Human Nature Jewish Thought

Author : Alan L. Mittleman
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 231 pages
File Size : 51,7 Mb
Release : 2017-06-06
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 9780691176277

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Human Nature & Jewish Thought by Alan L. Mittleman Pdf

What Jewish tradition can teach us about human dignity in a scientific age This book explores one of the great questions of our time: How can we preserve our sense of what it means to be a person while at the same time accepting what science tells us to be true—namely, that human nature is continuous with the rest of nature? What, in other words, does it mean to be a person in a world of things? Alan Mittleman shows how the Jewish tradition provides rich ways of understanding human nature and personhood that preserve human dignity and distinction in a world of neuroscience, evolutionary biology, biotechnology, and pervasive scientism. These ancient resources can speak to Jewish, non-Jewish, and secular readers alike. Science may tell us what we are, Mittleman says, but it cannot tell us who we are, how we should live, or why we matter. Traditional Jewish thought, in open-minded dialogue with contemporary scientific perspectives, can help us answer these questions. Mittleman shows how, using sources ranging across the Jewish tradition, from the Hebrew Bible and the Talmud to more than a millennium of Jewish philosophy. Among the many subjects the book addresses are sexuality, birth and death, violence and evil, moral agency, and politics and economics. Throughout, Mittleman demonstrates how Jewish tradition brings new perspectives to—and challenges many current assumptions about—these central aspects of human nature. A study of human nature in Jewish thought and an original contribution to Jewish philosophy, this is a book for anyone interested in what it means to be human in a scientific age.

Author : Jeffrey P. García
Publisher : Brill Schoningh
Page : 341 pages
File Size : 45,5 Mb
Release : 2020-11-13
Category : Human beings
ISBN : 3506704869

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On Human Nature in Early Judaism by Jeffrey P. García Pdf

This book is an analysis of early Jewish thought on human nature, specifically, the complex of characteristics that are understood to be universally innate, and/or God-given, to collective humanity and the manner which they depict human existence in relationship, or lack thereof, to God.Jewish discourse in the Greco-Roman period (4th c. BCE until 1st c. CE) on human nature was not exclusively particularistic, although the immediate concern was often communal-specific. Evidence shows that many of these discussions were also an attempt to grasp a general, or universal, human nature. The focus of this work has been narrowed to three categories that encapsulate the most prevalent themes in Second Temple Jewish texts, namely, creation, composition, and condition.

Author : Harold S. Kushner
Publisher : Random House Digital, Inc.
Page : 224 pages
File Size : 50,6 Mb
Release : 2001
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780805241938

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When Bad Things Happen to Good People by Harold S. Kushner Pdf

Offers an inspirational and compassionate approach to understanding the problems of life, and argues that we should continue to believe in God's fairness.

Author : Harold Coward
Publisher : State University of New York Press
Page : 232 pages
File Size : 40,7 Mb
Release : 2012-02-01
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780791478851

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The Perfectibility of Human Nature in Eastern and Western Thought by Harold Coward Pdf

How perfectible is human nature as understood in Eastern and Western philosophy, psychology, and religion? Harold Coward examines some of the very different answers to this question. He poses that in Western thought, including philosophy, psychology, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, human nature is often understood as finite, flawed, and not perfectible—in religion requiring God's grace and the afterlife to reach the goal. By contrast, Eastern thought arising in India frequently sees human nature to be perfectible and presumes that we will be reborn until we realize the goal—the various yoga psychologies, philosophies, and religions of Hinduism and Buddhism being the paths by which one may perfect oneself and realize release from rebirth. Coward uses the striking differences in the assessment of how perfectible human nature is as the comparative focus for this book.

Author : Joshua Parens
Publisher : University of Chicago Press
Page : 236 pages
File Size : 51,9 Mb
Release : 2012-04-09
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780226645766

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Maimonides & Spinoza by Joshua Parens Pdf

Until the last century, it was generally agreed that Maimonides was a great defender of Judaism, and Spinoza—as an Enlightenment advocate for secularization—among its key opponents. However, a new scholarly consensus has recently emerged that the teachings of the two philosophers were in fact much closer than was previously thought. In his perceptive new book, Joshua Parens sets out to challenge the now predominant view of Maimonides as a protomodern forerunner to Spinoza—and to show that a chief reason to read Maimonides is in fact to gain distance from our progressively secularized worldview. Turning the focus from Spinoza’s oft-analyzed Theologico-Political Treatise, this book has at its heart a nuanced analysis of his theory of human nature in the Ethics. Viewing this work in contrast to Maimonides’s Guide of the Perplexed, it makes clear that Spinoza can no longer be thought of as the founder of modern Jewish identity, nor should Maimonides be thought of as having paved the way for a modern secular worldview. Maimonides and Spinoza dramatically revises our understanding of both philosophers.

