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Recent Announcements by category:
Scholarships, Fellowships, Grants and Prizes
Conferences, Workshops and Calls for Papers
Positions Available
News and Events
New Books and Journals
by EAJS-Web-1
EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2015/16
REPORT
‘The Other Within’ – The Hebrew and Jewish Collections of the John Rylands Library
John Rylands Research Institute, John Rylands Library, University of Manchester, 27-29 June 2016
Convener: Dr Katharina E. Keim, John Rylands Research Institute, University of Manchester
The conference, entitled ‘The Other Within’ – The Hebrew and Jewish Collections of the John Rylands Library, convened an international group of scholars and curators at the University of Manchester’s historic John Rylands Library. Organised by Dr Katharina E Keim in collaboration with staff at the John Rylands Research Institute and the John Rylands Library, the conference met on 27-29 June 2016 to advance the study of the Library’s important Hebrew and Jewish collections. The event brought 60 delegates from Europe, Israel, and North America to Manchester, and support from the EAJS Conference Grant Programme enabled the organising team to offer bursaries to doctoral candidates and early career researchers. An evening Public Lecture opened the programme up to a wider audience of academics from related disciplines as well as to the general public.
Event Rationale
Despite the wealth of Hebraica and Judaica collections in European libraries, the scholarly networks and codicological and book-historical expertise required to study them fully are insufficiently cultivated in European academic institutions. This conference sought to address this by convening scholars and curators from across the UK, Europe, Israel, and North America to study the John Rylands Library’s collections and their relationship to others. As the John Rylands Library’s collections span late antiquity to the twentieth century, the Library provides the ideal forum to gather researchers with different fields of expertise with a common cause. In-house research, curatorial, imaging and collection care teams provide the optimum setting.
Event Programme
Overview: The conference programme was designed to bring scholars and curators from a wide range of disciplines together to study the Hebraica and Judaica collections at the John Rylands Library and bring them into conversation with related collections internationally.
This intense two-and-a-half-day meeting took place in the Historic Reading Room of the John Rylands Library. The 24 papers presented by 26 presenters were grouped into 10 themed sessions that showcased the diversity within the Rylands’ collections. All conference sessions were held in the same room, allowing participants to be present for all papers and for the discussion to develop throughout the programme. The conference schedule included ample opportunity for further exchange over coffee breaks and lunches provided, and the conference was enhanced by two collections encounters with Hebrew printed books and manuscripts that were curated and presented by Rylands archivists and curators Elizabeth Gow, Julianne Simpson, and John Hodgson. The conference was attended by a total of 60 participants, who were joined by a further 40 members of the public for the Public Keynote Lecture delivered by Sarit Shalev-Eyni.
The use of the John Rylands Library as a conference venue also allowed participants to benefit from proximity to the special collections, and a significant number of the participants took advantage of the opportunity to conduct research on important and understudied items in these collections during their visit. The Rylands also hosts two exhibition spaces that contained a number of items of significance to the discussion during the conference. The special exhibition on ‘Magic, Witches & Devils in the Early Modern World’ contained a number of items from our Gaster collections, and included magical texts and amulets. The Rylands Gallery also featured two cases curated by Stefania Silvestri, Katharina E. Keim, and Elizabeth Gow on Jewish life in the ancient, medieval, and modern world, and featured some of the earliest known fragments of the book of Deuteronomy in Greek (dating to 200 BCE), and an Amidah written on rice paper from the Jewish community of Hunan, China.
Session 1 focussed on Jewish Books: Production and Reception. Emile Schrijver (University of Amsterdam) offered a comprehensive overview of the history of the Jewish book from manuscript to print, with particular emphasis on seventeenth and eighteenth century Amsterdam as a centre of Jewish book production. Schrijver’s paper showcased a number of manuscripts originating in Amsterdam in the John Rylands Library’s collections, which contribute to our understanding of the development of Hebrew books following the invention of printing and, in particular, the use of the Amsterdam Hebrew type. Marci Freedman (University of Manchester) analysed the 17th century Latin and English translations of Benjamin of Tudela’s Book of Travels to investigate the Protestant reception of a popular 12th century Hebrew work. Freedman considered the ways in which the Protestant translators of the text read it through a theological lens, and examined their contribution to the reception of the work in the Christian world.
Session 2 centred on Cairo, with papers by Dotan Arad (Bar Ilan University) and Esther-Miriam Wagner (University of Cambridge and Woolf Institute) that engaged with the Cairo Genizah collections of the John Rylands Library and the Cambridge University Library. Dotan Arad gave an account of the organization of communities and guilds in the Musta’rib community of Cairo in the Ottoman period (1517-1882), demonstrating the importance of documents from the Cairo Genizah for understanding the makeup of Jewish communities in Cairo in this period. Esther-Miriam Wagner brought together examples of early 19th century North African Jewish mercantile correspondence from the Cairo Genizah collections of Cambridge, Manchester, Paris, and Oxford, and analysed their significance for our understanding of Jewish business and trading networks across the Mediterranean.
Session 3 was entitled Digital Humanities and Hebraica Collections, and brought together two ongoing digitization initiatives. Renate Smithuis, Stefania Silvestri (University of Manchester) and Nienke Valk (University of Amsterdam) presented the ongoing project to digitize manuscripts in Hebrew script at the John Rylands Library. The paper considered the benefits of digitizating of the collection, and discussed the importance of creating a catalogue in TEI XML that is compliant with the latest cataloguing standards. Ilana Tahan (British Library) presented the British Library’s Hebrew Manuscript Digitization project, outlining the project’s aims, methods, and the significance of making this material accessible to the wider public.
Session 4 on Magic included papers by Agata Paluch (Freie Universität Berlin), Gideon Bohak (Tel Aviv University), and Miruna Belea (University of Manchester). Agata Paluch described multi-text manuscripts containing a range of Jewish mystical texts, examined a number of Jewish magical formulae and considered their theoretical and practical uses and settings. Paluch also considered the effect of digitization on the study of Jewish mystical texts, and the changes in scholarly approaches to these texts following the advent of digitization. Gideon Bohak described the relationship between the Genizah fragments at the John Rylands Library (the third largest collection of such fragments in the world) and those of other Genizah collections. Bohak spoke of the usefulness of the Friedberg Genizah database to review the tens of thousands of fragments held in collections across Israel, Europe, and North America, and demonstrated the importance of digitized collections in allowing scholars to reunite texts by digitally ‘joining’ fragments held at different sites. Bohak presented some texts he has digitally reunited, and threw light on parallels between magical formulae in Genizah fragments he had surveyed so far. Miruna Belea presented a detailed close reading of magical formulae in three charms in the Rylands Gaster collection. Belea considered these in the light of ‘conceptual blending’ in order to articulate the mindset of the commissioners of the charms. Belea also presented the mechanisms of the legal and biblical language and formulae and their perceived importance for the efficacy of the charms.
Session 5 was dedicated to Moses Gaster’s Collections and Scholarship, wherein Brad Sabin Hill (George Washington University Libraries) offered a detailed study of Gaster’s collections with particular emphasis on his printed book collections. The distribution of his collections across a range of institutions across Europe, Israel, and North America has complicated the task of listing and describing Gaster’s printed book collections, and at present some are untraceable and others are likely lost. Reinhard Pummer (University of Ottawa) considered Gaster’s Samaritan scholarship, with particular reference to Gaster’s collections of Samaritan marriage contracts and deeds of divorce, as well as his Samaritan Hebrew Book of Joshua manuscripts and edition.
Session 6 was the first of two sessions on illuminated manuscripts. Dagmara Budzioch (Maria Curie-Sklodowska University) presented three recently-digitized illuminated Esther megillot at the John Rylands Library. The scrolls represent popular types of Italian scrolls with engraved decoration, and Budzioch examined their decoration programmes with reference to those of a related type of engraved scrolls. Eva Frojmovic (University of Leeds) analysed the Rylands Haggadah (Rylands Hebrew MS 6) and presented the decoration programme as a form of autoethnography, throwing light on the importance of these images as ‘self-portraits’ of the community and offering insight into how they had wished to see themselves. Stewart Brookes (King’s College London) continued the theme of the study of the Rylands Haggadah by presenting it as a test-case for extending the DigiPal framework. Brookes demonstrated the usefulness of DigiPal for the comparison of scribal and visual elements of the work with related manuscripts (including the Brother Haggadah and Mocatta Haggada), and presented a case for creating a consistent framework for the study of paleography and illuminations.
Session 7 on Prayer consisted of a paper by Aron Sterk (University of Lincoln) on an 18th century English translation of the Spanish and Portugese prayer book. Sterk reveals developments in the English language through an examination of the translation of particular Spanish words and phrases into English. Sterk argued that this manuscript represents the earliest English translation of the whole Spanish and Portugese prayer book, and demonstrated that it was likely produced for a woman.
