EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2019/20

REPORT

MONITOR Global Intelligence on Racism, RSCAS, European University Institute, Italy (http://monitoracism.eu).

International Centre on Racism (ICR), Edge Hill University, UK.

Zentrum für Antisemitismusforschung (ZfA), Technische Universität Berlin, Germany.

Hosted by the ICR.

Aims

Social media is impacting in significant ways on anti-Jewish racism- but what is novel about this relationship? Focused on this question, Edge Hill University, UK, hosted the first conference to analyse the connection between innovations in media and changes in antisemitism over the longue durée. Funded by the European Association for Jewish Studies, the event was a collaboration between the magazine MONITOR Global Intelligence on Racism (Monica Gonzalez-Correa) at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies, European University Institute, Florence (http://monitoracism.eu), Edge Hill’s new International Centre on Racism (ICR) (James Renton and Jenny Barrett), and the Zentrum für Antisemitismusforschung (ZfA) (Stefanie Schüler-Springorum, Uffa Jensen, and Marcus Funck) at the Technische Universität Berlin.

A principal aim of the conference was to bring experts in the digital humanities, literature, law, social sciences, and history into dialogue. With historian Professor Stefanie Schüler-Springorum (ZfA) and web epistemologist Professor Richard Rogers (Amsterdam) as keynotes, the organisers attracted participants in these fields from Germany, Israel, Norway, the UK, and the United States.

Scholars, analysts and policymakers have pointed to social media for some time as a driving force behind the increasing virulence of antisemitism. This new form of communication has evidently played an important role in the recent spike in violent attacks and murder of Jews by lone-wolf killers in the United States and Europe. The killers have interacted with like-minded people online, used the web as a means of articulating their ideology, and a platform for broadcasting their acts of violence. Beyond the realm of physical violence, antisemites are engaging with each other globally in new ways, are developing new forms of expression, and antisemitic notions and languages have moved into mainstream online debate and politics.

In order to combat this online racism effectively, we must decipher what, if anything, is really new – in form as well as content. Yet, the fundamental question remains: how can the novelty of contemporary antisemitic ideas, practices, and networks be assessed? The answer must begin, the conference organisers argue, by analysing new developments within a bigger historical framework: the relationship between media and antisemitism over the centuries. In collaboration, the meeting of academic disciplines can, we contend, sketch out new paradigms of analysis. In turn, this larger canvas provides new possibilities for thinking about effective anti-antisemitism.

Outcomes

The conference achieved our goal of providing a new temporal and multi-disciplinary framework for thinking about our subject; we began our analyses in medieval history, extended our discussions into modernity, and then delved into the recent past and the present. The speaker panel included scholars of literature, law, history, the social sciences, and digital humanities. Following recent scholarship on antisemitism, much of our discussions were embedded in the bigger subjects of the far-right, digital culture, and the relational dynamics between racisms.

Taken together, the conference established clear connecting elements that are pronounced in particular moments (for example between early modern Spain and contemporary global digital culture). This is not to say that we found unchanging features of antisemitism- to the contrary. Instead, the research unearthed points of similarity between points in time, including characteristics, defining emotions, and practices, that are brought into sharp relief by our deep historical approach. At the same time, the conference findings also underscore distinctive features of seminal junctures that are tied to innovations in media, and accompanying changes in political, economic, and social cultures.

Significantly for those combating antisemitism today, these findings include the unveiling of new evidence of effective contemporary antiracism strategies, along with suggestive parallels from the past.

These findings are to be communicated via an open access peer-reviewed publication edited by Monica Gonzalez-Correa, MONITOR, EUI, Michael Berkowitz, University College London, and James Renton, Edge Hill University.

The partnership between MONITOR and the ICR has been formalised, and their ongoing events and publications continue to examine antisemitism in the context of other racisms over the longue durée. Their next conference will be on ‘Centring Race in History’, and a webinar series on antiracism in the 2020’s after George Floyd. MONITOR and the ICR will also discuss future collaborations with the ZfA.

Papers and Discussion

The conference was opened by Professor George Talbot, Pro-Vice Chancellor for Research and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Edge Hill University.

Medieval Hate

The first panel began with media innovation and antisemitism in medieval Europe. It was chaired by Professor Uffa Jensen, an historian from one of the organising institutions, Technische Universität Berlin, and expert on visual antisemitism. Dr Marcia Kupfer, an art historian based in Washington DC and author of a Yale University Press monograph on the Hereford map, opened proceedings.

Kupfer argued that medieval Christianity’s adoption of the medium of the parchment codex led to it becoming a significant element in the projection of supersessionist theology—of Christianity as Judaism’s replacement. In medieval art, the object of the codex was presented as the glorious encasement of Christ’s teaching, in opposition to the scroll, the embodiment of Judaism as a backward religion. Kupfer went on to discuss the depiction of the Jew in carnival culture, of antisemitism as popular entertainment, rather than theological argument, focused on the controversy over the Aalst carnival.

Medievalist, Dr Lindsay Kaplan, from Georgetown University followed. Kaplan’s paper drew on her new monograph on racism in medieval Europe, and focused specifically on the medium of illuminations in psalters, manuscripts of psalms, which were the most widely read and circulated books of the Bible in the Middle Ages. Kaplan argued that there were marked shifts in these psalters from the 11^th century, through to the 13^th century, in which Jews became the central protagonists in the killing of Christ. In addition, dark Muslims emerge as the partners of the Jews, as anti-Islam and anti-Judaism become racialised in this imagery.

In the discussion that followed the panel, Professor Kitty Millet, San Francisco State University, noted the evolution of the Aalst carnival, and even more extreme antisemitism in the past with the depiction of gestapo guards and Zyklon B. A particular focus of the discussion then centred on racialisation in medieval Europe, and the relationship between figures of the Muslim and the Jew.

Keynote: “Eyes and Ears, Heart and Soul: Anti-Jewish Resentment and the Media: A historical perspective.”

Professor Stefanie Schüler-Springorum, Director of the ZfA, delivered the first keynote of the conference. The Director of the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism, Professor David Feldman, presided over the session.

Schüler-Springorum gave a sweeping lecture that provided an essential link between the medieval session, and the modern/postmodern papers that followed. A highly original contribution, the lecture explored the different senses (seeing, hearing, tasting, and smelling) through which anti-Judaism was conveyed via the media revolutions of modernity (the printing press, sermons, radio, the poster and the postcard, mass theatrical events). Schüler-Springorum argued that joy and amusement were critical emotional features of modern antisemitism.

With regard to the change inaugurated by the printing press and the circulation of books, Schüler-Springorum presented the case that early modern Spain was the originator of defining concepts in the history of antisemitism: Jewish and Muslim racial difference, and the Jewish conspiracy. Whereas most scholarship has pointed to Iberia as a case apart, the presentation contended that books from this part of Europe travelled into central Europe and the new world, and had a profound impact on humanism, the reformation and counter-reformation.

Another critical element of the lecture was the emphasis on participation in mass theatrical events. These range from the auto da fe in Iberia to carnival, football matches, and the web. Schüler-Springorum showed how spectacles themselves pass into different media in history: Francesco Rizzi paintings, Lopez de V songs, Shakespeare plays, to name but a few examples.

As one would expect, lively discussion followed, raising points including early modern “racism” (Kaplan); philology versus biology as the root of race, and the Iberia moment as a strong but not initiating point in antisemitism history (Feldman).

Modern/Postmodern Transitions and Continuities

The next panel shifted our attention to ‘Modern/Postmodern Transitions and Continuities’. It began with Dr James Smith (Royal Holloway, University of London), whose paper, ‘From Trope to Meme’, addressed the UK debate over Jeremy Corbyn and the Labour Party. He argued that we need to consider the nature of digital media and changes in knowledge, and how they interact with the very quick growth of an explicitly democratic mass political movement (over half a million members). Smith pointed to the theoretical importance of conceptualising digital media as a technology of desire, and a post-modern technology, as well as how old debates among the liberal left around antisemitism are projected onto faceless masses.

Expanding on a key theme in this conversation—the conspiracy theory— Dr Martina L. Weisz (Hebrew University) discussed its contemporary history in the Spanish daily press, especially El País, El Mundo and ABC. Weisz argued that the Jewish conspiracy theory has remained prevalent in print and online in this media from the 1990s to the present. Her starting point was the controversy over the publication by Penguin in English of the book, How They Rule the World, by Pedro Baños, a text that, significantly, was not deemed to be problematic in Spain.

Keeping with the same theme of conspiracy, but shifting to the context of the United States, Dr Victoria Woeste analysed the history of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion. Her presentation traced the unfolding impact of conspiratorial antisemitism from the early twentieth century in print media, and its legacies in the question of news in the era of Donald Trump. Her presentation compared Henry Ford, who was pivotal in the dissemination of the Protocols in the US, with Trump.

Keynote: “Deplatforming: Following Extremists to Telegram and Alternative Social Media.”

The second day of the conference started with a keynote by the world-leading digital media specialist, Professor Richard Rogers, from the University of Amsterdam. This talk took the conference into the question of how we can respond effectively to online antisemitism. Rogers explored the broad question of whether deplatforming—removing individuals from platforms including Twitter, YouTube, and Facebook—is a successful strategy. His analysis drew upon intensive digital research that he undertook with a group at the University of Bologna. They found that deplatforming did indeed reduce the reach of formerly high-profile extremists, that it reduced their income streams, and had a positive effect on the mainstream platforms that excluded them. Even though they can migrate to other platforms such as Telegram, far-right/alt-right new media celebrities end up with much smaller audiences and exposure.

In the discussion that followed, Dr Aaron Winter (University of East London), pointed out that we must look at the complex political context of prominent individuals, and not just the technical digital side, as they can stride across a ‘liberal Islamophobia’ as well as fringe alt-right fascism. Dr Ben Gidley (Birkbeck) followed with a discussion about deplatforming, the role of software as an intermediary, and the older political strategy of ‘No Platforming’. Rogers concluded by pointing to the contemporary challenges of effective digital research due to restrictions placed on accessing data by platforms such as Facebook.

Far right/alt right

Dr Ariel Koch (Tel Aviv University) kicked off the panel with an examination of the global activism undertaken by the extremist online group, the ‘Atomwaffen Division’. Koch outlined the eclectic ideological influences evinced by the group, from Hindu eschatology to jihadism. The official website is only found on the dark web, and Koch discussed its ideological make-up, with its aim of ‘white jihad’. Whereas those involved would have inhabited a markedly fringe political space years ago, they now have a transnational reach across the darker side of the web.

The theme of mainstreaming was then taken up further by Dr Aaron Winter (UEL) in his presentation concerning the alt-right. Winter discussed older attempts by, for example, the KKK to enter the mainstream, and early use of the internet. But he pointed to two fundamental shifts that have enabled the far-right to become normalised: 9/11, and the Presidency of Barack Obama. The result is ‘Trumpism’, which binds a diverse movement that incorporates liberal Islamophobia and anti-Black racism.

In the panel discussion, Weisz pointed to the resonance between the ideology of the online right and the eschatology of settler Zionism.  

Identities

The next panel dealt with identities. It delved further into the transnational development of online far-right hate, and the relationship between the online and off-line political worlds that this politics inhabits. Professor Kitty Millet (San Francisco State) focused on Polish nationalism, with the relationship between the political crowd of street protest, the football stadium and football culture, and the recruitment/growth of far-right groups. Millet showed how the ideas and political languages being developed and enunciated in this political space are having transnational impacts around the globe, including the United States, with antisemitism and the figure of the Jewish enemy as a binding force. Critically, the digital space functions as the infrastructure for this transnational political activism.