Author : Andrew R. Heinze
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 458 pages
File Size : 55,7 Mb
Release : 2006-11-05
Category : History
ISBN : 9780691127750

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Jews and the American Soul by Andrew R. Heinze Pdf

What do Joyce Brothers and Sigmund Freud, Rabbi Harold Kushner and philosopher Martin Buber have in common? They belong to a group of pivotal and highly influential Jewish thinkers who altered the face of modern America in ways few people recognize. So argues Andrew Heinze, who reveals in rich and unprecedented detail the extent to which Jewish values, often in tense interaction with an established Christian consensus, shaped the country's psychological and spiritual vocabulary. Jews and the American Soul is the first book to recognize the central role Jews and Jewish values have played in shaping American ideas of the inner life. It overturns the widely shared assumption that modern ideas of human nature derived simply from the nation's Protestant heritage. Heinze marshals a rich array of evidence to show how individuals ranging from Erich Fromm to Ann Landers changed the way Americans think about mind and soul. The book shows us the many ways that Jewish thinkers influenced everything from the human potential movement and pop psychology to secular spirituality. It also provides fascinating new interpretations of Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, and Western views of the psyche; the clash among Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish moral sensibilities in America; the origins and evolution of America's psychological and therapeutic culture; the role of Jewish women as American public moralists, and more. A must-read for anyone interested in the contribution of Jews and Jewish culture to modern America.

Author : Andrew R. Heinze
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 458 pages
File Size : 47,6 Mb
Release : 2021-03-09
Category : Social Science
ISBN : 9780691227917

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Jews and the American Soul by Andrew R. Heinze Pdf

What do Joyce Brothers and Sigmund Freud, Rabbi Harold Kushner and philosopher Martin Buber have in common? They belong to a group of pivotal and highly influential Jewish thinkers who altered the face of modern America in ways few people recognize. So argues Andrew Heinze, who reveals in rich and unprecedented detail the extent to which Jewish values, often in tense interaction with an established Christian consensus, shaped the country's psychological and spiritual vocabulary. Jews and the American Soul is the first book to recognize the central role Jews and Jewish values have played in shaping American ideas of the inner life. It overturns the widely shared assumption that modern ideas of human nature derived simply from the nation's Protestant heritage. Heinze marshals a rich array of evidence to show how individuals ranging from Erich Fromm to Ann Landers changed the way Americans think about mind and soul. The book shows us the many ways that Jewish thinkers influenced everything from the human potential movement and pop psychology to secular spirituality. It also provides fascinating new interpretations of Sigmund Freud, Alfred Adler, and Western views of the psyche; the clash among Protestant, Catholic, and Jewish moral sensibilities in America; the origins and evolution of America's psychological and therapeutic culture; the role of Jewish women as American public moralists, and more. A must-read for anyone interested in the contribution of Jews and Jewish culture to modern America.

Author : Levy Daniella
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 0 pages
File Size : 43,9 Mb
Release : 2016-03-30
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9659254008

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Letters to Josep by Levy Daniella Pdf

This book is a collection of letters from a religious Jew in Israel to a Christian friend in Barcelona on life as an Orthodox Jew. Equal parts lighthearted and insightful, it's a thorough and entertaining introduction to the basic concepts of Judaism.

Author : Jonathan Boyarin
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 220 pages
File Size : 49,6 Mb
Release : 2020-10-06
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780691207698

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Yeshiva Days by Jonathan Boyarin Pdf

An intimate and moving portrait of daily life in New York's oldest institution of traditional rabbinic learning New York City's Lower East Side has witnessed a severe decline in its Jewish population in recent decades, yet every morning in the big room of the city's oldest yeshiva, students still gather to study the Talmud beneath the great arched windows facing out onto East Broadway. Yeshiva Days is Jonathan Boyarin's uniquely personal account of the year he spent as both student and observer at Mesivtha Tifereth Jerusalem, and a poignant chronicle of a side of Jewish life that outsiders rarely see. Boyarin explores the yeshiva's relationship with the neighborhood, the city, and Jewish and American culture more broadly, and brings vividly to life its routines, rituals, and rhythms. He describes the compelling and often colorful personalities he encounters each day, and introduces readers to the Rosh Yeshiva, or Rebbi, the moral and intellectual head of the yeshiva. Boyarin reflects on the tantalizing meanings of "study for its own sake" in the intellectually vibrant world of traditional rabbinic learning, and records his fellow students' responses to his negotiation of the daily complexities of yeshiva life while he also conducts anthropological fieldwork. A richly mature work by a writer of uncommon insight, wit, and honesty, Yeshiva Days is the story of a place on the Lower East Side with its own distinctive heritage and character, a meditation on the enduring power of Jewish tradition and learning, and a record of a different way of engaging with time and otherness.

Author : Hava Tirosh-Samuelson,Aaron W. Hughes
Publisher : BRILL
Page : 255 pages
File Size : 50,8 Mb
Release : 2014-11-06
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9789004280762

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Lenn E. Goodman: Judaism, Humanity, and Nature by Hava Tirosh-Samuelson,Aaron W. Hughes Pdf

Lenn E. Goodman is Professor of Philosophy and Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. Trained in medieval Arabic and Hebrew philosophy and intellectual history, his prolific scholarship has covered the entire history of philosophy from antiquity to the present with a focus on medieval Jewish philosophy. A synthetic philosopher, Goodman has drawn on Jewish religious sources (e.g., Bible, Midrash, Mishnah, and Talmud) as well as philosophic sources (Jewish, Muslim, and Christian), in an attempt to construct his own distinctive theory about the natural basis of morality and justice. Taking his cue from medieval Jewish philosophers such as Maimonides, Goodman offers a new theoretical framework for Jewish communal life that is attentive to contemporary philosophy and science.