Session 8 on Bible began with a paper by Benjamin Williams (King’s College London) on the Rylands’ annotated 1525 Bomberg Bible and its Jewish and Christian readers. Williams traced the uses and ownership of the text from Jewish to Christian ownership, and demonstrated the usefulness of multi-spectral imaging for revealing an important link in the chain of owners. Javier del Barco (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC)) described the development of glossed Hebrew bible manuscripts, and highlighted the influence of the Latin Glossa Ordinaria in the development of such multi-text Hebrew manuscripts. Del Barco presented the graphic development of multi-text bibles, and expounded on the importance of the layout of text and paratext as models for later printed Bibles. Ben Outhwaite (University of Cambridge) drew together a number of examples of personal Bibles from the Cairo Genizah collections of Cambridge and Manchester, describing their range of quality and use. Personal bible texts copied on scraps of paper by their users were presented alongside commissioned Biblical manuscripts on parchment. Outhwaite demonstrated the importance of the personal bibles for our understanding of the development of the Hebrew language, and highlighted the Palestinian pronunciation tradition preserved in them.
Session 9 centred on Autobiography and Memoir. Gila Hadar (Haifa University) presented a little known autobiography of Reina Cohen of Salonika, a manuscript written in Ladino for Moses Gaster’s collection and received by Gaster in 1910. Hadar gave an account of Cohen’s access to education, the difficulties she had in accessing religious learning, and the perception of those around her that she was mentally ill due to the nature of her ideas. Despite the challenges she faced, Cohen authored three books, including a commentary on Daniel, and Hadar presented her life and work within the context of Jewish and Ottoman political and religious developments. Gershon Hundert (McGill University) presented a newly discovered portion of the Memoirs of Dov Ber Birkenthal, which he had found in the Marmorstein collection at the John Rylands Library. Hundert compared the Rylands manuscript with a manuscript at the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York, and demonstrated the importance of this memoir text in throwing light on an otherwise drab picture of Eastern European Jewish life in the 18th century. Maria Cioată (University of Manchester) presented another newly discovered memoir – Friedrich Horn’s Der Nationaltraum der Juden. Horn, an Austrian schoolmaster, was amongst the first Jewish settlers who moved from Romania to Palestine in 1882 and contributed to the founding of the colony at Samarin (later renamed Zihron Yakov). Cioată demonstrated that Horn’s Nationaltraum has much to contribute to our knowledge of the role of Jews from Romaina in the historiography of Zionism.
Session 10 was the final session of the conference, and the second on Illuminated manuscripts. Zsofia Buda (British Library) and Sara Offenberg (Bar Ilan University) presented papers on the Ashkenazi Rylands Haggadah (Rylands Hebrew MS 7), which is the less studied of the two famous Rylands Haggadot. Both papers offered descriptions of key images in the Haggadah’s decoration programme, contextualizing these against the decoration in comparable Ashkenazi haggadot. The papers took particular interest in the decoration relating to Ezekiel 16:7, and in the images of human figures decorating various folia of the work.
The event’s public keynote lecture was presented by Sarit Shalev-Eyni (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) on, “New Light from Manchester on Hebrew Illuminated Manuscripts: The John Rylands Collection and its Significance”. Shalev-Eyni analysed the decoration programmes of a number of key Rylands manuscripts, including the Sephardi and Ashkenazi Haggadot (Hebrew MS 6 and 7), Naḥmanides’ commentary on the Pentateuch (Hebrew MS 8), and Hebrew MS 36 (a decorated Hebrew Bible codex). The lecture contextualized the above Rylands manuscripts with reference to relevant manuscripts in collections in Paris, Jerusalem, Lisbon, Oxford, London to show religious and cultural aspects of Jewish life. Shalev-Eyni considered text, codicology, the decoration programmes and illuminations of these manuscripts in order to demonstrate the processes by which these books were produced, as well as the commissioners of these manuscripts who studied and used them for ritual purposes. Shalev-Eyni expounded upon the distinctive features of these works, and demonstrated their importance for our understanding of the history of the Jewish book.
Summary of discussions
The structure of the conference enabled all presentations to be given in the Rylands’ Historic Reading Room, with all participants present throughout. As a result, the conversation developed throughout the conference, the key themes of which are summarized here.
Digital Humanities
There was much discussion throughout the conference regarding the importance of digital approaches to the humanities. Particular reference was made to the digitization and digital cataloguing of manuscripts (with a session devoted to two ongoing digitization projects), and the great potential this has for scholars who wish to survey manuscripts/manuscript corpora held at different institutions. A number of papers on the Cairo Genizah, for example, demonstrated the usefulness of digitally accessible collections for reuniting separated fragments, and for cross-corpus surveys that support philological, codicological, and text-linguistic analysis. Initiatives like that of DigiPal also allow for corpus-specific interfaces to be built to allow comparison of text and image across selected manuscripts, and make individual user’s selections available to others via a URL permalink.
The discussions across the conference confirmed the importance of understanding the difference between the aims and methods of humanities scholars and computer scientists, and the need for communication between the two for the development of digital humanities projects.
History of the Book
A number of papers demonstrated the importance of Hebraica and Judaica collections like that of the John Rylands Library for the study of the history of the Jewish book. Most of the papers considered in some way the contribution that the manuscripts and objects presented had on our understanding of the development of the Jewish book. Papers considered a wide range of issues, including: the relationship between manuscript and the printed book, the graphic development of text and paratext, marginalia and evidence of reception and readership.
Jewish cultural, religious, and social contexts
Several papers considered the way in which Jewish manuscripts and artifacts reflect the cultural, religious, and social contexts of their production, use, and reception. These themes were present throughout the discussions, with particular emphasis on the study of Jewish domestic life, gender, culture, society, and Jewish/non-Jewish relations.
Collections and collecting
A significant strand of discussion related to the study of collections as corpora. This encompassed discussions of the following:
Outcomes
Networking: The conference provided a unique occasion for scholars of the John Rylands Library’s collections to meet. The event has broadened the academic networks of all participants, and has enabled the John Rylands Library and the John Rylands Research Institute to strengthen its relationships with scholars who have worked and will continue to work on the collections. It is anticipated that a number of fellowships, collaborations, and initiatives will develop from this meeting.
Training of early career researchers: The EAJS Conference Grant awarded supported thirteen early career scholars (MA- to postdoc-level) in attending the conference. This was a unique training and networking opportunity (as mentioned above), and the planned proceedings volume will provide opportunity for some of the early career scholars to see their first articles published.
Exhibition: The conference also provided the occasion to focus two cases of the Rylands Gallery’s exhibition space to showcase Jewish life around the world. This rare opportunity allowed the Rylands’ Greek Deuteronomy papyrus fragments (P Ryl 458) to be restored by the Library’s Centre for Heritage Imaging and Collection Care for display.
Outputs
A proceedings volume is planned. This edited volume will draw together key papers presented at the conference, and provide an important resource for the access and study of the John Rylands Library’s Hebrew and Jewish collections. It will also be of interest to scholars working with cognate collections in Britain, Europe, and Israel, as well as to researchers concerned with the study of Jewish history, culture, and society, and the study of the history of the Jewish book. The volume will be co-edited by Philip Alexander, Katharina E. Keim, and Stefania Silvestri.
Event Programme: Please see attached PDF (link).
Publicity
The event was publicized through the following channels:
1) Event page on the JRRI website: http://www.jrri.manchester.ac.uk/connect/events/conferences/institute-conference-2016/
2) The mailing lists of the following:
3) Pre-event publicity on Twitter by Katharina E Keim and Stefania Silvestri;
4) The conference was live-tweeted using #JRRIConf2016 by the following participants: Katharina E Keim (@katharinakeim), Stefania Silvestri (@stef_books; University of Manchester), Stewart Brookes (@Stewart_Brookes, King’s College London), Magdalena Janosikova (@magdajanosik; Queen Mary University of London).
Katharina E Keim (British Academy Postdoctoral Fellow, John Rylands Research Institute, University of Manchester)
With agreement from co-applicants, Professor Judith Olszowy-Schlanger (EPHE Paris) and Professor Emile Schrijver (University of Amsterdam).
by EAJS-Web-1
EAJS Programme in European Jewish Studies 2015/16
REPORT
Research Approaches in Hebrew Bible Manuscript Studies. A Critical Overview Based on Evidence from the Dead Sea Scrolls, Cairo Genizah and European Genizah
Aix-en-Provence, MMSH, Centre Paul-Albert Février (UMR 7297 – Aix-Marseille University), 6th to 8th June 2016
Main organizer: Élodie Attia-Kay (Aix-Marseille University, Textes et Documents de la Méditerranée Antique et Médiévale UMR 7297)
Co-organizers: Antony Perrot (EPHE – Paris, UMR Orient & Méditerranée UMR 8167); Samuel Blapp (Cambridge University)
This EAJS Lab Aix 2016 aimed to critically examine the research approaches used for the study of the transmission of the Hebrew Bible from Antiquity to the Middle Ages. To this end, the Laboratory brought together PhD students, Early Career Researchers and senior scholars of the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Cairo Genizah and the European Genizah in order to share their research methods and approaches. Furthermore, it sought to critically address questions regarding the Digital Humanities and how they can improve scholarly work on the transmission of the Hebrew Bible. This laboratory was designed to foster and encourage future transdisciplinary research collaborations between the participants.