Birgitte P. Haanshuus (Oslo) followed, and spoke about her research on the political left and online antisemitic hate speech in Norway. Her research focuses on the official Facebook pages of organisations that include the Red Party (Rødt), Palestine Committee, BDS Norway, Radikal Portal. Each of these left-wing groups hold either a pro-Palestinian and/or anti-Israel perspective. Using content analysis and interviews, Haanshuus has found that antisemitism is rarely an issue on these pages. Her interest, however, lies in how potential antisemitic content is moderated, given that those running the organisations are aware of its potential— in other words, how is online hate policed in the virtual space, depending on the conceptions of those in a position of authority.

Matthias Becker (Haifa University) also explored the virtual space of hate speech, focused on the UK in relation to Brexit. His talk discussed British news websites and Facebook, and considered whether exclusionary speech has become mainstream concerning Jews, along with Muslims and European immigrants. The focus on the seeping of hate into mainstream discourse dovetailed with several other contributions to the conference, as did the relational approach of exploring antisemitism with other racisms. In addition, Becker made a significant argument in regard to methodology: the importance of combining quantitative digital analysis with qualitative analysis. This point echoed Winter’s argument about the significance of attending to the political context of any digital change.

Antiracism

The penultimate panel addressed how we can respond effectively against antisemitism. Following the keynote by Richard Rogers, this session brought historical insights from print-media antiracism into dialogue with the latest digital research on what works in social media. Dr Patrick Soulsby (Edge Hill, ICR) analysed comparatively two prominent publications in France and the UK in the 1980’s and 1990’s: Le Droit de Vivre, published by the Ligue internationale contre le racisme et l’antisémitisme (LICRA), founded in 1927, and Searchlight magazine, founded in 1975. Even though these publications did not collaborate, their approaches had significant similarities. Both adapted over time in dynamic response to changes in antisemitism and the far-right, and represented an engagement between antiracism and anti-antisemitism. Perhaps most importantly they provided a successful model of intelligence gathering on far-right political activity, which was absolutely crucial for informing antiracists. Searchlight, in particular, possessed a national network that was able to gather real-time information on developments as they happened, enabling effective activism across the country.

From these models of a print-media response to antisemitism, the panel moved into the digital realm with the research of Dr Sefa Ozalp and his colleagues at the HateLab at Cardiff University. Ozalp presented new work that analysed Twitter in the UK for one year from October 2015. Using computational criminology methodology, the team used a machine learning classifier, identifying almost 3 million tweets. The project measured the impact, the digital lifecycle, of antisemitic tweets, as well as countervailing material from those against anti-Jewish online social media. A very important finding was that antisemitic tweets had a smaller and more short-lived influence than those producing anti-racist messages. In short, the recommendation is that widespread organic responses that challenge antisemitism work.

Reflections on Media History and Antisemitism

The final panel gathered several scholars from the conference to reflect on the key themes discussed. The panel began with the Deputy-Director of the ZfA, Professor Uffa Jensen. Jensen praised the multi-disciplinary discussions of the conference, and was particularly struck by the ways in which contributors contextualised antisemitism (and anti-antisemitism) in relation to other racisms. He also pointed to the significance of gender as a field for further investigation, specifically questions around masculinity, and deplatforming as a potential antisemitic trope. Professor David Feldman, Director of the Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism (Birkbeck, University of London) followed by arguing that we need to consider the history of print news (including fake news), and printed books for us to get to grips with contemporary social media. Feldman stated that Benedict Anderson’s notion of ‘imagined communities’ has become such a part of our vocabulary that the content of his work has been largely forgotten: specifically his focus on ‘print capitalism’ and genre (romance novels vs. chronicles).

Professor Kitty Millet built on this point in regard to Anderson on Immanuel Kant and aesthetic judgement. Relating back to the keynote by Schüler-Springorum, Millet argued that our senses (faculties) change with shifting media, with, for example, Burke, on smell, which he connected to being a British subject. Millet concluded with a note of optimism: the conference has shown that effective anti-antisemitism is possible. The panel concluded with interventions from Marcia Kupfer and Lindsey Kaplan. Kupfer discussed the historical dynamic evolution of antisemitism across media, and pointed to the shifting contexts of racisms. The significance of emotions was again underscored. Kaplan made the case for locating antisemitism in its shifting wider contexts of other racisms. This was an ongoing thread throughout the conference with regard to both antisemitism and anti-antisemitism, which began with Kupfer and Kaplan’s opening panel.

Public Engagement

Webinar

Before the opening of the conference, the two keynote speakers and Professor Uffa Jensen, Deputy-Director of the ZfA, and expert on the history of visual antisemitism, delivered a webinar for civil society organisations. The aim was to communicate key research findings in a condensed fashion for groups working in the field to combat antisemitism. Delegates from Jewish community and antiracism organisations participated.

Research Briefing

Based on the conference, organising partner, MONITOR, published a research briefing for civil society organisations and policy communities, a concise summary of the original insights and policy recommendations of the event. The briefing was published in issue 6 of MONITOR, and is available online for free. It can be consulted here: http://monitoracism.eu/monitor-policy-paper/

Event programme

5 November 2019

09.00-12.00 Webinar for Media, Community, and Antiracism professionals

Chair: Professor James Renton, Edge Hill University.

Professor Stefanie Schüler-Springorum, Technische Universität Berlin.

Professor Uffa Jensen, Technische Universität Berlin.

Professor Richard Rogers, University of Amsterdam.

Conference

13.00-13.15 Welcome

13.15-14.15 Medieval Hatred

Chair: Professor Uffa Jensen, Technische Universität Berlin.

From Codex to Carnival, Medium as Part of the Anti-Jewish Message.

Dr Marcia Kupfer, Washington D.C.

Creating Racial Hatred in Medieval Psalter Illuminations.

Dr Lindsay Kaplan, Georgetown University.

14.15-14.30 Break

14.30-16.00 KEYNOTE

Chair: Professor David Feldman, Pears Institute for the Study of Antisemitism.

Antisemitism and the Media: A Historical Overview.

Professor Stefanie Schüler-Springorum, Technische Universität Berlin.

16.00-16.15 Coffee

16.15-17.45 Modern/Postmodern Transitions & Continuities

Chair: Professor Bryan Cheyette, University of Reading.

From Trope to Meme.

Dr James Smith, Royal Holloway, University of London.

Jewish Conspiracy and the Daily Press in Spain.

Dr Martina L. Weisz, Vidal Sassoon International Center for the Study of Antisemitism, Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Fake News— From the Protocols to the Presidential Election of 2016.

Professor Victoria Woeste, Chicago.

6 November 2019

09.00 Coffee & pastries

09.30-11.00 KEYNOTE

Chair: Monica Gonzalez-Correa, ICR & MONITOR Global Intelligence on Racism, European University Institute.

Deplatforming: Following the extremists to an alternative social media ecosystem

Professor Richard Rogers, University of Amsterdam

11.00-11.30 Coffee

11.30- 12.30 Far-Right/Alt-Right

Chair: Dr Stephen Ashe, ICR & University of Manchester.

Online Hate: From the Far-Right to the ‘Alt-Right’, and from the Margins to the Mainstream.

Dr Aaron Winter, ICR & University of East London.

Nazism, Satanism and Jihadism: Inside the Bizarre Online World of Atomwaffen Division’s Network of Hate and Rage.

Dr Ariel Koch, Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern Studies, Tel Aviv University.

12.30-13.30 Lunch

13.30-15.00 Identities

Chair: Professor Shirli Gilbert, University College London.

Social Media, Hate and Identification.

Professor Kitty Millet, San Francisco State University.

What is (on the) left? Boundaries and content moderation of antisemitic hate speech online.

Birgitte P. Haanshuus, Norwegian Center for Holocaust and Minority Studies/University of Oslo.

‘I voted Leave! So, why are you still here?’ Antisemitic hate speech on British websites in the context of Brexit.

Dr. Matthias J. Becker,Center for Research on Antisemitism, Technical University Berlin/Weiss-Livnat Center and Department of Communication, University of Haifa.

15.00-15.30 Coffee

15.30-16.30 Antiracism

Chair: Dr Ben Gidley, ICR & Birkbeck.

‘A Resurrected Evil’: Challenging Antisemitism in Antiracist Media, c. 1980-2000.

Dr Patrick Soulsby, ICR, Edge Hill University.

Antisemitism on Twitter: Collective efficacy and the role of community organisations in challenging online hate speech.

Dr Sefa Ozalp, HateLab, Cardiff University.

16.40- 17.30 Reflections on Media History and Antisemitism

Chair: Professor James Renton, Edge Hill University.

Professor David Feldman, Birkbeck.

Dr Lindsay Kaplan, Georgetown University.

Dr Marcia Kupfer, Washington D.C.

Professor Uffa Jensen, Technische Universität Berlin.

Professor Kitty Millet, San Francisco State University.

Conference Acknowledgements

With special thanks to the ZfA in Berlin and the Department of English, History and Creative Writing at Edge Hill University for additional funding; Ruth Carr, Faculty of Arts and Sciences, at Edge Hill for administrative support; the Edge Hill conference team; our conference chairs, Dr Stephen Ashe, Professor David Feldman, Dr Ben Gidley, and Professor Shirli Gilbert; and our student helpers, Ivy Capehart, Helen Meakin, Thomas Ottley, and Alicia Sims.

Conference Steering Committee

Monica Gonzalez-Correa (MONITOR), Stephen Ashe, Jenny Barrett, Ben Gidley, James Renton (ICR).

EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2019/20

REPORT

Stranger in a Land: Late-Antique and Medieval Narratives on Foreigners and Exile

Córdoba, 4–6 March 2020

Academic Organizers: Miriam Lindgren Hjälm (Stockholm School of Theology & Sankt Ignatios Theological Academy); Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala, University of Córdoba; Israel Muñoz Gallarte (University of Córdoba); Meira Polliack (Tel Aviv University); Marzena Zawanowska, University of Warsaw & Jewish Historical Institute;

Academic Secretary: Lourdes Bonhome Pulido (University of Córdoba)

Abstract

The aim of the conference was to explore the ways in which representatives of monotheistic traditions perceived and described “the other.” This central category – understood not only as adherent of different religion, but also foreigner, sectarian, or convert – was studied from various perspectives and viewpoints in order to see how Judaism, Christianity and Islam conceptualized their respective “others,” as well as these “others’” sacred texts, their languages and deities. All these is intrinsically related to the idea of exile, another category that was subjected to analyses. The planned outcome of the event is the enhancement of international, multidisciplinary academic cooperation that transgresses the boundaries of distinct scholarly disciplines. The planned output of the event includes the publication of a conference report and of a collective volume of articles based on selected papers presented at the conference.

Main Conference Report

The Original Event Rationale

The medieval “Mediterranean Society” presented a rich tapestry of cultures and religions wherein the adherents of Judaism, Christianity and Islam wished to preserve their different identities vis-à-vis “the others.” These “others” were not necessarily outsiders, i.e., adherents of other monotheistic traditions, or outright heretics, but also insiders, i.e., representatives of the inner varieties of a given tradition, such as Rabbanite and Karaite Jews, Sunni and Shiʿi Muslims, Eastern and Western Syriac Christian communities and Copts, as well as converts. This last category is of special interest as it refers to those who initially had been “others,” until they decided to cross a community’s boundaries and become “one of us.” As such, although well-desired, they were always suspicious to the receiving culture.

