underscoring of Purim. ...

Much thanks to the well-done partial translation available in Sefaria. The use of Sefaria, Wikipedia (especially for blue-noted Wiki biographies, The Jastrow dictionary, Bar Ilan Database-among many other resources-I could not have accomplished this task.

In August 1412, Gerónimo de Santa Fe, a recently Jewish convert to Christianity who was formerly known as Joshua ha-Lorki (i.e. of Lorca), submitted a 12-chapter polemical treatise titled Ad convincendum perfidiam Iudaeorum ('To Prove the Perfidy of the Jews') to the anti-pope Benedict XIII. The purpose of this treatise was to demonstrate how Talmudic and other Jewish homiletical sources substantiate the assertion that the Messiah has already come, and that the conditions under which the true Messiah should be examined were thoroughly fulfilled in Jesus Christ. Nearly all the excerpts in this treatise are taken from the magnum opus of a 13 th century Dominican friar named Raymundus Martini-Pugio fidei ('Dagger of Faith'). This is to a large extent a monumental collection of rabbinical texts designed to serve as a handbook for the Christian polemicist. Ha-Lorki composed his treatise as an outline for what would become one of the milestones in the pre-expulsion decline of Spanish Jewrya public debate later known as the Tortosa disputation (named for the Catalonian city where it was located). This debate of 69 sessions, took place between February 1413 and November 1414 in the presence of the pope, high clergymen and other notables, alongside many local residents. Aragonese and Catalan Jewish communities were ordered by the pope to send their representatives to the papal curia in Tortosa, no later than January 15 th 1413. They appointed roughly 20 people who

English Abstract
In the 19th and early 20th centuries, rabbis serving in Egypt developed a halakhic policy affirming the acceptance into the Jewish community of a non-Jew married to a Jewish partner, via a welcoming conversion (giyyur). In this paper I present and discuss the very different attitudes to this policy of two Jerusalemite rabbis who served as Chief Judges of the Cairo Rabbinical court: Rabbi Hananya Gavriel (1925-1929) and Rabbi Ovadia Yosef (1947-1950)

HEBREW ABSTRACT
מאמצע המאה ה-19 ועד לאמצע המאה ה-20 זכתה מצרים כולה לפריחה כלכלית, והקהילה היהודית שם הפכה לקהילה רב-גוונית ומשגשגת, עם שילובים מעניינם ומפתיעים בין מחוייבות למסורת היהודית (מחד גיסא) ובין טמיעה תרבותית והתבוללות חברתית (מאידך גיסא). בתקופה זאת השכילו ראשי הקהילות היהודיות להעסיק שורה מרשימה של תלמידי חכמים בכירים בתפקידי מפתח כרבנים ראשיים וכדיינים. אחד מן האתגרים הבולטים שבפניהם נצבו חכמי הלכה 'מצריים' אלו היה, ריבוי המקרים של זוגיות מעורבת בין יהודי/ה ונכרי/ה. מדיניותם היתה, שאם בת או בן הזוג הנכרי מבקשים להתגייר, יש לאפשר זאת, ובכך לחלץ את הצד היהודי מן האיסור החמור של נישואי תערובת, ולאפשר לילדים שלהם לגדול כיהודים במשפחה שבה שני ההורים הם יהודים. עם הגעת רב מחו"ל למלא תפקיד רבני במצרים, הוא נתוודע למדיניות הגיור הנהוגה שם, וגיבש עמדה כלפיה.
במאמר זה, אני דן בעמדותיהם של שני חכמים ספרדים ירושלמים, אשר הגיעו במאה העשרים למצרים על מנת לכהן כאב בית הדין של הקהילה היהודית בקהיר. האחד מהם, הרב חנניא גבריאל, מילא תפקיד זה בשנים 1925 – 1929. הגם שהיה תלמיד חכם רציני ומילא שורה של תפקידים ציבוריים בכירים, שמו ידוע כיום למתי מעט, והוא לא זכה לעיסוק מחקרי ביצירתו התורנית. החכם הירושלמי השני כיהן כאב בית דין קהיר בשנים 1947 – 1950; הוא זכה לתשומת לב ציבורית ומחקרית מרובה, ושמו נישא בפי כל: הרב עובדיה יוסף.
כל אחד מחכמים אלו כתב כמה תשובות שבהן מתגלית היטב התייחסותו למדיניות של גיור הצד הנכרי בנישואי תערובת, שהיתה רווחת במצרים. במאמר נציג וננתח את התשובות של כל אחד מחכמים אלו, ודיוננו יהיה על פי סדר השנים, תרתי משמע: נתחיל מחכם גבריאל, אשר הגיע לקהיר באמצע שנות העשרים והוא במיטב שנותיו, בהיותו בן 50 שנה. לאחר מכן נעיין בתשובות שחיבר בקהיר הרב עובדיה יוסף, אשר הגיע לשם לקראת סוף שנות הארבעים והוא ממש בראשית דרכו הציבורית. בחלק האחרון של המאמר נדון בהבדלים שבין העמדות של שני חכמים אלו, וננסה להבין את השורשים של הבדלים אלו.