The Dead Sea Scrolls, the Cairo Genizah and the European Genizah are usually seen as three separate corpora. Scholars in these fields develop methods and approaches for the study of their respective sources and thus form isolated research communities. This EAJS Lab was conceived to facilitate a deeper scholarly understanding of the transmission of the Hebrew Bible from Antiquity to the Middle Ages in a cross-disciplinary perspective. It is our main aim to bring these isolated research communities closer together and thus contribute to a holistic understanding of the transmission of the Hebrew Bible.
The main questions were:
The expected outcomes and outputs of this EAJS Laboratory were the following:
The event was divided into the following main sessions:
Session 1: Dead Sea Scrolls Session
In his keynote speech, Daniel Stökl ben Ezra (EPHE, Paris) declined to consider the Cairo Genizah and the European Genizah as separate objects and proposed the term ‘genizot’ to describe the two areas. He offered an interesting new comparative overview of each kind of source. While we are well aware of the numbers of sources from the DSS, all are subject to a high numbers of hypotheses because of a very ancient state of the redactional shape of the biblical text. The sources of the genizot have not already been completely identified and reflect different forms of the biblical text (the homogeneity of the Tiberian Masoretic Text during the Middle Ages is not demonstrated anymore). He stated that there is no link between DSS and Genizot in terms of textual criticism, but there are fruitful areas for interactions: Book formats, Sitz im Leben, History of the books, Linguistics, technical tools.
Gilles Dorival (Aix-Marseille University) presented a paper on textual criticism and redactional criticism, underlying the importance of “interpretation of the text” over the text itself. He explored the Septuagint, trying to know if it was an initiative of the translator or a copyist. The textual pluriformity of the Dead Sea Scrolls was highlighted. These concepts allow us to edit or seek the best (or true) Vorlage of the Hebrew Bible, knowing that the Septuagint and the Masoretic text (if there is such unique version) have reviewed the original text. The Septuagint represents a Greek translation of a very ancient Proto-Hebrew text (proto-Masoretic) that has been lost.
Matthew Monger (Oslo) defended a methodological approach called ‘New/Material Philology’ applied to the Book of Jubilees (4Q216). This approach argues that the context of the artefact should be taken more into account, the production, the material of the DSS in order to study them, as this is often not the case in DSS studies: 1) the physical object, 2) The text words, 3) the layout and the material form of the text.
Drew Longacre (Helsinki) summarized methods used in the study of the DSS and the Herculaneum papyri, seeking to contribute to the question of the possible existence of a complete Pentateuch in Qumran (large literary scroll or roll). He provided interesting mathematical and practical tools for materially reconstructing fragmentary scrolls (for instance 4QExod-c).
Anna Busa (EPHE Paris) presented her work on forty Phylacteries from Qumran, specific items bearing biblical text, of which some were previously attributed to sectarian groups, and asked whether a specific or locally determinable Qumran Scribal Practice may have existed. Her methodological approach is maximalist, encompassing various disciplines (palaeography, textual criticism, rabbinic sources, linguistic). She determined the textual contents, the linguistic features, and the scribal practices and concluded that the scribal practices were employed without any particular connection to peculiar religious circles. She argued that the categorizations made by earlier researchers sometimes narrow the view and constitute an impediment to a real reconstruction of the artefacts.
Antony Perrot (EPHE Paris) and Matthieu Richelle (FLTE, EPHE-Sorbonne, Paris) presented a very stimulating palaeographical transdisciplinary analysis of the Paleo-Hebrew script from the Second Temple period based on different kinds of sources, namely DSS scrolls, coins and epigraphical items. They largely confirmed McLean’s relative chronology, but suggested that far more caution is necessary in proposing absolute dates, because of the extremely minimal amount of evidence.
Session 2: Cairo Genizah Session
In his Keynote lecture, Geoffrey Khan (University of Cambridge) presented “Recent Advances in our knowledge of the Tiberian Reading tradition”. Khan introduced his paper by stating that the Cairo Genizah and other material sources of medieval Judaism made it possible in the past couple of years to gain a more in depth picture of the medieval reading traditions of Hebrew. Such sources are in general vocalised manuscripts written in Hebrew script, Hebrew Bible manuscripts, grammatical treatises and Karaite transcriptions of the Hebrew Bible into Arabic script. The picture, which emerged from this wide variety of documents, is that despite the diversity of the Hebrew reading traditions the Tiberian tradition was the most authoritative of them. This is already reflected in the earliest grammatical treatises of biblical Hebrew by Saadia Gaon and the Karaite grammarians in the 10th century CE, since they use the Tiberian reading tradition in their works. Recent advances in the Tiberian reading traditions are based on such works, which record the original Standard Tiberian reading traditions in a theoretical way. So, for instance, we know that the qualitative value of šəwa is depending on its environment. By default it is pronounced as a short /a/ vowel, whereas when it occurs before yod it is always pronounces as short /i/ and when it occurs before a guttural it is pronounced with the same quality as the vowel below the guttural letter. Furthermore we know from grammatical treatises and the Karaite transcriptions that šəwa ga‘ya had the same quality as a full long vowel. Despite the high prestige of the Tiberian reading tradition, one can find many differences in the various Tiberian Hebrew Bibles. Some of these differences reflect an orthoepic development in order to disambiguate for instance the realisation of šəwa as silent or vocalic by adding for instance a pataḥ to the šəwa (i.e. ḥaṭaf pataḥ) in order to indicate its vocalic realisation. Khan also introduced us to one of his most recent discoveries about dageš, which he also considers to be of orthoepic nature. He suggested, that the pronunciation of dageš underwent a development, which he calls the extended dageš forte reading. This is reflected in the Karaite transcriptions and grammatical treatises. In an answer to a question Khan suggested that the Tiberian and Babylonian pronunciation tradition of biblical Hebrew are derived from the same proto-Masoretic reading tradition.
Samuel Blapp (University of Cambridge) dealt with “The Importance of the Classification of Standard Tiberian Manuscripts”. Blapp showed in his presentation that a close examination of the Standard Tiberian (in what follows ST) manuscripts of the Hebrew Bible is necessary to contextualize them within the ST tradition of biblical Hebrew. He then used three features to exemplify such an examination and their outcome on the most widely known Hebrew Bible manuscript, the Leningrad Codex B19a, by comparing it to other manuscript from the ST tradition (i.e. Aleppo Codex and BL Or 4445. Initially he showed that besides the orthoepic features in ST Hebrew Bible manuscripts, which Khan mentioned, there are also features, which have to be considered as non-standard features, since they directly contradict the ST grammatical treatises. The most prominent of these features are the more than 30 cases of ḥaṭaf vowels in closed syllables.
Kim Phillips (University Library of Cambridge, Taylor-Schechter Genizah Research Unit) presented a lecture on “Two New Fragments from the Scribe behind the Leningrad Codex (B19a)”. Phillips laid out his arguments for his latest discoveries of two manuscripts (T-S A2.46 and T-S A3.35) in the Taylor-Schechter collection held in Cambridge University Library, which were written by Samuel ben Jacob, the scribe of the Leningrad Codex B19a. Phillips emphasized that only the simultaneous occurrence of all of these features could point towards a Ben Jacob authorship, since many of these features occur isolated in other manuscripts. Phillips’ catalogue included the following non-palaeographical features, since he claims that these are characteristics which reflect the individual style of the scribe: Layout of the Masorah magna notes; the ornaments at the end of Masorah magna notes; the centre justification of final part-lines of Masorah magna if it contains more than two lines; the style of the Seder makers; line fillers employed for the left-justification of the biblical text; line fillers employed for blank lines; and the use of rafe, segolta, pašta and ga‘ya. In a comment on Phillip’s paper the possibility of scribal schools was suggested.
Elvira Martin-Contreras (CSIC Madrid) talked about the MS T-S D1.61. Martin-Contreras questioned in her paper Keller’s suggestion about T-S D1.61 that the author of the first of the two Masoretic lists of this manuscript did not use rabbinical interpretation tools although they appear to be similar. She explained that it is in fact a variant of the Midrash of the same manuscript rather than an independent Masoretic treatise. The second list contains entries identified as tiqqune soferim and from the Masoretic compendium Oklah we-Oklah. The combination of this Midrash with the Masoretic lists despite their originally separated transmission history is not an innovation by the author, since they have been found in the appendix to two Hebrew Bible manuscripts. Consequently, she suggested, T-S D1.61 might also originally have been part of a Hebrew Bible manuscript.