The idea of “the other” is intrinsically connected to spacial displacement. To be a refugee, forced from one’s home and homeland, has always been a difficult experience, for some even a death sentence. All monotheistic traditions, but especially Judaism and Islam, preserve collective memories of exile and emigration (e.g., Babylonian exile in Judaism, or the emigration from Mecca to Medinah in Islam) which form an important part of their religious self-identity. The experience of estrangement and hardship involved in sojourning in a foreign land found reflection in the respective sacred texts of both religions, which recount numerous stories of famous emigrants (e.g., Abraham, Muḥammad). The concept of exile is also present in Christianity, though in many texts it became sublimated to reflect the state of human soul as an outsider exiled in one’s material body (e.g., the texts from Nag Hammadi). Yet, in the Middle Ages, the exile was not always imposed. Spectacular military conquests as well as the steadily growing world of trade and commerce made many people abandon their homes and settle in foreign lands of their own will. This notwithstanding, their experience – even if living within their own religious community, and all the more so, if forced to settle among the confessional strangers – was not always an easy one.

The complex reality of vibrant multi-religious and movable society as well as the resulting cross-cultural and cross-sectoral interactions and interchanges find reflection in the respective literatures of Judaism, Christianity and Islam. The canonical texts of these religions register the authors’ concern with the subject. Later legislations of the monotheistic traditions tried to accommodate the sacred texts to the ever changing reality by means of elaborating legal frames to normalize the life together with “strangers,” while other literary genres provided more abstract conceptualizations of the subject at stake.

So far, more practical, legal aspects of the relations between Jews Christian and Muslims in the Middle Ages have mainly been addressed in research, while theoretical, conceptual dimensions of the ideas of “the other” and “otherness” have not drawn much scholarly attention. In addition, scholars who ventured to explore the subject, usually focused on one particular religion in isolation from others. The purpose of the proposed conference is to redress this unbalance and revisit the ways in which “strangers” and the state of estrangement were perceived and described in the intertwined worlds of the major monotheistic traditions in cross-fertilizing contact.

The papers presented at the conference – to a large extent based on unpublished and understudied sources (e.g., Cairo Genizah manuscripts) – will attempt to answer the following questions: What did the major monotheistic traditions share in common in their approaches to strangers and conceptualization of the state of estrangement? How did their respective views influenced one another and how did they change and transform over time? What were the possible venues of cross cultural transfers and inter-faith transmissions among them: direct or indirect, oral or written?

These as well as other issues will be addressed from different perspectives and viewpoints by scholars representing various disciplines related to Jewish, Christian and Islamic studies, and on the basis of versatile source texts, written in many different languages (Hebrew, Aramaic, Arabic, including Judaeo- and Christian Arabic, Coptic, Syriac, Latin and Greek) representing diverse literary genres (chronographies, exegetical literature, philosophical and grammatical treatises, legal texts, private correspondence, Genizah documents, etc.).

Yet the objective of the proposed conference is not only to give answers, but also to raise questions and map out possible avenues of research based primarily on unpublished and/or understudies sources. The main intention of this initiative is to foster international, multidisciplinary cooperation of established as well as early-career scholars. Therefore, we welcome submissions of papers in English that deal with the broad categories of “the other” and “otherness” in medieval monotheistic traditions and religious denominations.

The conferences met its original rationale. First, it addressed the subject in a pronouncedly interdisciplinary fashion thanks to the diverse fields of interests and scholarly competences of the participants. Accordingly, it explored different perspectives on the notions the “other”/ stranger otherness/ estrangement and exile from the view point of representatives of different monotheistic traditions, as well as of branches (or internal divisions) existing within these traditions (such as Rabbanite and Karaite Jews, or Sunni and Shiʿi Muslims). It did so through a close scrutiny of works written in different time periods (transcending late antiquity and the Middle Ages), in numerous languages (such as Arabic, Hebrew, Aramaic, Latin, Greek, Syriac). As a result, the papers investigated not only the respective sacred scriptures of major monotheistic traditions and/ or exegetical treatment of specific biblical and qur’ānic verses, passages, or broader narratives that refer to various types of strangers, the state of estrangement and exile, but also the conception of the “other” and the condition of otherness and exilic life as reflected in numerous other literary genres such as chronographies and other historical documents, philosophical, grammatical and lexicographic treatises, Genizah sources, legal texts (including fatwās collections and calendar calculations and rulings), mystical and polemical writings, formal letters and private correspondence, poetry, and others. Second, as initially planned many of the sources used by the participants were so far unpublished and/or understudied. Third, the conference not only addressed many of the above mentioned issues, but also raised a fair amount of new questions as testified by the discussion that followed participants’ presentations (see below). Fourth, it enhanced international cooperation of established and early-career scholars which will be continued while working on the post-conference volume.

Detailed Overview of Sections and Papers

There were altogether 24 papers (and not 26 as initially planned) presented at the conference, divided into 9 thematic sessions. Unfortunately, due to the situation caused by the COVID-19 global pandemic, 6 scholars decided to cancel their participation, of whom 4 sent their papers in advance, so that they be read by someone else in their stead).

The first session (chaired by Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala, University of Córdoba) was devoted to The Concepts of Stranger and Estrangement in Canonical Texts. Originally, it was planned to be opened with a paper Greece and Judah: Models of Mutual Relationships in Persian and Hellenistic Period in the Light of Common Intellectual Heritage by Łukasz Niesiołowski-Spano (University of Warsaw), who, unfortunately, had to cancel his participation. Therefore the first talk was given by Mette Bjerregaard Mortensen (Université Libre de Bruxelles) who spoke on Enclave Rhetoric in the Qur’ān. It argued that the tension between the early Muslim believers and the surrounding world, including the tension between in-group and out-group, was a prevalent theme throughout the Qur’ān which was evidently preoccupied not only with boundary drawing, but also – and perhaps even more so – with boundary maintenance. Building on the research of the American New Testament scholar, E.P. Sanders, who had introduced a distinction between the ideas of “getting in” and “staying in” in connection with the study of early Judaism and had argued that early Torah piety was concerned mainly with “staying in” (i.e., staying in the covenant with Yahweh), rather than “getting in” (meaning that Torah piety was not essentially missionary, but preserving and upholding in its character), the paper argued that a similar concern was mirrored in the Qur’ān. It demonstrated that the Qur’ān espoused what might be termed “enclave rhetoric,” that is, rhetoric which articulates the world in which the believers live as full of iniquity and rampant sinfulness. Referring to Mary Douglas’ observations that the enclave is particularly preoccupied with reactualizing and refueling the resentment that led to the formation of the enclave in the first place, Bjerregaard Mortensen argued that this tendency is particularly visible in the Qur’ān’s continuous encouragement to the believers to “emigrate in the way of God” (e.g. Q 2:218; Q 8:72; Q 9:20; Q 22:58) from maltreatment and persecution. She showed that the emigrant identity, articulated as a central, even decisive (e.g., Q 8:72) part of being a member of the early qur’ānic community, and upholding the “emigration project” – and, thereby, the boundaries of the early qur’ānic community – was in the Qur’ān enhanced by rhetorical reactualization of the reasons for emigrating in the first place. The following discussion focused on the double meaning of the concept of emigration which may refer to an actual physical displacement, but also spiritual alienation. The discussion also touched upon possible similarities to the Kharājites (Khārijites took their name from the term kharaja, meaning “to leave”), as well as devotional practices referred to in Sufi texts, where the Arabic root hajara – used to denote Muḥammad’s emigration from Mekka to Medinah – means “leaving house to devote oneself to God”).

The last paper in this session, Strangers on the Earth: Two Nag Hammadi Texts on Humans Exile in the Physical World, was presented by F.L. Roig Lanzillotta (University of Groningen). It is a well-established topos that Gnostics had a very low opinion both of their physical body and of the material world in which they were forced to live. In the black-and-white overview provided by anti-heretical writings, indeed, all Gnostic sects are described as being anti-cosmic dualists and pessimists. Roig Lanzillotta demonstrated that thanks to the discovery of the Nag Hammadi corpus, nowadays we have a much more nuanced picture of heterodox Christians, since it offers a broad spectrum of attitudes and concepts regarding both the physical body and the world, running the gamut from radical rejection to implicit acceptance. The paper focused on two Nag Hammadi treatises, namely the Exegesis on the Soul (NHC II, 6; ExSoul) and the Authoritative Teaching (AuthTeach), of supposedly dualistic character that conceive of human life as the soul’s exile on Earth. It showed that while the former mainly described the violence of incarnation in the body, which forced the soul to bear an unnatural, physical relationship, the latter pondered how violently the world imposed itself on the soul. In both these Nag Hammadi texts, therefore, physical life was depicted as that which perpetuates dualism, keeping the soul far removed from the Father and forcing her to live exiled in an alien and distressful environment. Yet, Roig Lanzillotta argued that against the commonly accepted view, they did not convey a clear-cut anti-cosmic dualism, as their cosmology was evidently monistic (only one God). Thus, he concluded, they rather represented a moderate dualism (akin to Platonic conceptions) in which the earthly/ human and the heavenly/ divine were in opposition. The following discussion raised the question as to what extant these texts reflected their authors’ wish to be the “other,” alienated from the common people who do not seek knowledge.

The second session (chaired by Mateusz Wilk, University of Warsaw) was devoted to Conceptions of “the Other” and the Exile in Medieval Thought and Traditional Literature. It opened with a paper The Karaites as others in Judah Halevi’s Book of the Kuzari, presented by Marzena Zawanowska (University of Warsaw & Jewish Historical Institute). It focused on one of the most influential books of Jewish religious thought ever written, namely Judah Halevi’s Book of the Kuzari. On the basis of a letter preserved in the Cairo Genizah, it had generally been assumed to have originally been composed as a polemical response to a Karaite convert. However, Zawanowska argued that the Karaites had neither been perceived nor described by Halevi as heretics. She pointed out that in fact, his depiction of this alternative to Rabbanite Judaism – its adherents and origins – appeared so appealing to the Karaites that it made some of them believe that the author had been a (crypto-) Karaite himself, while his reconstructions of the movement’s history became appropriated as the founding myth of Karaism. The paper attempted to answer the questions of what was the attitude of Halevi towards the Karaites, and what, in his view, was their main fault. It also addressed a more fundamental issue of what was his purpose in writing the Kuzari. In an attempt to answer them, she showed that although Halevi was evidently ambivalent towards the Karaites, he was also ambivalent towards the Rabbanites. Her conclusion was that the Book of the Kuzari conveyed a sustained critique of all the Jews, whether Rabbanite or Karaite, aimed not only at their improvement, but also at reconciliation between the adherents of these two major branches of Judaism. The ensuing discussion focused on the question of how different Halevi was in comparison with his contemporaries (especially in terms of his conceptualization of divine revelation), hence to what extent he was the “other” within his own society.