The religious conversion process is a significant expression of an individual’s intention to gain a new religious identity and be included in a particular religious community. Those who wish to join the Jewish people undergo giyur (conversion), which includes observing rituals and religious practices. While previous research on Jewish conversions in Israel focused on the experiences of persons who converted under
Orthodox auspices, this study analyzes the experiences of female immigrants from the former Soviet Union (FSU) and the Philippines who chose to convert through the Reform Movement in Israel. Based on qualitative research, we discovered that the non-Orthodox process, which is based on liberal values, not only grants converts under the aegis of Reform entry to the Jewish people, but promotes their affiliation
with the Reform Movement and advances their acculturation into Jewish Israeli society. Their choice is a political decision, an act of resistance against an Orthodox Israeli religious monopoly, and an expression of spiritual motivations. The converts become social agents who strengthen the Reform Movement’s socio-political position in Israel, where it struggles against discrimination. Furthermore, since most converts are women, new intersections between religion, gender, and nationality are exposed.

Wer ist nach gängiger Auffassung Jude? Unwissenheit ist oft der Hintergrund gequälter Formulierungen wie „ein Mitbürger jüdischen Glaubens“ oder der peinlichen Frage: „Bist du Deutscher oder Jude?“ Die Autoren zeigen, daß der Begriff „jüdische Identität“ nicht leicht zu fassen ist. In ihrem aufklärenden Buch zum Thema Konversion geben sie keine Anleitung zum Übertritt, es geht ihnen vielmehr darum, Aspekte der Geschichte und religiösen Lehre ebenso zu vermitteln wie die Entscheidungswege von Menschen, die den bewußten Weg ins Judentum gegangen sind.

Whom do Jews consider to be Jewish? Is one born a Jew? Does one have a choice? Marriage, religious conviction, feelings of guilt in the face of history have all been reasons for seeking membership of the Jewish community. What are the practical issues for someone wishing to convert to Judaism? International contributors describe in this volume the manifold theological, legal, sociological, and psychological aspects to the phenomenon of the new children of Abraham, and people who have confronted this issue in their own lives tell their stories.

Established in 1961 in Madrid, the Amistad Judeo-Cristiana strove to promote a dialogue between Catholic and Jewish Spaniards. The article accounts for the Amistad's origins and its development, explaining the critical impact of the Second Vatican Council, which allowed for the eventual formal recognition of Madrid's Jewish community by the Franco regime. The support received by a sector of the Spanish ecclesiastical hierarchy permitted the association to embark on a campaign to purge school textbooks from anti-Jewish content, and to condemn blood-libel traditions that were still very much alive in Spanish popular culture. The article argues that the experiences and activities of the Amistad Judeo-Cristiana should be included within the larger historiographical trend that highlights the role played by civil society in helping pave the way for the Spanish transition to democracy.

