Jewish Studies at the International Medieval Congress – a Jewish studies conference hidden in plain sight
1-4 July 2024 (Leeds / hybrid)
The International Medieval Congress has over the years developed into one of the largest annual conferences in medieval Jewish Studies – but this is a secret hidden in plain sight as the Jewish studies papers are integrated into a vast programme of global scholarship across more than a millennium. This year’s keyword will be “Crisis”.
17 sessions/panels of 3 – 4 papers each will wholly or in part deal with medieval Jewish culture or intercultural relations involving Jews or Judaism; there will also be sessions/papers about the medieval Holy Land and about non-Jewish re-imaginings of Biblical figures. Some very prominent researchers will give papers, but the IMC prides itself on its egalitarian pedagogic atmosphere, in which Ph.D. students give papers alongside “veterans” in a spirit of shared learning.
You can come in person or participate virtually from anywhere in the world.
You can register here: https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/register/
If you still want to give a paper, you may be able to be part of it… See the late papers CfP: https://www.imc.leeds.ac.uk/proposals/late-cfp/ closing date 19 April.
Here is a (non-exhaustive) digest of sessions/papers of interest to Jewish studies scholars:
102 – Afterlives and Legacies: Interventions in Medieval Hebrew Manuscripts
Description
The thirteenth and fourteenth centuries witnessed a particular efflorescence in the creation of decorated Hebrew manuscripts in Europe. Many of these manuscripts, made for Jewish patrons, are known for their beautiful micrographic designs, exceptional calligraphy, and elaborate illuminations. More importantly, they are also immediately recognizable for the interventions they have sustained over time; the panoply of censored passages, abraded images, and prominent signs of use, such as stains and tears, set this corpus apart. How did these interventions, whether intentional or accidental, shape Jewish visual and written culture in both the period when these manuscripts were made and beyond? What can these interventions reveal about the manuscripts’ provenance, namely, the diversity of viewers, readers, and owners who beheld these manuscripts, especially during times of forced relocation, persecution, and crisis? What do these interventions suggest about changes to this rich material culture over time and, more broadly, what insight can they provide into Jewish life, ritual, and thought across historical periods? In this session, three speakers will deliver twenty-minute papers addressing these questions and more in their examinations of these fraught codices.
Organisers, Moderator, Respondent
Laura Feigen, History of Art, Courtauld Institute of Art, University of London & Reed O’Mara, Department of Art History & Art, Case Western Reserve University, Ohio
Presentations
102-a – From Ashkenaz to Italy: The Giant Masoretic Bible in the Berio Civic Library of Genoa
Ilona Steimann, Hochschule für Jüdische Studien Heidelberg
102-b – Andalusi Prestige and Magical Migration: The Ritual and Diasporic Legacy of the Sefer Ahavat
Sara Gardner, University of Minnesota
102-c – Reimagining Visual Narratives: Interventions in Illustrations of Medieval Hebrew Manuscripts
Sivan Gottlieb, Universidad de Granada
201 – The Lincoln Jewry, I: Financial and Legal Sources
Description
There was a Jewish community at Lincoln by the 1150s. It was one of the leading communities of the kingdom and from the 1250s (at the latest) onwards, it seems to have been the second community in the realm, after London. The Lincoln Jewry was home to some of the greatest Jews in medieval English history including Hagin son of Master Moses who, from 1257, was the Archpresbyter of the Jews. As would be expected, therefore, the Lincoln Jewry is richly documented, in both the Latin and Hebrew sources. Equally, it occupies a difficult position in terms of memory, notably as the home of the Little Hugh of Lincoln case. Despite the richness of sources which allow us to access the community, Lincoln’s importance has not always been reflected in the historiography. Consequently, these panels will work to redress that imbalance, beginning a conversation on how we access the medieval Lincoln Jewry. The diverse nature of the sources allows that conversation to be multidisciplinary, in a way that is not possible for most other Anglo-Jewish communities. The speakers will situate Lincoln within its local and national context, as well as within the landscape of history and memory.