The second talk in this session, Exile and estrangement in the thought of Baḥya ibn Paqūda and Judah Halevi, was given by Ehud Krinis (independent researcher), who employed the interpretation of the prolonged existence of Jews in exile (Heb. galut) as a prime example of Baḥya’s and Halevi’s radically diverse understanding of the meaning of Jewish experience. He argued that Baḥya suggested a re-formulation of exile not as a historical experience, but as a personal-existential one, whose dimensions of loneliness and alienation were formulated with the help of the Arabo-Muslim terms of “estrangement” (Ar. ghurba) and “stranger” (Ar. gharīb). In Baḥya’s thought the individual’s acknowledgement of his status before God as the one meaningful axis of his existence, entails his inner acknowledgment of himself as a stranger (Ar. gharīb), one who is estranged and alienated, in his inner concealed level, from matters of his earthly existence in general, and from matters concerning his social existence and national affiliation in particular. In contradistinction, Judah Halevi, who perceived Judaism as developing along the axis between the God of Israel and the people of Israel, sought to emphasize the national dimension of exile (Heb. galut) as a situation which drastically weakens the ties bonding the people of Israel with the God of Israel. For Halevi, acknowledging and experiencing exile as an acute and profound crisis are crucial to the arousal of a real and concrete desire and plea for national redemption. According to him, an authentic yearning for God’s redemption of Israel from exile requires not just adhering to the traditional rabbinical customs of lamenting and praying, but also active steps of traveling and dwelling in holy land. It is in this context that Halevi integrated his own original interpretation of the concept of the “stranger” (Ar. gharīb), which he took upon himself to realize. The stranger is the one who, after departing from his family and community, assigned himself to walking across the holy land, grasping directly the bitter reality of the land’s occupation by foreigners and impostors. This is much in the way the nation’s patriarchs – Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, did in the aftermath of God’s convent with them. Thus, Krinis convincingly demonstrated that by applying the concept of the “stranger” (Ar. gharīb) to their interpretations of the situation of exile (Heb. galut), both Baḥya and Halevi had found themselves in conflict with their own cultural and social environment, retreating from their Jewish-Andalusian society. While in the case of Baḥya this retreat was inner and implicit, in Halevi’s case it was explicit and provocative. The following discussion focused on different influences on Baḥya and Halevi (of al-shuʿūbiyya, the possibility of which Krinis rejected, and of the shiʿīte concept of ṣafwa, which he confirmed referring to his PhD dissertation).

The third paper of this section presented by Łukasz Piątak (Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań), was entitled “Banished from its World.” The Image of Fallen Soul in al-Suhrawardī’s al-Wāridāt wa-al-Taqdisāt (The Divine Inspirations and Sanctifications). It explored the influences of Gnostic and Neoplatonic paradigms of treating what is divine in human (be it soul, spirit, pneuma, light, etc.) as essentially alien to the mundane world on Muslim religious thought, and more specifically on the twelfth-century mystic author, al-Suhrawardī’s (1154–1191). It argued that some traits of this worldview could be found in, or interpreted from, the famous hadīth of the prophet Muḥammad: “This world is the prison for a believer and paradise for a non-believer” (Ṣaḥīḥ Muslim, 5390) and that it had been typically interpreted in this way by Sufi mystics and Muslim Neoplatonic philosophers. Piątak demonstrated that in the thought of al-Suhrawardī the soul (Ar. nafs/ an-nūr al-isfahbaḏī) was an intermediate being, which had its origin in the realm of spiritual light. However, being attached to the body during its life on earth meant a forced descent to the dark world of matter. In this state a soul was engaged in a number of relations that caused its ethical deterioration and might have an impact on its eschatological fate. The paper showed that in his well-known allegorical narrative entitled Qiṣṣat al-ġurba al-ġarbiyya (The tale of western exile), al-Suhrawardī presented temporary stay of the human in this world as “an exile in the West,” while in al-Waridāt wa al-Taqdisāt, he developed an image of a soul as a stranger lost in the land of danger, desperate to free itself from oppression. Thus, Piątak concluded that the medieval author invoked his soul to remind it of its noble descent and called for its purification and implores the Active Intellect to facilitate the soul’s return to its homeland through the process of illumination. The paper was mainly based on Piątak’s critical edition of the hitherto unpublished Arabic text of al-Waridāt wa al-Taqdisāt. The ensuing discussion raised the question of al-Suhrawardī’s estrangement as a mystic. One of the participants asked why he was killed, whether it was because of his controversial and heterodox views. The answer was that one should not disregard the tense political situation in the region of the time (e.g., Crusades, but also Sunni/Abbasid and Ismāʿīli/Fatimid rivalry for power). Referring to previous scholarship (Ziai, Marcotte), Piątak pointed out that al-Suhrawardī was probably seen by his adversaries as possible crypto-Ismāʿīli (e.g, his ideal of the king-philosopher rather than orthodox Qurayshī caliph). In addition, the chroniclers mention him as a master sorcerer, a person perceived by his disciples as a prophet (Ibn Abī Uṣaybi‘a, Ibn Khallikān). Indeed, Piątak argued, that two of al-Suhrawardī’s texts might have been seen as having pretense to the status of revelated books, namely Ḥikmat al-Ishrāq (The Philosophy of Illumination) and al-Waridāt wa al-Taqdisāt.

The third session (chaired by Marzena Zawanowska, University of Warsaw & Jewish Historical Institute) was devoted to Converts and Community Boundaries in the World of the Genizah. It opened with the paper Conversion of women to Judaism in the Cairo Genizah documents, presented by Amir Ashur (The Research Authority of Orot Israel College). It discussed numerous cases of conversion of women, all dated to the 11th–13th centuries. It argued that the heroines of these conversions were independent women – each one of them being a foreigner not only as a non-Jew asking to be accepted into the Jewish community, but also as a woman, that is, of lower social status, not equal to men (thus “double strangers”). In-depth analyses of various documents from the Cairo Genizah inspired Ashur to raise interesting questions: how these women perceived themselves as “foreigners” or “others” and how they were perceived by the community, as well as whether there was any difference in the attitude of the community toward male converts or foreigners, as opposed to the attitude toward women. In an attempt to answer these and other questions, Ashur discussed different aspects of “otherness” – gender, religion and ethnic community. The following discussion evolved around the status (and rights) of women as internal “others,” and touched upon the question of their literacy and access to education. One of the participants gave an example of a woman who served as a Bible teacher for boys. There was also a question about the conversion of slaves and their status as “new-comers” in the society.

The next speaker in this session was to be Zvi Stampfer (The Research Authority of Orot Israel College), who was to give a talk on Trust or Suspicion: The Status of the Non-Jews as Reflected in Judaeo-Arabic Works, but, unfortunately, had to cancel his participation.

The last paper in this session, Strangers by the Law: A Sharia Perspective on Others According to Mālikī Fatwās from Medieval Maghreb, was delivered by Filip Jakubowski (Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań). It begun with an observation that being a stranger could be considered from different angles – religious, ethnic, tribal, social as well as others, and argued that the famous “us and them” dichotomy was also visible in Islamic jurisprudence (especially in fatwās, reflecting different perspectives). Considering Islamic legal rulings a unique source of knowledge on everyday life, Jakubowski analyzed Mālikī fatwās from the medieval Maghreb preserved in a collection known as Al-Miʻyār l-muʻrib wa al-jāmiʻ al-muġrib ʻan fatāwī ahl Ifriqiyya wa al-Andalus wa al-Maghrib. This multivolume work was compiled by al-Wansharīsī (d. 1508) and transmitted by al-Mahdī al-Wazzānī (d. 1923) in his Al-Miʻyār al-jadīd. Jakubowski pointed out that among many fatwās dating from 3rd/9th to 9th/15th c., there were cases of marginalisation of both individuals and entire groups. Not only were there entire groups labeled as heretics, as well as traces of some controversies with Jews or Christians could be discerned, but also, what is most peculiar, a clear distinction between local Muslims and others was made. Those considered strangers seemed to be Andalusīs, members of certain Berber tribes, or Muslims from other parts of the Islamic world. Although the Sharia theoretically treats all Muslims equally (this approach is based on Q 49:13), the questions posted to muftīs testify to the existence in practice of clear distinctions between “us” and “them,” especially if the customs of those who were recognized by the community as others were different from the local ones. Jakubowski demonstrated that the theoretical equality of Muslims (kafā’a) depended on: lineage (the descendants of the Quraish tribe were considered better), duration of adherence to Islam (recent converts were considered worse), freedom, piety, occupation (scholars were considered better; there were even produced tables of unsuitable professions) and wealth. Finally, he observed that the same distinction was also visible in the choice of the words describing the “others.” The ensuing discussion focused on different conceptualizations of otherness within Muslim society (e.g., the title of sharīf is given to those who descend from Fatima, but ironically women in some cases do not inherit it).

The fourth session (chaired by Yoram Erder, Tel Aviv University) was devoted to Strangers and Estrangement Real and Imagined. It opened with Camilla Adang’s (Tel Aviv University) paper on Ibn Ḥazm’s Self-portrayal as a Stranger in His Own Land. The controversial religious scholar and literary figure Ibn Ḥazm of Cordoba (d. 1064 CE) stood out in the intellectual landscape of al-Andalus for a number of reasons: (1) the rare breadth and depth of his scholarship, which resulted in a vast number of major works and short epistles on theology, morals, substantive law, legal theory, logic, history, political theory, interreligious polemics, belles lettres and more; (2) the suspicion that he had not acquired his knowledge through the accepted channels of oral instruction but rather from books; (3) his insistence that religious law and doctrine should be based exclusively on the Qurʾān and reliable Ḥadīth, taken in their external sense (Ar. ẓāhir) and, closely related to all the above (4) his relentless conflict with representatives of the dominant Mālikī religious establishment in al-Andalus, whose authority he challenged and whose piety and learning he questioned. All of this, together with his critique of some of the party kings, who had created small states on the ruins of the former Umayyad caliphate, led to his ostracism and withdrawal from public life and to the burning of his books. Even before events took this dramatic turn, however, Ibn Ḥazm seems to have been well aware of his unusual position, as we can infer from a number of texts that reflect his sense of alienation and otherness. The paper focused on a close analysis of these source texts. The final discussion evolved around the question of how common was it to feel linguistic estrangement in al-Andalus (the spoken Arabic dialect differed from the classical one), and thus to what extent it was a cultural topos. It also touched upon the question of the concepts and relationship between the oral and written traditions in Islam. In addition, one of the participants asked about Ibn Ḥazm’s competences and training (who were his teachers, whether he was a true Ḥadīth scholar; Adang confirmed that he was).

The second paper in this session was presented by Mateusz Wilk (University of Warsaw), who talked on Otherness and Politics in Zīrid Granada. It discussed the political and cultural activity of two Jewish leaders (viziers?) active in Zīrid Granada – Samuel ha-Nagid (Abū Ibrāhīm b. al-Naġrīla, d. 447/1055) and his son, Joseph (Abū Ḥusayn b. al-Naġrīla, d. 459/1066) – as well as the situation that led to the upheaval of Muslim inhabitants of Granada against the Jews in 1066. It used the case of Zīrid Granada as an example of a Classical Muslim state paradigm, where non-Muslim officials were often employed, but this practice frequently caused social upheavals, conflicts and riots. Wilk explored the nature of interactions between Jewish leaders and Muslim inhabitants of Granada, demonstrating how the “otherness” of Jewish high-ranking state officials influenced the politics of Granada in mid-5th/11th century, paying special attention to some methodological difficulties posed by the sources. He also scrutinized in detail one of these sources, namely the famous anti-Jewish poem written by the jurist Abū Isḥāq of Elvira, showing that the way he presented Jews in this text might have reflected collective fears characterizing the political unrest of the taifa period. At the end of his presentation, he addressed a question of whether the poem might indeed have triggered the outbreak of anti-Jewish violence in 459/1066 as maintained by some scholars. The ensuing discussion focused on the role played by the poem in the aforementioned riots of 459/1066. One of the participants argued that the poem did not incite violence (it would be hard to imagine for a poem written in classical Arabic to exert influence over uneducated masses), but rather it was the other way around – it reflected views that brought it about. Another participant observed that although it was against Muslim law to have a Jew in power, no one had a problem with it, as long as the Muslim ruler was strong and his politics were successful. The problem started when the Muslim power weakened and had to cope with its own defeats by looking for a scapegoat. Finally, someone made a comment that nowhere in Muslim sources ha-Nagid was called a vizier.