The earliest systematic Jewish polemical treatises against Christianity were written in Judeo-Arabic by Jews living in Muslim ruled countries, most likely in the Syro-Iraq area, and Sarah Stroumsa has contributed greatly to our knowledge of these compositions.* The ninth-century Dāwūd al-Muqammaṣ, the first identifiable medieval Jewish philosopher, wrote two short treatises against Christianity, of which only fragments survive; in addition, he included much anti-Christian material in his pioneering philosophical work ʿIshrūn maqāla (Twenty Chapters). The anonymous Qiṣṣat mujadalat al-usqūf (rendered as "The Account of the Disputation of the Priest" in Lasker and Stroumsa, The Polemic of Nestor the Priest), also composed in the ninth century, is the earliest complete extant anti-Christian polemic. Other Jewish writers in the Islamicate world included criticisms of Christianity and defenses of Jewish doctrines against Christian claims in their theological and exegetical works. Thus, the history of Jewish anti-Christian polemics began in the Islamic period when there was no organized public Christian mission to the Jews.1

This article presents, for the first time in the literature, the Israeli Chief Rabbinate’s policy on conversion to Judaism during the past seventy years. It focuses on the conversion policy applied to immigrants who are non-Jewish according to Jewish (Orthodox) parameters. The article’s main question is: what was the rabbinical establishment’s policy regarding the conversion of non-Jewish immigrants? Did the Israeli establishment encourage non-Jewish immigrants to convert to Judaism so that they could fully join the Jewish majority society, or did it, on the contrary, raise the level of requirements and make it difficult for them to convert? This question reflects a deeper one: How did the establishment of the State of Israel affect Israeli halakhic ruling? Was the creation of a Jewish sovereign state halakhicly significant for the Israeli rabbis? The main argument presented in this study is that the halakhic policy of conversion was indeed deeply influenced by the state, and that Israeli halakhic ruling has unique characteristics distinguishing it from Orthodox rulings in the Diaspora. At first sight, this claim is not new; many scholars have already demonstrated “Religious Zionist influence” on halakhic rulings on conversion to Judaism as well as on other issues. The exposure of new sources in this article reinforces this claim by providing further in depth scholarly analysis of this topic. At the same time, this article will also point out the limitations of this claim by revealing Zionist rabbis’ difficulties in applying Israeli halakha. Finally, while the Ultra-Orthodox’s influence on contempoary struggles over conversion in Israel today is well known, this article shows that as much as the Ultra-Orthodox have influenced the state’s policies on conversion, the state has in turn shaped the Ultra-Orthodox’s views

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for discussing the premises of this article with me, to Prof. Roth and Prof. Rubenstein for reading drafts of the article, and to Dine Israel's anonymous reviewer for the generous, constructive peer-review comments. I would also like to thank Prof. Suzanne Last Stone and The Consortium in Jewish Studies and Legal Theory. 1 One might conjecture that the meaning of ḥavalot might be resolved on the basis of whether the term should be read as ḥavalot or ḥabbalot, with the former referring to pledges and the latter to injuries. However, Michael Sokoloff, A Dictionary of Jewish Babylonian Aramaic (Ramat Gan: Bar Ilan University Press, 2002) defines ḥ-v-l as both to take a pledge or surety and to injure; Ben Yehuda, A Complete Dictionary of Ancient and Modern Hebrew, v. II (New York: Yoseloff, 1960) defines ḥavala as a bodily injury (citing our mishnah as an example) and ḥ-v-l as both to injure and to take a pledge, and also see Ernest Klein, A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language (Jerusalem: Carta, 1987).

How do we understand the representational violence done to black women? How has that radiated outward in other forms of opression and violence? In this paper I argue that Patricia Hill Collins five major tropes have theological and ethical significance, and as such require a theological account of the ways in which one might represent another human being.

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Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-pardes-2001-2-page-9.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info.

Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-pardes-2011-1-page-59.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info. Pardè s n° 49 59 Les trois universels judaïques Prolégomènes à l'histoire de l'universel dans la judaïcité Shmuel Trigano U ne traDition intellectuelle, bien établie depuis des siècles, et qui semble faire corps avec l'évidence, assigne la condition juive au particularisme, à une identité close et solitaire. si l'on en cherche au plus loin les origines, on aboutit à un type de conscience juive qui s'est cristallisée pour toujours à l'époque hellénistique et qui mériterait d'être sondée en tant que telle. deux figures l'illustrent : le philosophe Philon d'Alexandrie et l'apôtre Paul 1. dans leurs épousailles symboliques avec le logos grec, ces penseurs imaginent un partage entre israël et les nations suivant la ligne du particulier et de l'universel, héritant de schémas de pensée de la philosophie stoïcienne, un partage dans lequel les Juifs assument la condition d'un particulier inextricablement articulé à un universel grec. Cette perspective était à la fois un choix et une démission : les Juifs de cette époque étaient confrontés en effet à la puissance militaire de l'empire gréco-macédonien, derrière laquelle se pressait la puissance romaine : leur indépendance était forclose. Mais si les Juifs ont pu un jour se rebeller contre rome, ou, auparavant, contre Antiochus Épiphane, un monarque héritier de la décomposition de l'empire d'Alexandre, c'est que cette puissance n'était point absolue au point que les vaincus ne puissent que se soumettre. N'oublions pas en effet, ce que l'histoire confirme, que les Juifs étaient démographiquement nombreux sur tout le pourtour de la Méditerranée (rappelons la révolte ultérieure contre le pouvoir de rome, en diaspora, en Cyrénaïque en 115-117). N'oublions pas que leurs puissantes culture et religion pouvaient regarder de haut l'ordre symbolique impérial au point de récuser toute participation au culte civique qu'était le culte de l'empereur ou du potentat local. en cela, il y eut « démission ». en choisissant l'« universel », pensé dans les termes de la Grèce puis de rome (pour Paul), Philon autant que Paul choisissaient de se soumettre à

Only a few of the Rishonim related to the distinction between 'Commandments between Man and God' and 'Commandments between Man and his Fellow'. Prominent among them is R. Isaac Abarbanel. Abarbanel's position about the distinction between commandments is dichotomous. In his opinion, religious and social commandments should be separated. This attitude is derived from Abarbanel's general view, which perceives reality as composed of separate entities: the metaphysical differs from the physical, and the divine from the natural. This article attempts to examine how Abarbanel's normative duality integrates with a theistic, ethical, and political dualism.

The redundancy problem of Ahavat Yisrael combined with Ahavat ha-Ger is compounded by a certain paradox of praxis. As an extension of Mishnah Bava Metzia 58b, one is not supposed to identify nor treat a convert post-conversion as different from a born Jew, and yet the mitzvah of Ahavat ha-Ger demands specialized and preferential treatment.

Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-pardes-2007-2-page-65.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info. Quand les femmes interprètent la loi Le paradigme des filles de Tsélofrad dans la Bible SONIA SARAH LIPSYC EN GUISE D'INTRODUCTION, L'ENSEIGNEMENT DES FEMMES PROPHÉTESSES… Le Talmud 1 identifie sept prophétesses qui auraient vécu dans les temps bibliques entre le XVIII e siècle et le V e siècle avant l'Ère vulgaire : Sarah, Myriam, Déborah, Hanna, Abigail, Houlda et Esther 2. La majorité d'entre elles furent également impliquées dans l'enseignement de la Torah. Mais cet enseignement se donne le plus souvent à lire entre les lignes, reste inlassablement à creuser et à mettre en valeur. Il est ainsi emblématique de cette place accordée à l'enseignement des femmes dans la Bible et la tradition juive. « Avraham convertissait les hommes et Sarah les femmes » énonce le Midrach 3 sur l'un des versets de la Genèse et Rachi (1040-1105) de poursuivre «de sorte que le verset leur en tient compte comme s'ils avaient "fait" ces âmes 4 ». Avraham et Sarah sont à pied d'égalité dans la transmission du message monothéiste qu'ils incarnent l'un et l'autre mais le premier enseigne aux hommes et la seconde aux femmes. Il s'instruit ici, dans cette vision que le Midrach rapporte et/ou induit, une non-mixité peu souvent démentie dans l'enseignement de la Torah aux adultes au cours des siècles et jusqu'à nos jours, au sein du judaïsme orthodoxe. La littérature midrachique relate également que, durant les quarante ans passés dans le désert, Myriam enseignait aux femmes 5 alors que son frère Moïse transmettait aux hommes le savoir dont il était le passeur. De Déborah, le texte biblique dit clairement qu'elle « gouvernait Israël […] et qu'assise sous un palmier entre Rama et Beth El, […] c'est à elle que les enfants d'Israël s'adressaient pour obtenir justice 6 ». Cependant PARDÈS N°43