Organiser
School of Humanities & Heritage, University of Lincoln
Moderator
School of Humanities & Heritage, University of Lincoln
Presentations
201-a – A Tale of Two (Lincolnshire) Jewries: Lincoln and Stamford in the Jewish Receipt Rolls
Dean A. Irwin, University of Lincoln
201-b – Hagin, Son of Master Moses: Tracing the Life of a Prominent Lincoln Jew
Joshua Outhwaite, King’s College London
201-c – Rabbinic Scholars in Medieval Lincoln
Pinchas Roth, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan
301 – The Lincoln Jewry, II: Memory, Myth, and Archaeology
Description
There was a Jewish community at Lincoln by the 1150s. It was one of the leading communities of the kingdom and from the 1250s (at the latest) onwards, it seems to have been the second community in the realm, after London. The Lincoln Jewry was home to some of the greatest Jews in medieval English history including Hagin son of Master Moses who, from 1257, was the Archpresbyter of the Jews. As would be expected, therefore, the Lincoln Jewry is richly documented, in both the Latin and Hebrew sources. Equally, it occupies a difficult position in terms of memory, notably as the home of the Little Hugh of Lincoln case. Despite the richness of sources which allow us to access the community, Lincoln’s importance has not always been reflected in the historiography. Consequently, these panels will work to redress that imbalance, beginning a conversation on how we access the medieval Lincoln Jewry. The diverse nature of the sources allows that conversation to be multidisciplinary, in a way that is not possible for most other Anglo-Jewish communities. The speakers will situate Lincoln within its local and national context, as well as within the landscape of history and memory.
Organiser
School of Humanities & Heritage, University of Lincoln
Moderator
School of History & Archaeology, University of Winchester
Presentations
301-a – Jews and Ideas of Property in Medieval Lincoln
Hannah Boston, University of Lincoln
301-b – Little Hugh and the Jews of Lincoln, 1255: A Re-Appraisal
Emily Rose, University of Oxford
301-c – An Evaluation of the Material Evidence for the Medieval Lincoln Jewry
Esther Robinson Wild, Independent Scholar
502 – Lost and Found in Translatio?, I: Exchanges and Tales of Encounter between Jews and Non-Jews in Medieval Eurasia and Africa
Description
Hagiographical tales by or about Jews, often with polemical content, as well as polemical tropes circulated and were transformed throughout Europe, Byzantium, the Islamicate world, the Caucasus, and Ethiopia. The papers in this session will examine these exchanges and geographic movement and resulting cultural transformations of hagiographical tales, stories for entertainment, and polemic, both as evidence of voluntary interaction between Jews and various non-Jewish communities, and as contributors to or results of crisis between Jews and their neighbors.
Organiser
Centrum für Religionswissenschaftliche Studien, Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Moderator
Faculty of Humanities, Tel Aviv University
Presentations
502-a – Killing the Image: The Desecrating Jew and Christian Blood
Katherine Aron-Beller, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
502-b – The Gadla Susanna: Adaptation of a Christian Text among the Ethiopian Jews
Sophia Dege-Müller, Universität Hamburg
Rachel Hasson, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
602 – Lost and Found in Translatio?, II: Exegetical Encounters and Exchanges between Jews and Non-Jews in Medieval Eurasia and Africa
Description
Medieval Jews from various lands shared information about their own language(s) and exegetical traditions and sought out those of other groups. Sometimes these exegetical exchanges were voluntary, friendly sharing of information, at others they were highly polemical and served as forms of demarcation or resistance. Their functions and meanings often shifted as they moved from one cultural-religious context to another. The papers in this session will examine these exchanges and geographic movement and resulting cultural transformations of exegesis, biblical tales and polemic, both as evidence of voluntary interaction between Jews and various non-Jewish communities, and as contributors to or results of crisis between Jews and their neighbors.