The last paper in this session, Do Calendar Differences Cause a Social Rift?, was given by Nadia Vidro (University College London). She opened her talk with an introductory comment to the effect that calendars and time reckoning had occupied a central position in medieval society, as an organizing principle of society and social life. The calendar structured all aspects of social and economic life, defined the rhythms of religious liturgy and worship, and provided a focus for communal and religious identities. For this reason, scholars have often assumed that disagreements over the calendar led to social rifts and sometimes even schisms. In her paper, Vidro aimed to undermine this view, by offering a more nuanced picture of the impact that calendar differences between medieval Karaites and Rabbanites had exerted on Jewish social cohesion and daily life. She explained that in the Middle Ages, Rabbanites determined their calendar by calculation using fixed arithmetical schemes, while Karaites relied on the observation of natural phenomena, such as the new moon and the state of barley crops. It has thus long been recognized that the calendar differences played a critical role in Karaite-Rabbanite relations. In early research on the subject it was assumed that the use of different calendars would have broken up society and led to a Karaite-Rabbanite social and religious schism. More recently, the assumption that Karaite and Rabbanite communities must have led separate lives because of their different calendars has been challenged, for example, by marriage contracts between Karaites and Rabbanites which included special provisions for their different festival dates. In her paper, Vidro considered the implications of medieval Jews running their lives with different time frames and calendars and convincingly argued that calendar differences did not entail social segregation and schism. The ensuing discussion revolved around the question of whether there was a real schism between Karaites and Rabbanites in the Middle Ages and if it did affect the everyday life interactions of the adherents of both these branches of Judaism. One of the participant observed that one should not draw general conclusions on this matter from the Genizah documents relating to specific instances (thus not to take pars pro toto). It was also pointed out that the Rabbanite authors’ theoretical statements in this respect are not a reliable source either (e.g., Ibn Daud’s information on the yearly excommunication of the Karaites was probably his own invention). Another participant asked if calendrical works by Abraham bar Hiyya and Abraham ibn Ezra might have been composed in response to the Karaite “threat.” The answer was negative; they were composed in 12th century Spain where the Karaite presence did not pose a real threat, and therefore most likely reflected genuine scientific interests of their authors.

The fifth session (chaired by Camilla Adang, Tel Aviv University) was devoted to the question of The Status of Strangers and Converts in Religious and Secular Legislation. It opened with Krystyna Stebnicka’s (University of Warsaw) paper on Jews as Strangers in Late Antiquity Jerusalem/Aelia Capitolina. It began with a historical introduction on Emperor Hadrian and his refounding of Jerusalem as the Roman colony called Aelia Capitolina. Jews were banned from this totally pagan city populated with military veterans, as well as from its environs. The ban remained in force for the next couple of centuries (in the 4th c. Constantine permitted Jews to visit the Temple site only once a year to commemorate the destruction of the Temple). Stebnicka presented and analyzed in detail all known evidence (objects with Jewish symbols) for Jewish pilgrimages to the Christian Holy City from the 4th to the 6th c. CE. She argued that the early fourth-century itinerary of the anonymous Bordeaux Pilgrim, including the first description of the Temple Mount after the one by Josephus Flavius, as well as Jerome’s commentary on Zephaniah and the so-called pilgrim vessels decorated with Jewish menorot, left no doubt about regular Jewish visits to Jerusalem and Jewish presence on the ruined Temple Mount during the time when Emperor Hadrian’s ban was theoretically still in force. The ensuing discussion focused on the question of why the Jews were allowed to enter Jerusalem, what made Constantine issue a permission for Jews to access the Temple site once a year. The conclusion was that their visits were tolerated for religious propaganda purposes as a means of showing the superiority of Christianity (the miserable situation of the Jews was considered as convincing proof that God favored Christians). As to the preserved material evidences of their presence, it may safely be assumed that they represented a sort of souvenirs produced for the pilgrimages.

The second paper in this session, The Proselytes (gerim) in the Hebrew Bible According to the Early Karaites, was presented by Yoram Erder (Tel Aviv University). It opened with a remark that as on many other issues, there were numerous contradictions in the Hebrew Bible regarding the proselyte status in Israel. The answers given by the Talmudic sages to these contradictions in the Oral Law were irrelevant to the Karaites, who sought solutions through their own interpretation of the Hebrew Bible alone. Analyzing the Hebrew concept of ger (“proselyte”), Erder demonstrated that the Karaites maintained that the Bible made a distinction between two types of proselytes: Ger ṣedeq (in Judaeo-Arabic: ger dīnī) who accepted the yoke of religion, and ger shaʽar – a proselyte who partially assimilated to the Jewish people. The Karaites found it hard to identify the type of proselyte to which a particular scriptural verse was referring to. Erder explored in depth the definitions of proselyte in Karaite law, and the duties and rights of the various types of proselytes, considering the following issues: Are the rights of a proselyte in the Land of Israel the same as those of a proselyte in the Diaspora? Did the laws of the dhimma in Islam influence the Karaites’ legislation concerning the proselytes? He also pondered the extent to which the Karaite discourse influenced the Rabbanite commentators of the Hebrew Bible in the Gaonic period and after. The ensuing discussion focused on the medieval Karaites’ internal debates over the concept of “proselyte,” as well as how their internal disagreements were reflected in their writings (theory) on the one hand, and influenced their legal rulings (practice) on the other.

The last paper in this session, Maimonides and Andalusian Legal Thought, by Marc Herman (Yale University), was read by Camilla Adang. It opened with the observation that Moses Maimonides (1138–1204) had penned perhaps the most comprehensive medieval account of rabbinic tradition, but that his ideas were at odds with his medieval predecessors and frequently, as his interpreters noted, the Talmudic tradition itself. It situated several anomalous features of Maimonides’ legal thought in the context of Andalusian Mālikī and early Almohad jurisprudence, thereby embedding Maimonides’ timeless vision of Jewish law in a particular moment of Islamic legal history. Herman demonstrated that integrating ideas from non-Rabbanite Jews and, more decisively, Muslims thus enabled Maimonides to reevaluate rabbinic literature and to present rabbinic authority in a novel way. Ultimately, he argued that reading Jewish and Islamic legal traditions in concert contributed to a long-needed reevaluation of the constitutive elements of Jewish law in the Islamic world. Given the absence of the author of the paper, there was no possibility to take questions from the audience.

The sixth session (chaired by María Angeles Gallego, Spanish National Research Council) was devoted to Reflections on “the Other” and “the Other’s” Scripture in Exegetical Literature. The first paper, The Pedagogy of Failure: Christian Arabic Commentaries on Exile Psalms, by Miriam Lindgren Hjälm (Stockholm School of Theology & Sankt Ignatios Theological Academy), was read by Marzena Zawanowska. It opened with the observation that reception history is increasingly becoming an integral part of biblical studies. Accordingly, the reception of the popular Psalm 137 [LXX 136, “By the Rivers of Babylon…”] has recently been the subject of several studies that show how the interpretation of this Psalm was adapted so as to be made meaningful for new audiences as it traveled through the centuries. We are told in these studies that the interpretation divided Jews and Christians because of their respective approaches to the Bible. Yet the story told is the story of the West. As a complement, the present paper focused chiefly on the Eastern Christian reception. It argued that Eastern Christian commentaries and homilies on this Psalm showed that Eastern Christianity resorted to a broad spectrum of approaches in their efforts to make sense of the Jewish exile and that Christian reception was far more complex and rich than what recent studies on the reception of this Psalm have accounted for. By bringing examples from Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Arabic texts, Hjälm demonstrated that the question of interpretation divided not primarily Jews and Christians, but Christians internally in Patristic times and for centuries to come. Given the absence of the author of the paper, there was no possibility to take questions from the audience.

The second paper in this session, The Vision of the “Other” in Menahem ha-Meiri’s Commentary on Psalms, was presented by Mariano Gómez Aranda (Spanish National Research Council). It opened with an introductory information on Menahem ha-Meiri (1249–1315), a Provençal halakhist and exegete. He wrote several commentaries on the Bible, of which only two have been preserved up to our times (viz. on Psalms and Proverbs). In his commentary on Psalms, ha-Meiri observes that some Psalms were written as prophecies of “our long exile” or “our exile in Edom,” making a clear reference to the situation of the Jews among Christians in Medieval times. Thus in his exegesis, the ambiguous “other” of the biblical text is transformed into the Christian “other.” The paper analyzed how this Provençal exegete perceived the Christian “other” by applying the biblical text of Psalms to the circumstances of his own time (“actualization”). By doing so, it contributed to our understanding of how the contacts of Christians and Jews in Medieval Provence were perceived by a Jewish exegete in the light of the biblical text. Finally, Gómez Aranda analyzed and compared Meiri’s vision of the Christians as expressed in his exegetical comments (in his Bible commentaries) with his positive attitude towards them in his halakhic works (Talmud commentaries). The following discussion touched upon the resemblance between ha-Meiri’s approach and those of the earlier Karaite exegetes from the East (especially Daniel al-Qumisi) in terms of his “actualizing” comments. One of the participants asked whether ha-Meiri made a clear theoretical distinction between the literal-contextual and allegorical interpretations, and if he elaborated on his hermeneutics (e.g., in introductions to his commentaries). The answer was negative. Moreover, Gómez Aranda stated that it was rather improbable for ha-Meiri to be acquainted with Karaite writings. Another debated issue was the apparent incongruity in ha-Meiri’s approach to Christianity – his positive assessment of this religion as non-idolatrous and promoting positive values in his Talmud commentaries, and his negative assessment of it in his Bible commentaries. The conclusion was that both types of works were written for different audiences with different purposes in mind and that ha-Meiri considered Christianity good in theory, but bad in practice.

The seventh session (chaired by Israel Muñoz Gallarte, University of Córdoba) was devoted to The Others, Their Languages and Deities. It opened with a paper entitled The “Unsacred” Language of the Others: Jewish Views on Other Languages in the Andalusi Context, delivered by María Angeles Gallego (Spanish National Research Council). It opened with the introductory observation that the role that the Hebrew language played in the history of the Jewish people as their sacred language has been widely studied. The study of Jewish attitudes towards other languages is arguably less developed, especially for the pre-modern period. The paper addressed the issue in the specific context of al-Andalus. The Jews of al-Andalus played a crucial role in the study and revival of the Hebrew language for literary purposes in the so-called Golden Age period. Interestingly, however, their investigative work in the Hebrew language took place at a time of profound Jewish embedment in the Arab-Muslim milieu, often idealized as the Golden Age of “convivencia.” Gallego demonstrated that references to languages other than Hebrew, the sacred language of Judaism, were scarce and usually occurred in grammatical works in the context of comparative analyses between Hebrew and Arabic. The view that Andalusi Jews had of other languages was also reflected in the initial polemics between those scholars who were in favor of writing in (Judeo)-Arabic on the one hand, and those in favor of using Hebrew for their scientific works on the other. Furthermore, attitudes towards languages other than Hebrew, and more specifically Arabic, are implicit in the linguistic registers used for their writings and their acknowledgement of the literature of other groups, notably Arab Muslims. Thanks to the in-depth analysis of these different factors, Gallego offered a comprehensive view of Jewish attitudes to languages other than Hebrew in al-Andalus. While doing so, she showed how they evolved through time (early period, 8th–11th c.; from 11th c. onwards) pointing to the link between religious and linguistic identification. The ensuing discussion revolved around the Jews’ of al-Andalus “nationalism” versus their pride in their Oriental ancestors (such as Saadia Gaon). One of the participants suggested that in al-Andalus it was generally considered prestigious to study in the East. Another participant responded to this comment by observing that initially the Jews of al-Andalus indeed recognized the intellectual superiority of Eastern Jewry and its cultural centers, and only with time developed a sense of self-pride. Yet, he argued, the Jewish-Muslim encounter in medieval Spain would not have been as fruitful as it was, if not for the earlier interactions of both cultures in the East. Gallego pointed out that although the Andalusi Jews evidently acknowledged and were proud of their cultural heritage, during the Golden Age they predominantly saw themselves as an independent intellectual elite, superior to other contemporary traditions. Comments from the audience reinforced some of Gallego’s arguments. Furthermore, one of the participants pointed out that in the quotation of Moshe ibn Ezra regarding his conversation with a Muslim scholar about the use of other languages for translating the sacred texts, we should assume that the conversation took place within a shared house (pointing to the closeness of Muslims and Jews) rather than merely in the same land. One of the participants referred to the linguistic evolution of al-Andalus and asked why from the 11th c. onwards Latin ceased to be used as a literary language in the Iberian Peninsula, especially given the spread of Christianity. The answer was that Christians had largely adopted Arabic. Another participant was interested to know if the Jews of al-Andalus might have known Greek. The answer was that it was hardly probable.