The recent debate regarding the eligibility of converts to Judaism (gerim) to sit on a beṯ din – a judicial panel – is unexpected. In the 19th century, when rabbis first begin to answer questions about whether or not gerim may serve on panels for the conversion of other potential gerim, the tone is consistently one of surprise: the answer was an obvious yes. In later reflections, however, the tone shifts, with increasing demands for definitive proof that no prohibition exists. But such a proof has been hard to articulate based on the classical sources. This article contends that the eligibility of a ger to sit on a beṯ din was at one point obvious because such acceptance mirrors a central characteristic of classical Jewish judicial culture, which rests on welcoming strangeness and, hence, human strangers. Truth was understood to arrive through a gap rent in the familiarity that ordinarily rests between members of a community.

Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-pardes-2012-2-page-199.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info.

Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. Distribution électronique Cairn.info pour In Press. La reproduction ou représentation de cet article, notamment par photocopie, n'est autorisée que dans les limites des conditions générales d'utilisation du site ou, le cas échéant, des conditions générales de la licence souscrite par votre établissement. Toute autre reproduction ou représentation, en tout ou partie, sous quelque forme et de quelque manière que ce soit, est interdite sauf accord préalable et écrit de l'éditeur, en dehors des cas prévus par la législation en vigueur en France. Il est précisé que son stockage dans une base de données est également interdit. Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse Article disponible en ligne à l'adresse https://www.cairn.info/revue-pardes-2013-2-page-49.htm Découvrir le sommaire de ce numéro, suivre la revue par email, s'abonner... Flashez ce QR Code pour accéder à la page de ce numéro sur Cairn.info.

The aim of this e-book is to offer concise but also comprehensive view on the learned music repertoire of Italian Jews after the fall of the ghettos and the beginning of the Emancipation. Virtually all Italian Jewish communities, while officially sticking to rabbinical orthodoxy, made several changes in their synagogue rituals, mostly with the introduction of choirs and the organ, and giving the birth to a complex and fascinating (as largely unexplored so far) Jewish learned "music Commonwealth" with scores that circulated broadly in Italy and abroad.

A small group of six local Christians make their way through the city of Córdoba, a major urban center of al-Andalus (Muslim-ruled area in the Iberian Peninsula) that is located approximately two hundred fifty miles south of Madrid. They quietly walk by the Great Mosque, possibly glimpsing the "Visigothic" arches built by Christians that punctuate the mosque, giving it its unique appearance. After passing through the dusty market stands, they find themselves at the threshold of the Cordovan Court with one thing one their minds: gaining their eternal crowns. They would soon arrive at the feet of the Muslim Judge (or qadi) of the Cordovan Court and begin their professions of faith. A typical Christian profession at this court during the mid-ninth century went as follows: Confessing Christ to be truly God, we declare your prophet to be a precursor of Antichrist and the author of a profane dogma. We grieve, knowing the eternal torments that you, infected with the lethal venom of his prophecy and pledged to the virulent preaching of the devil, will presently suffer, and we bemoan your blindness and ignorance. 1 Insulting the Muslim prophet, Muhammad, was a direct insult to the ruling Muslim religion and community in ninth-century Córdoba. This act was deemed to be blasphemy and was not only considered illegal but also a crime that demanded the penalty of death. Although the circumstances varied, deliberate acts of blasphemy, as well as the "stroke of a raging sword [of decapitation] as a result of their testimony to the truth," was the fate that thirty-three of the fortyeight Christian martyrs faced between 850-859 in Córdoba. 2