Viktor Golinets (Hochschule für Jüdische Studien – Heidelberg) presented the lecture “Biblical Manuscripts from the Collections of the Russian National Library and Their Place in the Textual Research of the Hebrew Bible”. Golinets presented an overview of the collections of Hebrew Bible manuscripts held in the Russian National Library. His paper contained a detailed description of which collections the codices and scrolls can be found in, as well as how many of them they contain. Furthermore, he gave an overview of what has already been published of this material so that he could subsequently suggest that a study of these Hebrew Bibles is necessary, since they bear invaluable information about the Tiberian Masoretic tradition, which has not yet been properly examined. His paper also contains shelfmarks for Samaritan manuscripts as well as Talmud and Rabbinica and further Jewish manuscripts in Hebrew and Arabic script.
Philippe Cassuto (Aix-Marseille University) “The Four Great Oriental Manuscripts, a Family?” Cassuto presented his research on the four most famous Oriental manuscripts: Leningrad Codex B19a, Aleppo Codex, BL Or 4445 and the Cairo Codex of the Prophets, which should be considered as belonging to the same family of manuscripts, namely the Tiberian ben Asher family tradition.
Session 3: European Genizah Session
Judith Olszowy-Schlanger (EPHE, Paris) was not able to attend the event, but she had a short paper read in absentia surveying the results of the Books within Books project (in what follows the BWB Project). This project identifies fragments of manuscripts reused in ancient bookbindings throughout Western Europe. The BWB Database has been available on-line since 2014 and contains at least 15000 fragments, enlarging considerably our knowledge of Hebrew manuscripts. The identification of a wide range of fragments of manuscripts, some one third biblical, highlights a great prospect by defining palaeographically sub-local regions, especially in the Ashkenazic Area.
Javier del Barco (CSIC, Madrid) gave a brief history of the cataloguing of Hebrew manuscripts, underlining the need to update most of the extant catalogues made at the end of the 19th century. He emphasized the trend to include more codicological information in parallel to the New Philology and the distinction between cataloguing complete manuscripts and fragments. He underlined the place of the Digital Humanities by mentioning the new features of meta-data catalogues bearing the source itself (when digitized) and bibliography, among other information such as use and reuse in other places.
Judith Kogel (IRHT, Paris) followed the use of thirty-three biblical fragments found in the bindings of incunabula housed in the municipal libraries in Colmar and in Strasburg (fragments on-line in BwB Database). The fragments are the remaining part of a “liturgical Pentateuch” (containing only the Torah, the Five Megillot and the Haftarot) that were possibly copied quire by quire in a specific scriptorium. Kogel focused mostly on variants in the Haftarot: qere qetiv on God’s Name, addition of words in the margin, and minor other variants. The question of the method of identifying a Model Codex depending on these variants has been raised.
Mauro Perani (University of Bologna) presented a summary of his findings on the 12th century Bologna Torah scroll, one of the oldest medieval Torah Scrolls, preserved in a complete form at the Library of the Bologna University. The script had been not correctly identified and a recent analysis had brought the scroll back to scholarly interest. Perani noted the use of final nun in vacats to indicate awareness of different traditions of segmentation and patterns of usage of taggin (decorations on letters in Torah scrolls).
Roberta Tonnarelli (EPHE – Paris) and Élodie Attia-Kay (Aix-Marseille University, UMR 7297) then discussed their work on differentiating between Italian and Ashkenazi manuscripts before 1300. They used various biblical manuscripts, fragments of the Cairo Genizah (one bearing a script quasi similar to Tosefta Erfurt) and fragments from the Cairo Genizah and the European Genizah. The interest is in the possibility to better localize and date textual variants, improving our knowledge of the Palestinian tradition transmitted via Italy, and to better reconstruct the transmission of biblical text traditions from Orient into the Early Medieval Western Europe.
Session 4: Project Sessions
The first two projects are currently funded; the last three are planned projects.
Daniel Stökl ben Ezra presented the mid-term project Scripta Qumranica Electronica – Dead Sea Scrolls Aggregated Database and Virtual Research Environment (DIP – DFG / University of Göttingen, Haifa, and Tel Aviv in cooperation with the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) in Jerusalem). The aim of the project is “to create a dynamic, virtual research environment for the digitization of the Dead Sea Scrolls. This is to be achieved by enhancing and linking the robust databases administered by the Qumran-Lexicon-project of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities and the Leon Levy Dead Sea Scrolls Digital Library of the IAA, by developing advanced digital tools for linking texts and images, and by developing new end-user applications for the creation and publication of a new generation of critical digital editions.”
Élodie Attia-Kay presented the mid-term project Manuscripta Bibliae Hebraicae (further MBH Project) funded by the French ANR (Agence Nationale de la Recherche) to start in September 2016. It is planned to study Biblical manuscripts from Ashkenaz (Germany, England, France and Italy) produced before 1300 in their material and social context, meaning interrogating their forms (definition of palaeographical sub regions of Ashkenaz), use and socio-cultural functions. A new database (MBH Database) will be developed, intended to deal first with Ashkenazic manuscripts before 1300, but afterwards up to 1500 and to all biblical manuscripts. The Sfardata Database and the BWB Project will be continued with the MBH Project.
Javier Del Barco presented a personal scientific planned project intending to study the different forms and functions of late biblical manuscripts within the New Philological approach. His project and the MBH project share in many points and a fruitful cooperation should develop in the next years.
The long term planned project of Ben Outhwaite (Cambridge University Library) deals with the idea of the diversity of the biblical text and biblical fragments. The on-line publication of the 24000 biblical fragments of the Cairo Genizah should be pursued without neglecting the documentation related to them (for instance letters, contracts of redaction). He gave the example of some letters concerning the main scribe of Codex Leningradensis, showing the precise historical context of production of the manuscripts, their price and the maturity of the scribal practices.
Hanna Liss (Hochschule für Jüdische Studien, Heidelberg / SFB 933 Heidelberg University) presented her long term planned project applied at the DFG – Akademie der Wissenschaft to collect and study Masoretic annotations in Hebrew Biblical Manuscripts of the Middle Ages. ‘BiMa’ will be the first database ever dedicated to Masorah and would be a significant aid for critical digital editions of the Hebrew Bible.
Session 5: Workshop session / suggestion of co-writing articles.
The last session – shortened due to modifications in the program – offered the possibility to discuss and suggest co-written articles to be published in the proceedings, one on the concept of New Philology, the other on the cross-comparison method in Palaeography from DSS and genizot sources.
***
Several problems and questions were highlighted during the discussions:
To conclude, the diversity and the richness of the different material forms of the biblical text imply a diversity and variety of perspectives and research approaches; even with everything that was presented at the Laboratory, it could not come close to being exhaustive. In this huge amount of work, with fruitful perspectives of research, it has been only possible to favour some interesting aspects, and we hope for another event in 2018 to complete aspects or issues that would have not been completely exposed or analysed here. Besides, it was noted (by Stökl Ben Ezra and Longacre) that the interdisciplinary approach requires specific commitments from the participants to especially address their papers to non-specialists and to stress the main elements of their work. The second important point to emerge is that, for most of the participants, the digital tools represent an evident way to work more rigorously on Biblical Manuscripts, especially because they offer the opportunity to compute large amounts of data, much more than in previous decades. Nevertheless, computerised tools cannot replace the traditional method that requires expertise in the scripts. The limits of the digital palaeography and digital recognition of scripts emerges especially when the scripts are rare. Another issue, that was perhaps not sufficiently debated, was the sustainable development of digital tools over the years, decades and centuries.
The event has been an occasion to create a transdisciplinary scholarly network of researchers and should improve the study of the transmission of the Hebrew. The participants enjoyed the discussions (public and private) that emerged from this meeting. Specific collaborations should emerge between projects from Attia-Kay, Outhwaite, Del Barco, and Liss. An innovative collective volume on the themes of the Laboratory is planned that will include the keynote lectures, the papers, a summary of the discussions, and co-written articles that emerged from the discussions and the concluding session. Attia-Kay plans to transform the website www.hebrewbiblemanuscripts.com into a Web portal on Hebrew Bible manuscripts studies (via her ANR Manuscripta Bibliae Hebraicae) that will provide a structure for a transdisciplinary networking group and information about activities of the network participants. A future workshop or conference should be held in 2018.
As stated in the rationale, this Laboratory aimed to foster an inter- and cross-disciplinary network between early career scholars and established specialists. Indeed, it helped create bonds among all participants and foster long-term institutional and scientific collaborations, collective and individual projects, publications, public conferences, workshops and courses.