The second paper in this session, The Self as the Other in the Jewish Literature of the Egyptian Diaspora in the Hellenistic Period: The Case of the Letter of Aristeas, was delivered by Agata Grzybowska (University of Warsaw). It opened with the introductory comment that the pseudepigraphic Letter of Aristeas was one of the two works of Jewish literature of the Hellenistic Period (the other being the Sybilline Oracles), in which a non-Jewish figure was introduced as the narrator and the central figure of the text. In this work, the story of how the Greek Bible translation known as the Septuagint came about is told from the perspective of a Greek court official under the rule of Ptolemy II Philadelphos in a letter – or a diegesis [narrative] – written to his friend Philocrates. The author of the Letter, who, according to the scholarly consensus, was a Hellenized Jewish intellectual most probably based in Alexandria, adopted the Hellenic perspective to the point of approaching his own culture as a Hellene would approach the culture of the “other.” The narrative features several digressions, including a travelogue, in which Aristeas relates his impressions of Jerusalem, an apology of the Law, in which peculiarities of the laws of kashrut are explained to him by the High Priest Eleazar, and a symposion, where King Ptolemy II Philadelphos interviews the Judean translators on their culture’s views on kingship. The paper analyzed the construct of the non-Jewish narrator, who explored his own tradition as the cultural legacy of the “other.” In the first part of her talk, Grzybowska connected this work with the Greek educational practice of progymnasmata (exercises in rhetoric), as well as early Hellenistic attempts at historical fiction. In the second part, she briefly discussed the benefits and ideological implications of this kind of approach. Finally, she concluded pondering the questions of what and how did the text tell us about the author’s own approach to the “other.” Grzybowska posited that although it was seemingly aimed at conveying a favorable image of the Jews to the Greeks, it in fact conveyed a favorable view of the Greeks to the Jews. The following discussion disputed this claim providing various arguments for and against this claim.

The last paper in this session, The Treatment of Idols (asnām) in the Hebrew Bible According to Andalusi Hebrew Lexicography, was presented by José Martínez Delgado (University of Granada). It opened with the observation that although according to the Bible the God of Israel is evidently one, He is not the only one, as Scripture contains numerous allusions to neighboring local deities and gods (called “idols”). In the following, it showed how these deities and gods were treated in the Andalusi lexicographical tradition, especially in Ibn Janah’s dictionary. The paper offered a detailed lexicographic analysis of their names demonstrating that medieval authors had ridiculed them through providing mocking etymology of their names (e.g., as originally zoomorphic terms). Martínez Delgado argued that this interpretative tradition was deeply Arabized. He also demonstrated that when a reference to an idol or idols appeared in the Bible in connection with the forefathers, it was neutralized in lexicographic texts by means of interpretative translation (e.g., Rachel’s home deities, tĕrafīm, were explained to mean astrolabe). The ensuing discussion touched upon the possible sources of inspiration of Andalusi lexicographers. It was pointed out that strikingly similar explanations were earlier provided by the Karaite exegetes active in the East (e.g., the explanation of tĕrafīm as astrolabe).

The eighth session (chaired by Filip Jakubowski, Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań) was devoted to Power, Powerlessness and Expulsion. It opened with Fred Astren’s (San Francisco State University) paper, A Doubly-Articulated Anomaly in the Muslim Past: The Expulsion of Jews and Christians from the Hijaz under the Caliph ʿUmar, read by Marzena Zawanowska. It discussed the expulsion of Jews (and Christians) from the Hijaz that is recorded to have taken place under the caliph Umar (634–644). Since Muḥammad made a pact with the Jews of Khaybar and others in the Hijaz, this expulsion seemingly violates rightly-guided prophetic precedent. Many reports found in ninth and tenth-century Muslim tradition and historical writing sought to harmonize this anomaly, in part to define the Hijaz as a Muslim holy land, and as part of a wider discourse on Muslim space. In this regard, questions about a Hijaz purged of non-Muslims parallels scholarly discussions on the character of Muslim cities. Even as later Muslim scholars imagined the seventh-century Hijaz, they also imagined the seventh-century Muslim garrison cities as pristine exemplars to be applied to contemporaneous Muslim urban space, in which the presence of non-Muslims was either circumscribed or entirely forbidden. Re-writing both the history of the Hijaz and the garrison cities in Muslim tradition together was used to frame the place of Jews (and Christians) in Muslim society. Given the absence of the author of the paper, there was no possibility to take questions from the audience.

The second paper in this session, The Exile of Cain. A Passage in the Syriac and Arabic Apocryphal Sources, delivered by Lourdes Bonhome Pulido (University of Córdoba), focused on one particularly problematic passage from the Book of Genesis (Gen. 4:10–16). It narrates how Cain, after having killed his brother Abel, was sent to inhabit the Land of Nod. The paper offered an overview of the reception of this passage in the Apocryphal Cave of Treasures, written in Syriac. A detailed analysis of the source text aimed at enhancing our understanding of where was located – according to the Syriac author – the place of Cain’s exile, as well as of how early Christian commentators conceived of the controversial character of Cain. The ensuing discussion touched upon the question of whether the music which, according to the Bible, was created by Cain’s descendants should be considered blameworthy or not. Someone also asked about the possible relationship between this Syriac text and the apocryphal Book of Jubilees. The answer was that this issue has so far not been researched well enough.

The last paper in this session, entitled Stranger in Power: The Image of Shmuel ha-Nagid as a Jewish Dignitary at a Muslim Court in Contemporary Literature from al-Andalus, was presented by Barbara Gryczan (University of Warsaw). It scrutinized selected aspects of Shmuel ha-Nagid’s political activity through the prism of his poetic oeuvre. Ha-Nagid (993–1056) – known also as Ismāʻīl Ibn al-Naġrīla – was a Jewish intellectual who rose to power and prominence in the city-state of Granada in the first half of the 11th century. His life story provides a rare example of the spectacular success and career advancement of a Jew, thus a stranger, at a Muslim court. Gryczan explored the ways in which ha-Nagid’s unusual biography (with its various stages: Cordoba 993–1013; Malaga 1013–1020; Granada 1020–1056) was reflected in his poetry. Analyzing in detail his poems in which ha-Nagid recorded the events of his life, kept poetical track of what was happening around him, or commented on it and replied to criticism, Gryczan argued that his lyrical oeuvre represented a single example in the history of Jewish literature of a versified autobiography. In this unusual autobiography recounted by a poetic voice, he presents himself as a Jewish leader of the chosen people appointed to this role by God, despite that in reality he was serving as a hight official at a Muslim court and leading wars for Berber Kings. Special attention was paid to the poet’s reflections on his own status as “the other,” at first as a refugee from Cordoba and next as a stranger in power in the city-state of Granada. The following discussion focused on the question of the reliability of ha-Nagid’s texts as well as other sources of the period and on his purposeful auto-creation as a stranger in the exile. In addition, it considered possible ways of tracking the waves of emigration from Cordoba after the fall off the Umayyad dynasty and ha-Nagid’s probable visit to Lucena. It also touched upon the issue of the reception of Ibn al-Naġrīla’s figure in Arabic sources (Ibn Hazm and ‘Abd Allāh).

The ninth session (chaired by José Martínez Delgado, University of Granada) was devoted to Historical and Exegetical Narratives on Strangers. It opened with a paper entitled A Christian Out of Home: The Greek Sources of the Abgar’s Legend Revisited, delivered by Israel Muñoz Gallarte (University of Córdoba). It analyzed one of the most intriguing texts in the history of Christianity, related to the supposed exchange of letters between King Abgar V Ukama of Edessa and Jesus. The original source texts, probably composed in the early 4th c. CE in Syriac, have been translated and preserved in various languages (Armenian, Coptic, Latin as well as Greek, and afterwards also in Arabic). Although they have already deserved scholarly attention, the information regarding the Greek sources remains scarce and misleading. The paper revisited the main threads of the legend, closely analyzing Greek sources from literary, historical and philosophical perspectives. It scrutinized the circumstances in which they were written (after the conversion of Constantine to Christianity in 312 CE) and the purpose of their composition. Muñoz Gallarte suggested that they might have reflected Eusebius’ interpretation of the history of Christianity on the one hand presenting Jesus as a good pastor and letter writer, and over-emphasizing the culpability of Jews on the other. In addition, at the time of the spread of Christianity towards the East, the image conveyed by these letters of a pagan king who converts to Christianity and is rewarded might have served as an instructive model to be emulated by other kings. In the end Muñoz Gallarte demonstrated that the letters analyzed were evidently in popular use (as amulets). The ensuing discussion revolved around the question of whether these letters might have been originally composed in response to Manicheism and whether Eusebius translated them directly from Syriac.

The second paper in this session, An Idumean among Nabataeans and Romans: On the Source-text of a Passage in Maḥūb al-Manbijī’s Kitāb al-‛Unwān, was offered by Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala (University of Córdoba). It focused on a short text contained in Maḥbūb al-Manbijī’s Chronicle (dated to the 10th c. CE). Among other things, this work recounts the major events of the life of Antipater. The paper provided a detailed analysis of the relevant passage with a view of shedding new light on the possible sources employed by Maḥbūb al-Manbijī in his recount of Antipater’s narrative. To this purpose, it scrutinized two other accounts of the same story provided by earlier Jewish and Christian historians: the Hellenized Jew Flavius Josephus’ War of the Jews (1st c. CE), and the Christian historian and exegete Eusebius of Caesarea’s Historia ecclesiastica (3rd–4th c. CE). In addition, a quotation brought by Michael the Syrian (12th c. CE.) was also analyzed in this context. Finally, Monferrer-Sala offered some conclusions about the possible Vorlage of the story cited by Maḥbūb al-Manbijī, stating that it was impossible to know for certain whether he had drawn directly on Josephus, or not. The ensuing discussion revolved around the questions of whether in his recount of Antipater’s story Maḥbūb al-Manbijī might have used the Book of Yosippon as his source (given the popularity of this text as attested by the Genizah documents), and whether he provided some more detailed information on Antipater’s title (designation).