This article is a piece of microhistorical research of a court case investigating religious conversion in Russia in the 1820s. It presents the story of an Orthodox Christian girl who adopted ”Jewish law” and married a Jewish man. The article attempts to define the background and peculiarities of the conversion and clarify the context in which this was taking place. The work uses various methods: narrative, comparative, contextual analysis, text interpretation, etc. Analysis of the court case establishes that the girl’s change of faith was the result of: (1) close contacts with the Jews and lack of social ties within the Christian community; (2) poverty and extremely low social status; (3) lack of “religious capital”. Jewish social assistance practices, ways to legalize a new status, finding a job, and personal freedom turned out to be attractive to the serf woman. The novelty of this study involves the introduction of a previously unknown archival source representing a very rare phenomenon of conversion to Judaism in imperial Russia. In addition, the article presents the paradoxical case of an attempt at re-socialization by transitioning from the dominant confession to the faith of a religious minority and integration into a community whose rights in Russia were heavily curtailed.

In 849 forty-eight Christians were executed in the city of Córdoba for disparaging Islam and insulting the Prophet Muhammad. The Memoriale Sanctorum describes in detail the executions of the martyrs for capital violations of Islamic law, namely blasphemy and apostasy. With few exceptions, the Christians appeared before Muslim authorities while * Two different versions of this paper were delivered at the Conference "Global Encounters: Legacies of Exchange and Conflict" at UNC, Chapel Hill on 14 November 2008 and at the sixth biennial conference of the Society for the Medieval Mediterranean (SMM), Barcelona 8-11 July 2019. Research for this paper was made possible by a Veritas grant from Villanova University. I am indebted to Felix María Arocena Solano and several anonymous readers for their valuable help. All mistakes remain my own.

To the memory of my father Baxter Keyt Wolf, a different kind of artist *** I would also like to express my gratitude to Robert Burns, S.J., for bringing the manuscript to the attention of Cambridge University Press as well as for his continuous support of the project over the last six years. Raphael Jiménez Pedrajas, too, deserves recognition for his gracious assistance. My father and mother contributed in an indirect but formative way by fostering the discipline and confidence that would see me through the project. Much more intimate was the involvement of my wife, Mary Kashmar, who saw the work and its author through every one of its ups and downs. Finally I would like to acknowledge Stanford University and the Whiting Foundation, both of which provided me with the financial support needed to expedite the completion of the manuscript.

Talmudic literature documents a sharp debate among the tannaim regarding the legitimacy of the process of compromise or, to be more precise, of the process of bitsu‘a. This dispute appears in a well-known passage in Tosefta Sanhedrin, chapter 1, and in both Talmuds (y.Sanh. 1:1 [18b], b.Sanh. 6b), and is also mentioned briefly in Sifre Deuteronomy §17. Even upon first glance it can be seen that the debate assumes a principled character, relating to goals and values that lie at the very basis of the judicial process: truth, peace, and justice. Examination of the toseftan passage reveals that it is a well-fashioned and well-edited unit that not only presents positions but also discussion of the legal questions relating to compromise and the goal of the judicial process. However, this passage requires clarification and interpretation. First of all, concerning what kind of compromise, precisely, is there disagreement? Does it refer to every process of compromise or only to a particular ...

To the memory of my father Baxter Keyt Wolf, a different kind of artist *** I would also like to express my gratitude to Robert Burns, S.J., for bringing the manuscript to the attention of Cambridge University Press as well as for his continuous support of the project over the last six years. Raphael Jiménez Pedrajas, too, deserves recognition for his gracious assistance. My father and mother contributed in an indirect but formative way by fostering the discipline and confidence that would see me through the project. Much more intimate was the involvement of my wife, Mary Kashmar, who saw the work and its author through every one of its ups and downs. Finally I would like to acknowledge Stanford University and the Whiting Foundation, both of which provided me with the financial support needed to expedite the completion of the manuscript.