Élodie Attia-Kay, Samuel Blapp, Antony Perrot
Aix, July 26, 2016
Conference Posters:
Websites promoting the Laboratory
by EAJS-Web-1
EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2015/16
REPORT
XXIII International Annual Conference on Jewish Studies, Moscow
Moscow, 31st January to 2nd February 2016
Co-organizers: Dr Victoria Mochalova, Sefer – the Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Moscow;
Ms Svetlana Amosova, Sefer – the Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Moscow; and
Mrs Irina Kopchenova, Sefer – the Center for University Teaching of Jewish Civilization, Moscow.
The 23rd International Annual Conference on Jewish Studies was held between 31st January and 2nd February in the Hotel Izmailovo in Moscow. Scholars from research centers in Russia, Ukraine, Moldova, Latvia, Belarus, Poland, Germany, Israel and the USA took part in the event.
The conference was financially supported by the Joint Committee, the Russian Jewish Congress, and the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress. Funds from the European Association for Jewish Studies Conference Grant Programme were used specifically to enable junior scholars to attend the conference.
Mikhail Chlenov opened the first plenary session with the lecture “Typology of the Jewish Communities in the Contemporary World”. He was followed by Victor Shnirelman with the report “Day of Victory over Khazaria: Festival and Monument”. Then the presentation of new publications in Jewish Studies took place, where new books published by the Sefer Center were presented along with books and magazines published by our colleagues in Russia, Ukraine, Latvia and the USA.
After this the Professor Eugene Weiner grants were awarded. This year 3 people received grants: Galina Zelenina (Moscow, RSUH), Valentina Fedchenko (Saint Petersburg State University) and Alexey Lyavdansky (Moscow, RSUH).
The Conference program included 13 sessions, 2 round tables and the meeting of the Sefer Academic Board. Here are brief descriptions of each session.
Biblical and Ancient Middle-Eastern Studies session (chairpersons: Aleksey Lyavdansky, Sergey Tischenko) was dedicated to Professor Vladimir Jakobson, who passed away last year. One of the reports (made by Jakobson’s student Vladimir Emelyanov) considered the contribution of the great scientist in the development of Assyriology. This report was an example of scientific biography. The two parts of the session contained thirteen reports, and it is notable that young researchers were included as presenters of papers in the session. The most brilliant paper was considered the one by Svetlana Babkina “The Star that Had a Son: to the Meaning of Bar-Kokhba’s Name”.
Jewish Thought session (chairpersons: Mikhail Wogman, Dr Uri Gershovich) consisted of five reports connected by the common theme “The Thought – and the Commentary”. The chronological spectrum was wide: from the ancient times to the 20th century. Some of the participants shared their own experience of the translation of Jewish philosophical texts from Hebrew into Russian.
Judeo-Christian Relationships session (chairperson: Dr Maksim Khizhyi) consisted of six reports. Chronologically the subjects of the presentations ranged from the 19th to the 20th centuries, and had a wide geographical spread and diversity of themes: conflicts of Jews with Christian bishops, Jews and Cossacks, religious jokes about Jews, etc. The most vivid discussion was evoked by Nikolay Omonov’s report “Science in the Court of Amateurs: Research of Neo-Paganism in the Comprehension of Neo-Pagans”.
The session Around Yiddish (chairperson: Valery Dymshits) was one of the most interesting sessions of the conference. Six papers were presented; half of them were prepared by very young but very talented and professional researchers.
Non-Ashkenazic Jewish Communities session (chairpersons: Prof. Mikhail Chlenov, Maxim Hammal) differed from the similar session of previous years in that there were fewer reports about the Caucasian Jews and Karaites. At the same time, the report by Mikhail Chlenov “Jews in Indonesia” opened a completely new research area. The session consisted of five reports.
The session Jews in the USSR and the Post-Soviet Space (chairperson: Prof. Gennady Kostyrchenko) consisted of nine reports. Three of them were dedicated to the Jews in Belarus, and two to the anti-Jewish repressions in the 1940-1950s. The report by Prof. Victoria Romanova “The Jewish Community of Kharbin after August, 1945” evoked high interest.
Seven reports were presented in the session Jews in the Russian Empire (chairpersons: Prof. Dmitry Elyashevich, Prof. Victor Kelner). The chronological spread of the reports was wider than just of the Russian Empire, and new and interesting themes were introduced. For example, the study of the micro- history of emotions was discussed by Dr Olga Sobolevskaya.
The State of Israel session contained of three parts: From the History of Zionist Movement, The State and Society of Contemporary Israel, and Israel in International Relations. The chairpersons of all three parts were Dr Tatyana Karasova and Dr Zeev Khanin. Together with the participants who have attended the conference for many years there were young researchers who presented their first serious scientific papers. One of them was Alim Ulbashev with the paper “Theodor Herzl’s Zionist Views and the Newest Codification of Civil Law in the State of Israel”.
The session Gender Etudes (chairperson: Dr. Galina Zelenina) was included in the programme for the first time in the history of Sefer conferences. The themes of the reports were as interesting as they were diverse: rabbinical disputes about the Bat-mitzvah ritual, unusual gender metaphors in the Bible and Maimonides’ philosophy, interaction between Marranos and the inquisition in the gender dimension, the memoires of Jewish women of the 19th and 20th centuries, feminist critique of the post-Holocaust theology, and others.
The presentations in the session Jewish Material and Artistic Culture. Museums (chairperson: Dr Maria Kaspina) revealed the ambivalent situation in the evaluation of the Jewish museums’ work in Russia. While some curators speak about the crisis and the exhaustion of this field, others speak about new concepts, collaborations with other museums, and new projects. Most of the reports were of a review character. The report by Anatolyi Sinilo “Attribution of the Drawings by Moses Maimon from the Collection of the National Art Museum of Belarus” was considered one of the most interesting.
The Jewish Literature. Literary Communications session (chairperson: Leonid Katsis) consisted of seven reports. The themes were various: poetry, prose, drama. Special attention was paid to the problems of translation, to the problem of literary influences and allusions, and to the reflection of the relations between Jews and other nations in literature.
The session The Holocaust and Historical Memory (chairperson: Leonid Terushkin) served as a meeting place for senior professional researchers in this subject and young scientists. The six reports included discussions of interesting oral and written sources, and the problems of memorialization.
The seven reports in the session History of Jews in Eastern and Western Europe in Modern Times (chairpersons: Alexander Ivanov, Andrey Shpirt) considered the history of the Jews as a history of minority. The chronological spread of the talks was between 17th and 20th centuries. The problems of Jewish contacts with the regular government were discussed in the paper by Ilya Dementiev.
In the round table Khazar Studies (chairperson: Vladimir Petrukhin) the discussions were extremely interesting and vibrant, since this is not a regular theme for Sefer conferences. The participants were all aware of the limited time and large number of subject areas to discuss, and noted that there should have been more time for such an important subject. Two reports were presented, by Oleg Bubenok and Oleg Mudrak.
Finally, the round table Jewish Field Research (chairpersons: Svetlana Amosova, Olga Belova) was a work meeting of ethnographers and epigraphists where the results of previous field researches and ideas for future work were discussed. The question of development of the new project www.sfira.ru was one of the most interesting.
At the closing ceremony the chairpersons of the various sessions returned positive assessments of the content of the conference sessions and to its excellent organization.
The conference photo album is here.
Media coverage of the conference (some websites are no longer available following the end of the conference):
http://booknik.ru/today/announce/kak‐krokodil‐stal‐begemotom‐i‐chto‐takoe‐ksy/
http://stmegi.com/posts/30703/xxiii‐konferentsiya‐po‐iudaike/?sphrase_id=3013
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqJCU5zvY-Y
PhD students and early career researchers who have received travel grants from the EAJS Conference Grant Programme:
Paper: Jews in Belarus – the characteristics and examples of activity.
Paper: Immanuel of Rome’s Maḥberot
Paper: The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth Jewish Migration in Moldavian Principality during the Khmelnytsky’ uprising (late 40’s – early 50’s XVII century).
Paper: “Unused people”: the Jewish minority in East Prussia during the stay of the Russian army at the beginning of the First World War (1914—1915).
Paper: Is there a semelfactive aspect in Yiddish?
Paper: From Judaism to Orthodoxy and Back Again: Apostasy among Converted Jews in the 18th century Russia.
Paper: Reasons for collaboration of the Jews at the beginning of the Maccabean revolt (167- 160 BC).
Paper: Translating Sholem Aleichem: the Problem of Biblical and Talmudic Quotations.
Paper: Caught into two inhibited lands: Was there a mutual right of residence in the Kingdom of Poland and the Jews of the Empire?
Paper: The professional occupation of the Western Volhyn’s Jewish people during 1921 – 1939.