The last paper in this session, prepared by Dotan Arad (Bar-Ilan University), Muslim Rule in Jewish Eyes: Different Views and Approaches from the Middle Ages to the Early Modern Period, was presented by Marzena Zawanowska. It dealt with the relations between Jews and Muslims in the Islamic world. In previous research, legal aspects of these relations (in terms of discriminatory laws against Jews and their enforcement) have chiefly been discussed, but not the conceptual ones. Addressing this lacuna in research, Arad investigated texts written in the Middle East in the late medieval and early modern period by Jewish thinkers, Kabbalists, preachers, as well as laymen, exploring different ways in which these authors addressed the following questions: What did they think of the Muslim authorities? Did they consider their governors to be righteous and fair rulers? Would they have preferred to live under Christian rulers? He discussed inter alia a Talmudic dictum which rates the non-Jews as rulers depending on under whose rule it is more comfortable for a Jew to live (BT Shabbat 11a). Arad showed that there existed different variants of this saying. While manuscripts copied in Christian countries put the Ishmaelite on top of the list, those written in Islamic countries put the “Goy” (i.e., the Christian) on its top. The Jews living in in the realm of Islam imagined Jewish life in Christendom as relatively more tranquil and safe than their own. Analogously, Jewish travelers from Europe (mainly Italy) described with enthusiasm the safety of roads in the Mamluk state as well as deep involvement of Jews in the local economy. Interestingly, their travelogues preserve also voices of local Jews which reflect a more negative view of the Muslims (including mockery of Islamic praxis). In addition, a negative attitude towards Muslim neighbors and Islam appears in a letter (dated to the 15th c.) sent to the Community’s leaders of Cairo. The Cairene Jews are described in it as those “who live in their enemies’ wilderness; who dwell in a land that is not theirs.” The author’s viewpoint is clear: The Jews are strangers who are subjected to the Muslim rulers like the Jewish slaves in Egypt at the time of the exodus were, while their neighbors are their enemies. In light of the above, Arad suggested that despite the paucity of sources we may conclude that Jews in the Muslim lands in the late Middle Ages and early modern period did not share the optimistic view of their own situation expressed by their brethren from Christian lands, and depicted their Muslim rulers in a dark light. The difference in descriptions written by the representatives of the two Jewish Diasporas reflects well the idiom: “The grass is always greener on the other side of the fence.” Given the absence of the author of the paper, there was no possibility to take questions from the audience.

Summary of the most significant and productive threads

Among the most significant and productive threads in papers and discussions were the following:

• the importance of the ideas of otherness, estrangement and exile in late antique and medieval sources, no matter their literary genre; the impression is that in one way or another everyone felt a stranger or wished to depict himself as such;
• it was relatively common to be/ feel the “other” within one’s own society (e.g., women, converts, slaves, but also free-thinkers, mystics, etc.);
• the double meaning of the concept of emigration which may refer to an actual physical displacement (often conceived of as negative), but also spiritual and/or intellectual alienation (often conceived of as positive, e.g., in gnostic tradition, but also in Baḥya ibn Paqūda’s and Judah Halevi’s thought);
• the use of the concept of exile to construct one’s own religious identify vis-à-vis another religious tradition/s; accordingly, emigration may sometimes be made into an important part of a group’s self-identity (or cultural topos, as in the case of early Muslim society of the Muhājirūn);
• alienation may sometimes be self-imposed and conceived of as a sort of a privileged status (e.g., Gnostics, but also Baḥya ibn Paqūda);
• linguistic estrangement and alienation may sometimes make one feel at home in an alien culture and thus create cultural boundaries between representatives of the same religion;
• the concepts of stranger and estrangement is much dependent on the nature of inspected sources (e.g., the Genizah materials testify to no social segregation and schism between the Rabbanites and Karaites, while other sources prove the contrary);
• the inner dynamics of parallel developments within different religious traditions (e.g., Gnostic authors of Nag Hammadi texts, mystical thinkers such as al-Suhrawardī), as well as cross-cultural transfer of ideas, concepts and motifs;
• diverging and converging interpretations of the concept of exile, as well as exegetical methods and techniques applied by Jewish, Christian and Muslim authors; the enduring efforts on the part of both Jewish and Christian commentators to make sense of the Jewish exile, as well as the extent to which the question of interpretation divided not only Jews and Christians, but also Christians internally;
• synchronic processes of cross-cultural development of given concepts or phenomena, and their diachronic evolution;
• the extent to which some interpretations were informed by the Sitz im Leben of a given Jewish, Christian or Muslim author (e.g., ha-Meiri’s approach to Christiany versus the approach of the Jews who lived in the Muslim realm);
• the unusual fertility of the discussed concepts of the “other”/ stranger, otherness/ estrangement and exile that inspired many varied interpretative responses;
• the extent to which interdisciplinary approaches contribute to and enhance fruitful inspiring discussions.

Planned Outcomes and Outputs

The conference helped to shed new light on conflicting tendencies of inclusion and exclusion discernible in Judaism, Christianity and Islam, as well as dialectic tensions between freedom and coercion in one’s choice of belonging to a given religious community or geographic location (homeland). It traced and thus helped elucidate the roots of modern approaches to “the others” – no matter foreigners or minority groups – and “otherness” within a given society. The subject is of special interest and significance in Europe now, given all the discussions related to the refugees.

The additional outcome of the event is the enhancement of international, multidisciplinary academic cooperation that transgresses the boundaries of distinct scholarly disciplines, in order to examine the cross-cultural transfers of concepts and ideas among different monotheistic traditions. The underlying assumption is that none of these traditions operated in isolation from others, and that they all had a far-reaching, cross-fertilizing effect on one another.

The planned output of the event includes the publication of a conference report in a well-established journal (indexed by Scopus, and included in the ERIH or Master Journal List, such as Collectanea Christiana Orientalia or Studia Judaica). An additional output considered by the organizers is publication of a collective volume of articles based on selected papers presented at the conference (edited by Juan Pedro Monferrer-Sala, Miriam Lindgren Hjälm and Marzena Zawanowska) to be submitted to a renowned publishing house (such as Mohr Siebeck, Brill, etc.).

EAJS Conference Grant Programme 2019/20

REPORT

Biographies and Politics: The Involvement of Jews and Activists of Jewish Origin in Leftist Movements in 19th and 20th Century Poland

Event abstract

The conference “Biographies and Politics” approached the involvement of Jews and people of Jewish origin in leftist movements in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries from a biographical perspective. Using this method, we aimed to analyze how personal motivations, social and political conditions as well as issues such as gender, generational change and family dynamics influenced the individual and collective paths of Jews into various Jewish (Bundism, Labor Zionism) and general leftist political and social movements. Employing a biographical approach and a long-term perspective, we moved the scholarly debate on Jewish involvement in leftist movements beyond the stereotypes and superficial generalizations which still bedevil discussions of this issue. The conference took place in the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews. It was co-organized by Aleksander Brückner Center for Polish Studies, Halle (Germany), the Centre for Hebrew and Jewish Studies at the University of Oxford, and University College London (both UK).

Event rationale

The involvement of the Jews of Poland in leftist political movements in nineteenth and twentieth-century Poland is a complex and challenging topic. Bundism and Labor Zionism openly combined Jewishness with leftist ideology. The situation is more complicated in the case of people of Jewish origin in non-Jewish organizations, who, at least to some degree, did not consider themselves to be Jewish but were regarded as Jews by others. In addition, in the imperial era of the long nineteenth century, we cannot speak exclusively of “Polish Jews” or “Poland” since other affiliations were also possible.

Nevertheless, the presence of Jews or people of Jewish descent in leftist movements, especially the prominent position some “Jews” held in the revolutionary movement and in state socialism, has been an issue of public debate to this day. On the one hand, the stereotype of communist Jews as “Jewish perpetrators” was often and is still used to stir up anticommunist or nationalist sentiments. On the other, especially in western historiography the dominant narrative on the role of “Jewish” participants in leftist movements is that of a struggle for political and social equality, whose results were often disappointing. This narrative focusses on the failure of Jewish revolutionaries and portrays Jewish communists as victims of Stalinism and the Communist regimes in East and East Central Europe.

Our conference will go beyond such schematic conceptions. Instead we approach the involvement of Jews and people of Jewish origin in leftist movements from a long-term perspective starting in the nineteenth century and with a clear focus on individual motivations, ideological choices and personal biographies. To explore the different paths which led Jewish individuals to become active in leftist parties and organizations, we seek to approach the topic from a biographical perspective. Analyzing the formation of Jewish political identities on the basis of biographical sources, especially documents like diaries, personal letters, memoirs and oral testimonies, makes it possible to avoid fruitless debates on the number – real or imagined – of Jews in the higher ranks of communist parties or their supposed influence.

During our conference we seek instead to gain source-based insights on questions such as:

• Was Jewishness an important factor in choosing a specific political path?
• Which other factors led Jews and people of Jewish origin to affiliate with a particular political group?
• How did their leftist involvement influence their attitude towards imperial settings, occupying powers, internationalist movements, as well as Poland and Polish identity?
• How did such individuals assess their leftist engagement later in their lives?

The answers to these questions will shed new light on the character of Polish Jews’ involvement with the left and will lead to a better understanding of their actual motives—why some Central and Eastern European Jews chose to engage in leftist political movements.

The conference will be held at POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, which provides a well-equipped venue and a professional institutional backing. The whole conference will be open to the public and simultaneously translated (English/Polish). The conference sessions are, however, directed, in the first place, to an academic audience. Two public evening events address a broader public and will be more widely promoted. Karen Auerbach’s keynote lecture will convey the key theme of the conference analyzing the biographies of several Jewish families who lived in an apartment building in postwar Warsaw. Its local flavor should, in addition, attract many Varsovians. The second event will be the screening of the film Tonia and her Children, which tells the life story, from the perspective of her children, of a prewar Jewish communist, who was arrested during the Stalinist period. The professional PR and the extensive network of the POLIN Museum will secure a high outreach into the academic and non-academic public.

To improve the methodological skills of Polish and international graduate students engaged in biographical projects and to promote Jewish Studies the conference will be preceded by a one-day methodological workshop. This will be jointly conducted by Joanna Nalewajko-Kulikov (Polish Academy of Sciences) and Stephan Stach (POLIN Museum). In it up to twelve graduate students will be given instruction into how to analyse different biographical sources and will discuss with the organizers and other senior scholars’ important aspects of biographical analysis. They will also be invited to attend the conference. The participants will be selected after a publicly announced call for applications. This call will be published after the closure of the CfP for the conference so as not to discourage advanced doctoral students from submitting a proposal for the main conference.

The conference, the workshop and the accompanying programme attracted great interest. We received a huge number of responses to the CfP of the conference as well as to the Early Career Scholars Workshop. The contributions to the conference covered a wide range of issues raised by CfP and discussed them from various disciplinary viewpoints. The biographical approach to the topic of left-wing political commitment of Jews proved to be suitable for examining even difficult aspects from new perspectives.

The Conference and its Accompanying Programme

Workshop for Early Career Scholars. 30 November 2019

The conference was preceded by a workshop on biographical research for early career scholars, organized and directed by Joanna Nalewajko-Kulikov (Polish Academy of Sciences) and Stephan Stach (POLIN Museum). Eleven participants from Poland, Germany, Croatia, Hungary, Ukraine, Russia, the United States and Israel discussed their biographical research projects and methodological texts. The discussion was given additional impulses by a presentation of Piotr Osęka (University of Warsaw) about challenges and opportunities of using communist security service files as a source for biographical research. After the day full of lively and engaged discussions all participants were invited to also observe the conference. Two of them also presented a paper at the conference.

First Day of the Conference

The conference was opened by Anthony Polonsky, who welcomed participants and guests on behalf of the conference organisers. He also gave a concise outline of the basic ideas and considerations, that lead to the organisation of this conference. In particular he emphasised the epistemic advantages of approaching a complex and disputed topic like Jewish engagement in left-wing politics though specific biographies. After his words the participants split up to continue in two parallel panels.