The last king of Ḥimyar, Yūsuf Asʾar Yathʾar (reign 522-525 AD), is famously known as the Jewish persecutor of the Christians of South Arabia, most notably the ones in Najrān, who were martyred in the autumn of 523 AD. In Islamic literature, the king was known as Dhū Nuwās and became associated with the aṣḥāb al-ukhdūd "the People of the Trench" mentioned in Q85:4-10. The article surveys the Islamic Arabic literature about Dhū Nuwās and the Martyrs of Najrān from its beginnings until the fifteenth century AD, and tries to establish literary relationships between the sources as well as literary typologies in the rich and overwhelming literature. Throughout the survey, attention is given to how different Muslim writers have dealt with the Pre-Islamic 'Abrahamitic' past of Arabia in forming the Islamic narrative of history.

Rabbi Michael Gold1 was raised in an ethnically Jewish, but anti-religious home. His mother disdained observant Jews, claiming that they were “more interested in the law than in people. ” Needless to say she was disappointed when her son dropped out of graduate school to begin rabbinic studies at the Jewish Theological Seminary. After failing to convince her son to

Donato Manduzio was a Southern Italian peasant who only learned how to read and write in his early thirties, while convalescing in a military hospital during the First World War. Upon his return to San Nicandro Garganico, his reading of the Bible and the visions he experienced led him to believe that Judaism surpassed all other religions. As he was convinced that the Jewish people had disappeared from earth, he thought God had given him the mission of recreating His people. After chancing to discover the existence of organized Jewish communities in Italy, Manduzio set about obtaining an official conversion for himself and about seventy of his followers. This paper endeavors to shed light on the circumstances of this collective conversion and to elucidate its causes by examining its historical and sociological contexts.

The Torah recounts numerous times the mitzvah of Ahavat haGer,  which literally means the love of the stranger or sojourner, though is primarily understood in Jewish legal sources to refer more specifically to loving the convert to Judaism.  Furthermore, the Torah commands us that “you shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Leviticus 19:18), and also charges us to love God (Deuteronomy 6:4), creating multiple duties of love as halakhic obligations.  This article will explore the question: When does the duty to love the convert commence and does it impact the conversion process?  Does it apply only to a newly converted Jew, or to a Noachide who is in the process of converting, or even to a Gentile who has expressed an interest in converting?

This study investigates definiteness marking in earlier stages of Arabic, based on a corpus of Classical Arabic idols' names attested in technical prose. The latter mentions not only Arabic idols, the names of which bear definite markers, but also the tribal units that worshipped them. Relying upon attestations of this sort, the present study investigates the areal distribution of definiteness marking in earlier stages of Arabic. Finally, it compares the results of such an investigation with the current knowledge on the areal distribution of definiteness marking in earlier stages of Arabic, based on epigraphic and dialectological evidence.

Warder Cresson was born to a prominent Quaker family in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,...Warder's family members were successful artisans and entrepreneurs who owned prime real estate on Chestnut Street in the center of Philadelphia as well as farmland in the surrounding countryside. When he was 17, Warder went to work on the family farms. Within a few years, he became the head of a very successful farming enterprise. Yet Warder had interests beyond agriculture and finances. In 1827, he began to publicly question some of the fundamental tenets of Quakerism, and he did so in writing. In his first religious tract, "A Humble and Affectionate Address to the Select Members of the Abington Quarterly Meeting," he criticized the religious leaders of his day while showing both his knowledge of Scriptures and his grasp of the social issues of his time. In 1830, he published a pamphlet entitled "Babylon the Great Is Falling! The Morning Star, or Light from on High." In it, he bemoaned the extravagance and misdeeds of those around him and exhorted all Quakers to lead better and more focused lives. Around this time, he went through a period of strong religious upheaval. He left Quakerism and subsequently joined various different sects, each