Paper: Holocaust and national identity in Moldova and Eastern Europe.
Paper: Judaism in the periodical publications of the Union of the Godless. Letters to the editorial office.
Paper: Living in neighbourhood: the Cossacks and the Jews in the villages and cities of the Kuban Cossack area in XIXth – the beginning of the XXth centuries.
Paper: The role of Judaism in the social and political life of The State of Israel in 1948-1977.
Paper: Ksy!Ksy!: About Religious Jokes on Jews in the material and oral narratives, collected during the ethnographic expeditions that took place in Latgale in summer and winter 2013-2014.
Paper: Holocaust in the memories of Ukrainian children of war.
Paper: Memory about the Holocaust in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russian Discourses on World War II (the Case of North Caucasus)
Paper: The role of Judaism in the social and political life of The State of Israel in 1948-1977.
Paper: Body experiences of the Jewish soldiers in Russia, Germany and Austrian-Hungary in 19th and early 20th century.
Paper: Representation of “Jewish” in Palestine in the eyes of Russian travellers in the late XIX – early XX centuries.
Paper: History of formation and development of Jewish education in Georgia: legal aspects.
Paper: Holocaust and national identity in Moldova and Eastern Europe.
Paper: The attributes of the pictures the painter M. L. Maymon from the collection of the National Art Museum of the Republic of Belarus.
Paper: The Letters of Eugenia Ioelson (1888-1914) аs a Source for the Study of Micro-History of Emotions.
Paper: The Role of Jewish Women of Ukraine in the Zionist movement in 1920-s years: Rose Meltzer, BebaIdelson, Clara Klinger.
Paper: The reconstruction of the practices of memorialisation of the victims of the Holocaust in Smolensk region.
Selective feedback from the participants:
I am very grateful to the European Association for Jewish Studies for the opportunity to participate in the Twenty-Third Annual International Conference on Jewish Studies and to give a presentation on “The Role of Jewish Women of Ukraine in the Zionist movement in the 1920: Rose Meltzer, Beba Idelson, Clara Klinger” in the section “The State of Israel: Past and Present” (sub-section “From the history of the Zionist movement”). I express my deep gratitude personally to V.V.Mochalova and to all the staff of “Sefer” for the excellent organization of the conference, held at high scientific and practical levels, and for the long-term support to a young researcher in Jewish studies (Olena Suchkova).
I have been delighted to take part in this year’s Sefer Conference. For me, as a post-doctoral student specialized in the study of Jewish literatures in Jewish languages and in Hebrew, this conference was a great opportunity to meet with Russian colleagues I did not know yet (since my academic background is rather a French one) and to present the evolution of my latest researches on the Medieval Hebrew Poet Immanuel of Rome. At this occasion, I have concentrated my attention on the different Yiddish adaptations of the poetic collections of the Hebrew poet. As a whole, I am very satisfied from the conference and I am already looking forward to next year’s conference! (Arnaud Bikard)
Our panel was devoted to the problems of representation of the history of the Holocaust and took place in the last working day. We had the opportunity to listen to and discuss six very deep and rich papers. It is very important to mention that our panel was small so the presentations could be discussed at length. Half of the panelists were young scholars, for whom it is useful to receive a clear feedback or who tried to answer provocative questions. All the papers led to a very productive discussion, which I hope, will help a deeper understanding of the sources, as well as the political and social problems in the East Europe and the history of the Holocaust itself. (Irina Rebrova)
by EAJS-Web-1
EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2015/16
REPORT
The Western Balkan Encounter of Sepharad and Ashkenaz:
Between Tradition and Change
Belgrade, July 5-7, 2016
Co-organizer: Prof. Krinka Vidaković-Petrov, Institute for Literature and Art, Belgrade
Co-organizer: Dr. Katja Šmid, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
The conference was held in Belgrade, July 5-7, 2016, at the hall of the Jewish Community of Belgrade. The colloquium was organized in cooperation with the Institute for Literature and Art in Belgrade and made possible by a generous subvention of the European Association of Jewish Studies’ Conference Grant Programme. Additional funding was provided by the Embassy of Israel in Serbia as well as the Hungarian Cultural Center Collegium Hungaricum in Belgrade.
Event Rationale
The issues the conference is designed to address are the following: status of Ashkenazi and Sephardi communities in the Habsburg and Ottoman territories; types of cultural contacts between the two communities in this period; how historical changes affected their cultures and the contacts between them; differences between patterns of Ashkenazi and Sephardi integration/acculturation; the Yugoslav framework of Ashkenazi-Sephardi communication; shifts in identity concepts and images; new approaches to inter-Jewish communication and extra-Jewish perceptions; the meaning of the Ashkenazi-Sephardi historical encounter in the past and today, in the Western Balkans, Europe and Israel. The event is designed to provide public exposure to Jewish Studies and encourage the establishment of a regional network in the field of Jewish Studies.
Event Report
The conference was opened by co-organizers Prof. Krinka Vidaković-Petrov and Dr. Katja Šmid, who gave brief information on the latter and expressed special gratitude to the EAJS and the Institute for Literature and Art, as well as other institutions supporting this academic endeavor. Dr. Bojan Jović (Director of the Institute for Literature and Arts), Dr. Ruben Fuks (President of the Federation of Jewish Communities of Serbia) and Jovan Krstić (Vice-President of the Jewish Community of Belgrade) greeted the participants and attending audience (altogether around ninety persons were present at the opening ceremony) in the full Ceremonial Hall of the Belgrade Jewish Community, highlighting the importance of scholarly research of the topic.
The conference brought together a total of 33 participants from 12 countries (Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Macedonia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Italy, Austria, USA, Germany, Poland, Israel). It was structured in 8 panels/sessions.
In coordination with the EAJS an additional panel titled “Regional Network of Jewish Studies: Discussion”, introduced at a later stage of planning, was integrated into the conference. The conference itself provided a rationale for this final panel that discussed possible ways of responding to the need for better communication, cooperation, and organization of scholars focused on Jewish studies in South-Eastern Europe. The wide range of topics elaborated in papers presented at the conference as well as the vibrant discussion that accompanied them highlighted the basic premises of Jewish Studies in South-Eastern Europe: the impossibility of isolating the region from adjacent areas (Central Europe, Italy, Turkey), the need for multilingual skills, the benefits of an interdisciplinary approach and the need of intensifying cooperation among specialized scholars. These premises provided the rationale for the discussion on the “Regional Network of Jewish Studies”.
The first panel was opened by the presentation “Sisters and Strangers: Sephardi and Ashkenazi Women in the Western Balkans” by Prof. Harriet Pass Freidenreich (Temple University, Philadelphia, USA) dealing with a neglected topic – the role of women in the process leading from tradition to modernization, from parallel action of Sephardi and Ashkenazi women to emancipation, interaction, and joint activities, especially highlighting the issues of education and religion. Dr. Milan Koljanin (Institute for Contemporary History, Belgrade, Serbia) discussed the “New Patriotism or ‘Yugoslavization’ of the Jews in Yugoslavia (1918-1941)” in view of the changes that ensued from the establishment of the Yugoslav political, economic and cultural framework in 1918, the development of a new Yugoslav ideology, issues of dual nationality, nationalism, Zionism, and the impact of these factors on the self-perception and identity of the two Jewish groups interacting within the joint Jewish community and with the Yugoslav multicultural environment. Dr. Jasmina Huber (Heinrich Heine University of Düsseldorf, Germany) presented a paper titled “How many Changes Can Tradition Tolerate? Singing and Prayer in the Jewish Community of Belgrade Facing the Challenges of Today”. She drew a distinction between tradition (embedded in the community, a collective body) and neo-tradition (frequently promoted by individuals introducing innovation that may or may not become accepted as “traditional”) in the musicological aspect of the religious domain. Dr. Huber highlighted the process whereby Ashkenazi elements became dominant in Belgrade, indicating how the influence of the Viennese model was mediated by Sarajevo, and how the education/training of contemporary rabbis of Belgrade contributed to the introduction of Israeli musical culture into the Belgrade synagogue. The discussion that ensued dealt with issues regarding migrations, generational differences, the existence of “Yugoslav Jews” in Austria-Hungary prior to the establishment of Yugoslavia, the challenges of globalization.