Author : Frederick E. Greenspahn
Publisher : Yeshiva University Press
Page : 288 pages
File Size : 44,6 Mb
Release : 1986
Category : Religion
ISBN : UVA:X001156497

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The Human Condition in the Jewish and Christian Traditions by Frederick E. Greenspahn Pdf

Author : Robert M. Seltzer
Publisher : Unknown
Page : 904 pages
File Size : 54,5 Mb
Release : 1980
Category : History
ISBN : UOM:39015054077840

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Jewish People, Jewish Thought by Robert M. Seltzer Pdf

This classic survey of the main features of the Jewish historical landscape exposes students to the rich scholarly literature on Jewish history, theology, philosophy, mysticism, and social thought that has been produced in the last century and a half. It shows Judaism as a creative response to ultimate issues of human concern by members of a group that has faced a unique concatenation of political, economic, and geographical circumstances. -- From product description.

Author : Sarit Kattan Gribetz
Publisher : Princeton University Press
Page : 408 pages
File Size : 45,6 Mb
Release : 2022-08-09
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780691242095

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Time and Difference in Rabbinic Judaism by Sarit Kattan Gribetz Pdf

How the rabbis of late antiquity used time to define the boundaries of Jewish identity The rabbinic corpus begins with a question–“when?”—and is brimming with discussions about time and the relationship between people, God, and the hour. Time and Difference in Rabbinic Judaism explores the rhythms of time that animated the rabbinic world of late antiquity, revealing how rabbis conceptualized time as a way of constructing difference between themselves and imperial Rome, Jews and Christians, men and women, and human and divine. In each chapter, Sarit Kattan Gribetz explores a unique aspect of rabbinic discourse on time. She shows how the ancient rabbinic texts artfully subvert Roman imperialism by offering "rabbinic time" as an alternative to "Roman time." She examines rabbinic discourse about the Sabbath, demonstrating how the weekly day of rest marked "Jewish time" from "Christian time." Gribetz looks at gendered daily rituals, showing how rabbis created "men's time" and "women's time" by mandating certain rituals for men and others for women. She delves into rabbinic writings that reflect on how God spends time and how God's use of time relates to human beings, merging "divine time" with "human time." Finally, she traces the legacies of rabbinic constructions of time in the medieval and modern periods. Time and Difference in Rabbinic Judaism sheds new light on the central role that time played in the construction of Jewish identity, subjectivity, and theology during this transformative period in the history of Judaism.

Author : Alan Mittleman
Publisher : Oxford University Press
Page : 252 pages
File Size : 48,9 Mb
Release : 2018
Category : Religion
ISBN : 9780198796497

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Holiness in Jewish Thought by Alan Mittleman Pdf

Holiness is a challenge for contemporary Jewish thought. The concept of holiness is crucial to religious discourse in general and to Jewish discourse in particular. Holiness seems to express an important feature of religious thought and of religious ways of life. Yet the concept is ill defined. This collection explores what concepts of holiness were operative in different periods of Jewish history and bodies of Jewish literature and offers preliminary reflections on their theological and philosophical import today. The contributors illumine some of the major episodes concerning holiness in the history of the development in the Jewish tradition. They are challenged to think about the problems and potential implicit in Judaic concepts of holiness, to make them explicit, and to try to retrieve the concepts for contemporary theological and philosophical reflection. Not all of the contributors push into philosophical and theological territory, but they all provide resources for the reader to do so. Holiness is elusive but it need not be opaque. This volume makes Jewish concepts of holiness lucid, accessible, and intellectually engaging.

Author : Lenn Evan Goodman
Publisher : Yale University Press
Page : 318 pages
File Size : 52,8 Mb
Release : 1991-01-01
Category : Philosophy
ISBN : 0300049439

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On Justice by Lenn Evan Goodman Pdf

What is fair? How and when can punishment be legitimate? Is there recompense for human suffering? How can we understand ideas about immortality or an afterlife in the context of critical thinking on the human condition? In this book L. E. Goodman presents the first general theory of justice in this century to make systematic use of the Jewish sources and to bring them into a philosophical dialogue with the leading ethical and political texts of the Western tradition. Goodman takes an ontological approach to questions of natural and human justice, developing a theory of community and of nonvindictive yet retributive punishment that is grounded in careful analysis of various Jewish sources--biblical, rabbinic, and philosophical, His exegesis of these sources allow Plato, Kant, and Rawls to join in a discourse with Spinoza and medieval rationalists, such as Saasidah and Maimonides, who speak in a very different idiom but address many of the same themes. Drawing on sources old and new, Jewish and non-Jewish, Goodman offers fresh perspectives on important moral and theological issues that will be of interest to both Jewish and secular philosophers.