In the first panel explored the interconnection of Jewishness and leftwing political activism. Jacob Stürmann investigated, how the exiled Russian-Jewish Social-Democrat Pavel Axelrod became an important point of reference for interwar Jewish Socialists. Alexandra Kemmerer traced the impact of Rosa Luxemburg’s personal Jewish experience on her political thinking and Katarzyna Chmielewska approaches the question through an analyze of narrative structures in Polish-Jewish communist family memoirs. François Guesnet, who chaired the panel, opened the discussion. With a short reference to Karl Marx’s concept of communism as liberation from Jewishness towards human liberation, he added another perspective on the panels central question.

In the second panel titled “Internationalist Politics, Transnational Biographies, Local Activism” addressed the question of leftist engagement in Polish Jewish émigré communities. Zoé Grumberg analyzed political and social trajectories of Polish-Jewish Communists in France during from the 1920s to the 1960s. Among other she points on the exceptionally high engagement of this group in the French Résistance but also to their strong Jewish identity, which, however, did not contradicting their internationalist conviction. Ebony Nilsson examined the paths of an anticommunist Polish-born Jewish labor activist that immigrated along with of several thousand other Jewish DP’s to Australia. Based on his own family history Daniel Walkowitz explored how Jewish immigrants from Lodz and Bialystok engaged in the Yiddishist, socialist General Jewish Labor Bund formed a specific milieu in Patterson, New Jersey. Among other topic brought forward during the lively discussion, David Slucki raised the question, how family histories focusing on rank-and-file activist and institutional sources concentrated on party leaders could be better integrated into a more comprehensive narrative.

Cultural and social activism was in the center of discussion in the third panel, exploring leftist activism beyond party boundaries. Sylwia Kuźma-Markowska analyzed the biography of the gynecologist Herman Rubin. He was one of the proponents of birth control and conception and his Yiddish and Polish publications influenced the discussion of birth control in socialist circles and leftist literary journals. Andrea Feldman examined the role of the progressive Jewish academic and social activist Vera Ehrlich Stein in interwar Zagreb and her involvement in leftist politics. The “unwritten autobiography” of the Soviet Jewish actor and cultural activist Solomon Mikhoels was the topic of Vassily Schedrin’s talk. On the example of Mikhoels’ contribution to the Soviet movie “The Return of Nathan Becker” of 1932, he demonstrated, how combined elements of religious messianism of Judaism and the messianic ideology of the Bolshevik revolution.

The fourth panel titled “Antifascism facing the Holocaust” began with Stefan Gąsiorowski’s presentation on the poet and early Holocaust historian Michał Borwicz. Gąsiorowski explored the in how far his personal and political connections to the Polish socialist movement contributed to his rescue form Lviv’s Janowska camp. Michał Trębacz in turn investigated the role of socialist ideology in Szmuel Zygelbojm’s writing and thinking in face of the Holocaust. As he points out, despite his suicide protest against the World’s indifference towards the fate of the Jews under Nazi occupation, Zygelbojm remained faithful that it will be up to labor movement to create peaceful postwar order. While Zygelbojm is one of the more prominent leaders of wartime Jewish socialist movement, Maria Ferenc introduced the so far mostly unknown Shmuel Breslaw, as the “Unacknowledged Intellectual Leader of Hashomer Hatzair in the Warsaw Ghetto”. As Ferenc underlines, Breslaw was one of the staunchest advocates for armed resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto, however murdered before the outbreak of the Ghetto Uprising.

Ula Chowaniec chaired the fifth panel “Exclusion and Inclusion in Leftist Jewish Biographies” and opened the floor with a mild critique of the quite general character of the panel title. The three papers tied together here explored the impact of additional overlapping experiences of inclusion and exclusion on Jewish biographies: In the case of Jewish Social Democrat Zygmunt Glücksman, a leader of German Socialists in interwar Poland, this was the double minority identity as German and Jew. Wojciech Goslar presented the biography of Maurycy Jaeger, who oscillated between socialism, anarchism, Polish and Jewish national identities in both late nineteenth century Galicia and his exile in London. Anna Ładowska case study on Dina Blond a leading representative of Bundist women’s movement, persuasively pointed out how the inclusion of gender equality into the Bundist program had to struggle with practiced gender inequal in the organization.

The sixth panel was dedicated to leftist Jewish visions for the future after the Holocaust. Magdalena Semczyszyn examines the different views of two leftist Zionist partisan leaders presented on a meeting in Lublin in 1944. While Aba Kowner was convinced that surviving Jews needed emigrate as soon as possible after the war. Icchak Cukierman on the contrary argued for a better planned and controlled emigration in several waves. Anna Nedlin in turn presented the founders of the Kibbuz Lohamei haGetta’ot (The Ghetto Fighters Kibbuz) – one of whom was the afore mentioned Icchak Cukierman. Eryk Krasucki’s paper was placed on this panel for organizational rather than thematic reasons (cancellations by several participants). In it he evaluated the references of various communist functionaries to their Jewish origins. He shows that family relationships often remained the only remaining link to Jewish life.

The first day ended with Karen Auerbach’s keynote lecture “Jewish Biographies, Leftist Politics, and the History of Emotions”. Auerbach reevaluated analyses of why some Jews have been drawn to Communism and other leftist political movements, under the guiding question, how reconstructions of individual biographies can illuminate commonalities and variations in mindsets as well as frameworks of belonging at times of changing ideas, what binds individuals to broader political, social and cultural communities. To this end, she drew primarily on the material for her study of the families of Jewish communists who lived in a Warsaw apartment building on Ujazdowski Street after the war.

Second day of the conference

The second day started with a panel on religious labor movements. Ada Gebel introduced the orthodox labor union “Poalei Agudat”, founded in 1922 and linked to the leading orthodox Jewish party in interwar Poland. Gebel focused on two pioneering thinkers of the union, Yehuda Leib Orlean and Isaak Breuer, and their concepts to conciliate socialism with orthodox religious thinking. Gershon Bacons, paper that was read by panel chair Yvonne Kleimann, as Bacon was not able to be present, also concerned Polaei Agudat and examined the movement as an orthodox answer to the social needs of Jewish artisans and workers. Yitzchak Schwartz investigated Am Olam, a radical, Utopian agricultural movement founded in Odessa in 1881, building several colonies throughout the Eastern Europe. Schwartz called for the increased consideration of such groups into an inclusive the history of left political movements. A call which was generally welcomed during the following discussion, which circled around the question, where exactly to place it in this history.

Panel eight examined three generations of Marxist historians of Jewish working class: Mojżesz Kaufman, Rafał Mahler and Feliks Tych. Kaufman was the subject of Piotr Laskowski paper analyzing several Polish and Yiddish manuscripts of Kaufman’s articles on the Jew engagement in the Polish Socialist Party during the 1930’s. Laskowski interprets these works among others also as an implicit criticism of the politics of the Pilsudski regime. Tom Navon presented on Mahler’s efforts to create and apply a Marxist methodology to study Jewish History. Tomasz Siewierski presented on Tych, who as child surviver of the Holocaust, became an outstanding historian of Worker’s movement in communist Poland before he turned to Jewish history, after 1989.

A panel chaired by Dariusz Stola gathered talks circling around the question if there is a particular Jewish responsibility for communist crimes. Stanisław Krajewski approached the delicate issue through his own family history: his grandfather and his great-grandfather were both pre-World War II communist leaders and victims of Stalinist purges. Katarzyna Rembacka presented the reckoning of a Jewish pre-war communist with communism in post-war Poland based on autobiographic writings. Katarzyna Kwiatkowska-Moskalewicz and Marcin Moskalewicz examined the pre-war and war-time biographies of Helena Wolińska and Włodzimierz Brus, both communist activists associated with Stalinist crimes in postwar Poland. The following at times heated discussion considered, among other things, the role the identification with Polish culture of most of the persons, whose biographies were debated.

Less controversial but no less exciting was the panel “Emancipatory Empowerment and Leftist Politics” that took place simultaneously. Emma Zohar analyzed autobiographical writings of two communist women activist regarding emotions expressed in relation to their political activity in interwar Poland. Jan Rybak, too, based his talk on the autobiographical writings of an activist of Zionist-Socialist Poale Zion from Galicia, describing her experience of emancipation through revolutionary politics. Magdalena Grabowska in turn examined the biography of the postwar Polish communist women’s activist Edwarda Orłowska, raising the question if such activism can be described as feminism.

The last panel focused on generational aspects in biographical research of Jewish leftist activism. Jaff Schatz evaluated the biographical paths that led young Jew into the Communist party of interwar Poland. He pointed at general social mechanisms that led to the political formation of this group. Łukasz Bertram evaluated three periods of activity in his biographical analysis of Jewish communists beginning with their entry into the movement, proceeding through interwar clandestine activity until the postwar period. He raises the question whether a and in how far dispositions shaped in the processes of their political socialization can be considered as a specific habitus of Jewish communists.

The end of the conference was heralded by round table on Jewish Leftwing Activism and Family History, whose participant approached this issue form different perspectives. Ewa Herbst portrayed the biography of her great-uncle, the Polish-Jewish socialist Herman Diamand, in a very committed and engaging way, drawing among others on family correspondence. Leopold Sobel spoke about three generations of Leftist engagement in his Jewish family beginning with the union career of his father in interwar Poland, through his own engagement in the formation of the New Israeli Left in post-1967 Israel up to his sons current political work as a British Labour MP. David Slucki discussed the story of his grandfather Jakub, a Bundist activist first in Poland and later in in Australia, based on his recently published book “Sing This at My Funral”.

Yvonne Kleinmann, co-organizer of the conference representing the Aleksander Brückner Center for Polish Studies, took over the task of making a short final comment. Referring to the longish and complicated title conference, she pointed at the complication the organizers faced defining Jewishness in the period under consideration. In the course of the conference and this problem repeatedly appeared in different contexts. The most fruitful of these approaches had been those that consider of Jewishness as pluralistic and bound to its historical context. Summing up, Kleinman was especially satisfied with the fact that many new currents in historical research such as history of emotions of gender studies had been used to examine Jew leftist engagement.

The final cord of the conference was a public screening of of the film Tonia and her Children, which tells the life story, from the perspective of her children, of a prewar Jewish communist, who was arrested during the Stalinist period.

Outcomes: The conference made a significant contribution to the networking of European, American and Israeli researchers of different generations working in this field. Furthermore, it deepened the existing personal and institutional academic contacts between the organizing institutions. A video recording of the individual conference panels, the keynote lecture and the round table including the discussions is available online at: https://www.polin.pl/pl/aktualnosci/2019/12/24/biografie-i-polityka-nagrania-wideo

Output: A selection of the contributions will be published either in the form of an anthology or as a thematic issue of a scholarly journal.

Event Programme: https://www.polin.pl/pl/system/files/attachments/program-v3_0.pdf

Publicity

The conference sparked an enormous public interest. It was attended by 180 visitors. The countrywide radio station Tok.fm dedicated an issue of its 45-minute programme “Historia Polski” to the conference.  Krzysztof Persak, representing the POLIN Museum, and Stanislaw Krajewski, representing the conference, discussed the conference topic with the moderator Maciej Zakrocki. The broadcast is available online via the following links:

http://www.tokfm.pl/Tokfm/7,103089,25552291,zydokomuna-jako-uzasadnienie-antysemityzmu-dlaczego-zydzi.html

https://audycje.tokfm.pl/podcast/83612,Zaangazowanie-Zydow-w-komunizm-nie-oznacza-ze-to-byl-system-zydowski

An academic report for the web portal HSozKult.de is currently under preparation.