The second panel dealt with Medieval, Early Modern and Modern Periods. Dr. Janez Premk (Jewish Archive of Slovenia) presented his research on “Encounters of the Medieval Jewish Exiles from Slovenia with Sepharad in the Eastern Adriatic”. He focused on the Medieval Jewish community of Maribor (Slovenia), the persecution in the 15th c. and their migration to the Eastern Adriatic, especially the port of Split, where the Maribor Ashkenazi Jews established good interaction with the local Sephardi Jews. The presentation “Contextualizing Ladino Merchants’ Documents from Early Modern Ragusa” by MA candidate Matthew Dudley (Yale University, USA) focused on Mediterranean trade routes involving Ragusa (Dubrovnik) and the cluster of Ladino sources (16-18th c.) housed in the rich Ragusan archives. He specifically dealt with several documents dating from 1582, indicating possible Sephardi-Ashkenazi joint activities, but also highlighting the problems of deciphering and interpreting these documents due to usage of multiple scripts, Portuguese lexical elements and various transcription systems. PhD candidate Zsuzsana Toronyi (Hungarian Jewish Museum, Budapest) presented a paper titled “’And the Pomegranates Bud Forth?’ The Stories Behind a Ceremonial Object Preserved in the Hungarian Jewish Museum”. The enigmatic museum item she described reflects the complex Ashkenazi and Sephardi migrations from the European north and the Balkan south intersecting in Budapest as well as the sparsely documented role of the Sephardi community in Pest. The closing discussion indicated how all the refugees from Maribor, although not belonging to the same family, became known as the Morpurgos, and brought about new information on some branches of this “family” (in Venice and other places); there were suggestions on possible interpretations of the Ragusan documents based on linguistic and transcription parameters as well as questions on the presence of Ashkenazim in 17th c. Ragusa; regarding the enigmatic museum item there were comments dealing with the Sephardim in Hungary and their Balkan connections.
In the third panel there was a change in the Program: Dr. G. Abramac (from Zagreb, Croatia) cancelled her participation, so the presentation of Dr. K. Šmid was moved from Panel 5 to Panel 3. The first speaker, PhD candidate Martin Stechauner (University of Vienna, Austria) discussed “Vienna: A Cultural Contact Zone Transforming Sephardic Jewry on the Balkans”, focusing on the Sephardic press as a domain of public communication within the Sephardic community in a Central European environment in close contact with the Balkans, with special emphasis on Sephardic “separatism”, the impact of the Sephardic Haskala and press in Vienna on the Balkan Sephardim, monolingual and multilingual paradigms. Prof. Krinka Vidaković-Petrov (Institute for Literature and Art, Belgrade, Serbia) in “A Tale of Three Towns: Belgrade, Zemun, Pančevo” focused on Sephardi-Ashkenazi contacts in three towns on the centuries long border towns Belgrade (Ottoman) and Zemun and Pančevo (Austrian), the impact of shifting of borders, different legal status, migrations, interaction between the two groups, and identified unknown Judeo-Spanish texts from Zemun and Pančevo: a newspaper, folkloric items (folksongs and proverbs) and modern texts (among them a rare example of the travelogue genre). Dr. Katja Šmid (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel) analyzed “The Ashkenazim in Ladino Works Written by Ya’acov Moshe Hay Altarats”, contextualized her topic by discussing the development of Hebrew and Ladino printing in 19th c Belgrade, the scope of publications, the role of subscribers, focusing on allusions to the Ashkenazim in the works of Altarats and his interpretation of the identity of the Jewish nation. The discussion, comments and questions were related to the issue of sources and their accessibility, the role of printing and the Sephardic press, and Sephardic attitudes towards the Ashkenazim.
The fourth panel was opened by Dr. Alexandra Twardowska (Nicolaus Copernicus University, Torun, Poland) whose topic “In Search of a Common Identity? Collaboration of Ashkenazi and Sephardi Jews within Cultural and Political Organizations in Bosnia until 1941” moved attention from the Danube route (Vienna, Belgrade, Zemun, Pančevo) to Sarajevo. She indicated that the first phase of Sephardi-Ashkenazi contact in Sarajevo highlighted differences between the two groups and announced relations of both convergence and divergence. However, organizations active in the 20th c. such as La Benevolencija as well as newspapers such as Jevrejski glas sought to forge unity and support Zionism, despite the polemics initiated by the “Sephardic movement” that voiced a complaint regarding Ashkenazi domination in the Zionist movement. PhD candidate Miloš Damjanović (University of Priština, Kosovska Mitrovica, Serbia) discussed “Sephardim and Ashkenazim in Kosovo and Metohija between the Two World Wars (1918-1941) – Parallel Coexistence”, pointing out that the substantially more numerous Sephardic community existed apart from the reduced number of Ashkenazim dispersed in small towns, that there was a social distinction between them (the Sephardim being mainly small merchants, craftsmen and bankers, while the Ashkenazim were medical doctors, surveyors, judges, army officers), and that their direction of migration was divergent (emigration of Sephardim versus immigration of Ashkenazim). Dr. Sofija Grandakovska (independent researcher, Skopje, Macedonia) tackled in her presentation “Jews in Ottoman Macedonia: When the Messianic Idea of Zion Meets Secularism” the complex issue of Macedonian Jews, predominantly Sephardim (the biggest community being in Bitola) and the question of how to read Zion in the last period of Ottoman rule, the secularization of education (begun by the Alliance Israélite Universelle) and the competing interests in the region (Young Turks Revolution, Greek and Slavic nationalism) in times of radical change, highlighting the attitude of Dimitar Vlahov towards Jewish issues raised in the Turkish Parliament.
The first speaker of the fifth panel was Dr. Simona Delić (Institute of Ethnology and Folklore, Zagreb, Croatia) whose topic “Golden Age Ballad in Zagreb” dealt with her field work, the collection of the last remnants of Sephardic ballads in a predominantly Ashkenazi environment, the identification of collected fragments and interpretation of their semantic aspects and the relationship of some of them to Golden Age Spanish literature. Prof. Rudolf Klein (Szent Istvan University, Budapest, Hungary) spoke on “The Convergence of Sephardi and Ashkenazi Funerary Art in the Balkans in the 19th and 20th Centuries”. He contextualized Jewish funerary art of this period regarding social, gender and religious aspects manifested in the morphology of cemeteries, pointed out general differences between Sephardic and Ashkenazi cemeteries, identified “Orientalism” as the main Sephardic influence, highlighting the influence of Slavic folklore and Central European culture, commenting the examples of the cemeteries in Belgrade, Sarajevo and Bucharest. In the presentation “Influence and Adoption of Central European Ashkenaz Funerary Monument Forms in the Belgrade Sepharad Community’s Cemetery Space in the End of the 19th and the Beginning of the 20th Century” PhD candidate Vuk Dautović (University of Belgrade, Serbia) focused his detailed analysis on the Sephardic cemetery in Belgrade, identifying specific elements of Ashkenazi influence in Sephardic sepulchral architecture and emblems, in the context of intensified cultural communication between the two communities within the framework of the general shift of cultural models in Serbia. The discussion was related to the issue of folklore collection and interpretation, the distinction between Ashkenazi and Slavic influences in funerary art, how certain tombstone elements (texts, emblems, photographs) reflect these influences in funerary culture.
The sixth panel was dedicated to linguistic studies. Dr. Ivana Vučina-Simović (University of Kragujevac, Serbia) and Dr. Jelena Filipović (University of Belgrade, Serbia) presented the paper “Sephardim and Ashkenazim in the Belgrade Linguistic Landscape” offering a socio-linguistic analysis of language in public spaces (including signs in vivo, graffiti and stencils), its symbolic role, the positioning of the two communities, diachronic shifts, ethnolinguistic vitality in multilingual settings, contrasting Sephardic and Ashkenazi examples that also manifest the distribution of power in the Jewish cultural geography of Belgrade. Prof. David Bunis (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel) in his presentation “Ashkenazi Literature in Judezmo Translation, Sephardic Literature in Yiddish Translation: Some Sociolinguistic Notes” focused on a selection of 19th c. texts (originals and translations) in the context of distinct Jewish subcultures, translations of various types of texts (religious, historical, fiction, socialist writing), literary contact (Sephardic authors impacted by Yiddish authors through translations), specific traits of translations (importation of whole words to fill in terminological voids in Judezmo and Hebrew), and types of interaction (through the written word, physical interaction of groups, face to face contact). In his presentation “Writing in Tongues: Translating into Judezmo or What it means to Translate in a Minority Language” Prof. Michael Studemund Halévy (Institute for the History of the Jews in Germany, Hamburg, Germany) indicated that Judezmo and Yiddish functioned as minority languages lacking official status. He interpreted a detailed statistical presentation of translations to Judezmo identifying factors impacting them, he explained why Judezmo literature can be considered as a literature of translation and highlighted the importance of quantifying and qualifying data pertaining to Judezmo translations. The panel was concluded by a vivid discussion about the importance of the linguistic landscape regarding Jewish monuments and sights in Serbia and other surrounding countries, and the involvement of Jewish (local community) and non-Jewish institutions (municipality, national tourism authority, etc.) in implementing/preserving of these signs in a minority language such as Judeo-Spanish and its translation.
The seventh panel was dedicated to literature. Dr. Željko Jovanović (University of Cambridge, UK) and Julie Scolnik (independent researcher, San Francisco, USA, absent) prepared a presentation on “The Spicy Side of Jewish Humour: Judeo-Spanish and Yiddish Tales of Sex and Scatology” based on tales (collected from Balkan informants and East European Ashkenazi informants) dealing with two topics: humour involving female transgression of social norms and the humour associated with the particular character of Djoha, touching also on the attitude of the speakers towards “dirty” or “salty” tales. The presentation of Dr. Dina Katan Ben Zion (independent researcher, Israel) “Sepharad and Ashkenaz in the ‘Golden Era’ of Jewish Literature in Former Yugoslavia – Insights and Perspectives in View of a Personal Experience” is based on her experience of being a scholar, writer and literary translator. Her analysis provided insights into the ‘Golden Age’ of Jewish literature in Yugoslavia (the period between the two World Wars), a time of cultural conflict and cooperation, oscillating between Zionism and the legitimacy of Diaspora existence, converging finally in the common literary language of both Sephardim and Ashkenazim (Serbian/Croatian), the exploration of Jewish identity, and the modern testing of new literary standards challenging tradition. PhD candidate Tsippy Levin Byron (independent researcher, Israel) presented a paper on “Elements of Sephardi/Ashkenazi Traditions in the Works of Natalia Ginzburg and David Albahari”. Her research highlighted several common semantic clusters in the works of Ginzburg (Venice) and Albahari (Belgrade): the role of women, difference in customs but awareness of common Jewish identity, feelings of detachment, their view of history and the relationship between faith, secularism and literature. The discussion highlighted literature as an expression and reflection of self-perception, identity issues, forms of transgression, the literary function of language and the relationship between traditional and modern literature.
The eighth panel, dedicated to art, was to feature two participants, one speaking on visual art and the other on music (the role of Belgrade Jews in the beginnings of jazz in Serbia), but the second speaker, M. Milovanović (independent researcher, Belgrade, Serbia), cancelled his participation. Prof. Nenad Makuljević (Department of Art, University of Belgrade, Serbia) spoke about “Jewish Identity in the Oeuvre of Leon Kojen” (1859-1934), an outstanding painter from the Belgrade Sephardic community, based on two preferential themes in his oeuvre: Joseph’s Dream and the Wandering Jew. Makuljević’s research suggests that the first theme, rare in works of Jewish painters, is associated with Kojen’s Sephardic background, while the second one, frequently represented in Western culture, is a reflection of Ashkenazi influence appearing during and after Kojen’s studies in Munich. The discussants drew attention to the presence of the Joseph’s Dream theme in Judeo-Spanish poetry from the mid-19th c and plays performed in Balkan Sephardic communities, to more information on the painter’s relationship with the well-known Davičo family, and also to the fact that Kojen’s paintings had been featured on the walls of the Belgrade Jewish Community Ceremonial hall (the venue of the conference), but were destroyed during the Nazi bombing of Belgrade in 1941.
Concluding panel: Discussion and establishment of a Network for South-Eastern European Jewish Studies
During the concluding panel Regional Network of Jewish Studies: Discussion, supported by the EAJS to discuss the potential creation of such a regional network, the Network for South-Eastern European Jewish Studies was founded. The discussion is reflected in the minutes (taken by M. Dudley).
Seven persons were selected to attend the panel, but two of them (Maria Fragkou, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece and Jonna Rock, Humboldt University Berlin, Germany) cancelled their participation a week before the event, and finally, five invited speakers spoke about the prospects of the proposed network: Benedetto Ligorio, Sapienza University of Rome (Italy); Irina Ognyanova, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia (Bulgaria); Jolanta Sujecka, University of Warsaw (Poland); Melita Švob, Research and Documentation Center CENDO, Zagreb (Croatia); and Bojan Mitrović, University of Trieste (Italy). The panel was attended by around forty interested colleagues.
The participants of the discussion agreed on the name Network for South Eastern European Jewish Studies and decided to use English as the language of communication. It was suggested that the Network should have an Advisory board, but no names were suggested in the discussion, a task to be addressed at the next panel of this kind.
The goal of this Network is to identify and connect scholars of various disciplines in the region and beyond with an interest in the history and culture of the Jews in South-Eastern Europe, and also to function as a network for academics with a general interest in Jewish Studies working in the region. There was a suggestion to look for candidates for the network on preexisting networks of academic institutions and associations as well as on those of the Jewish communities from South-Eastern European cities and abroad. The main goals and plans of the Network are to promote cooperation among academics, to encourage the coordination and organization of the conferences, seminars, courses, colloquia, workshops, and to support publications and databases dedicated to Jewish Studies in the South-Eastern Europe.
The participants decided to pursue further networking through organizing panels on Jewish topics in South Eastern Europe on the occasion of other conferences dealing with Jewish studies in the region and beyond (for example at the 17th World Congress in Jewish Studies in Jerusalem in August 2017, and at the 11th EAJS Congress in Jewish Studies in Krakow in July 2018).
After the conclusion of the panel a Facebook page Network for South Eastern European Jewish Studies was created to build a network on-line. This is an open group to be joined by interested scholars upon invitation and will help in communication among them together with the following (already existing) email address: southeasternetwork@gmail.com.
Accompanying program
In the accompanying program, two 25-minute documentary films were screened: “The Synagogues of Belgrade” and “The Jewish Cemeteries of Belgrade” (donated by authors and volunteers of the Belgrade Jewish Community J. Raković, M. Mentović and Z. Pantelić).
The Museum of Genocide Victims in Belgrade donated copies of their publications on the Holocaust in Belgrade, the Serbian-Israeli colloquium on the Holocaust and the Museum’s anniversary edition.
The conference was wrapped up by a visit to the Jewish Historical Museum hosted by Museum director Vojislava Radovanović.
The photographs documenting the conference will be accessible on an internet link.
Co-organizers Krinka Vidaković-Petrov and Katja Šmid spoke about the conference in an interview given to Radio Belgrade.
Summary
The theme of the conference is an unexplored field as most of the existing research has focused on Sephardic studies, few on Ashkenazi studies, and even fewer on the relationship between Sephardim and Ashkenazim in the Western Balkans. The conference was planned to respond to this challenge which it did. The time frame was limited to the period prior to World War Two because the inclusion of the Holocaust would have expanded the number of participants beyond our possibilities. Even so, the number of participants and topics exceeded the original limit, enriching the overall contribution of the conference to the elucidation of the main theme.
The conference brought together researchers from various disciplines (history, linguistics, literary studies, translation studies, history of art, musicology) providing a much needed interdisciplinary approach that illuminated the subthemes spelled out in the rationale. The geographical framework was the territory of the former Yugoslavia (Serbia, Bosnia, Macedonia, Croatia, Slovenia) including adjacent regions (Austrian, Turkish, Italian, Bulgarian, Rumanian, Hungarian) as this historical and cultural space as a whole witnessed migrations, conflicts and cooperation among the multiethnic and multicultural protagonists of Western Balkan history, affecting especially the encounter and communication between the Sephardim and Ashkenazim.
The interaction and mutual influences between the two communities were explored regarding identity shifts, historical relations, language, the effects of translations (from Hebrew, German and Yiddish) on Judeo-Spanish, the public linguistic landscape, literature (written traditional, oral, modern, various genres such as ballads, tales, novels), religion, art (religious and secular), funerary customs and art (architecture, decorative elements), music, printing, periodical publications as public fora, community organizations (educational and cultural), education, economic activities, political backgrounds, status of women, all highlighting the diachronic process leading to change and shifts in cultural models and practices.
Public exposure and the choice of venue (Jewish Community of Belgrade) attracted an audience that actively participated in the discussion on points of special interest to them, providing information on some projects in Jewish studies members of the audience were engaged in.
The participation of academic researchers from a wide range of countries contributed to the discussion on how to promote Jewish Studies in the Western Balkans and establish a Network whose function would be to facilitate communication among them and stimulate joint activities and projects in various formats.
Planned outcomes and future projects
The conference lead to several new cooperations. Firstly, the establishment of the Network for South Eastern European Jewish Studies, the first step of which was the creation of a Facebook page to be used as a tool for registering scholars from the Western Balkans and beyond interested in this field of research. Secondly, the co-organizers Prof. Krinka Vidaković-Petrov and Dr. Katja Šmid agreed to commonly edit a volume that would assemble the conference papers. Thirdly, the joint organization of one or two panels for the conference of the World Union of Jewish Studies to be held in Jerusalem (2017) and the EAJS conference to be held in Krakow (2018).
The Conference Programme may be found here (pdf).
The Conference Poster may be found here (pdf).
The link to the website promoting the conference may be found here.
The link to the Facebook page of the Network for South Eastern European Jewish Studies may be found here.
Krinka Vidaković-Petrov
Katja Šmid
28th July 2016
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