Organiser and Moderator
Centrum für Religionswissenschaftliche Studien, Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Presentations
602-a – Black/Beautiful: The Polemical Uses of a Biblical Verse
Miri Rubin, Queen Mary University of London
602-b – Medieval Karaite Readings of Biblical Characters and Their Interreligious Context
Meira Polliack, Tel Aviv University
602-c – Byzantium Writes Back: Jewish Byzantine Exegesis as Counter-Narrative
Saskia Dönitz, Goethe Universität Frankfurt am Main
702 – Physical Dimensions of Pilgrimage to Jerusalem in the Middle Ages
Description
This session examines pilgrimage to Jerusalem from the perspective of physicality, namely space and objects. The first paper addresses the mobilization of relics within the borders of Jerusalem itself. It explores its role in shaping the city’s sacred topography and ritual space in times of prosperity and crisis. The second paper examines the puzzling site of the Kidron Valley and how Christian pilgrims describe the future location of the Final Judgement. The third paper considers Jewish sacred space, focusing particularly on trees and how the natural landscape enhances the pilgrimage site.
Organiser
Independent Scholar
Moderator
Historiska institutionen, Stockholms universitet
Organiser
Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
Moderator
Museum Alte Synagoge, Erfurt
Presentations
702-a – Between Relic and Place: Mobilising Holy Relics in Medieval Jerusalem
Netta Amir, Johannes Gutenberg Universität, Mainz
Karl Lysén, Stockholms universitet
702-c – Trees and the Shaping of Jewish Sacred Space
Marci Freedman, Independent Scholar
725 – Crisis of Faith, I: The Impact of Jewish Conversion on Individuals and Families
Description
In the Middle Ages, Jews converted to Christianity for a variety of reasons: in some cases, a religious motivation can be assumed; many converted in order to obtain better living conditions or to be able to marry a Christian; for many, however, it was the only way to survive in the face of persecution. Thus, while conversion was often the result of, or the only way out of, a precarious or even life-threatening situation, the conversion itself and its consequences for the individual and their family can also be interpreted as a crisis, as can the challenges converts had to face as members of their new faith, where they were often met with suspicion and hostility. From a Christian perspective, Jewish converts were often interpreted as a threat, not only because they were seen to still hold to their old faith, but also because they were seen to be proselytising Christians. In this session (and its consecutive session), we aim to explore the multitude of crises that could cause (and force) Jews to convert, and the crises in their lives, both as individuals and a group, that resulted from this conversion. In this session, the three papers will trace individual life stories of converts and their families and analyse the various forms of crises that could arise from such a conversion.
Presentations
725-a – Pressburg 1438: The Cases of the Jewish Aunt and the Unbaptised Christian
Eveline Brugger, Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
725-b – Gender and Inter-Religious Conflicts in the Medieval Family
Ahuva Liberles, Tel Aviv University
725-c – The Mass Conversions of 1391: The Immediate Impact on Individuals
Paola Tartakoff, Rutgers University, New Jersey
802 – Sacred Gestures over Time: Unveiling Latin, Byzantine, Qur’anic, and Jewish Chant Practices from the Middle Ages Onward
Description
Various cultural, historical, and religious factors shaped the evolution of the performance practice of sacred chant traditions in Eastern and Western Christendom, Islam, and Judaism. Some of these techniques have been carefully preserved, while others have evolved further, sometimes pushed by significant events in history like reforms, changes of rulers, wars, etc. Therefore, the present session will include the following topics:
• The role of the hand in the performance of Latin and Byzantine chant
• The inner attitude when reciting the Qur’an
• Recitation practices for sacred texts other than the Torah
For the Christian West, hand gestures were used during the Middle Ages for conducting and teaching since late Antiquity. Singers and musical leaders of religious communities used their hand all the time for preparing and performing the daily liturgy. In Byzantium, the performance practice was determined by the precentors and usually conveyed to the choir with the help of specific hand gestures. Thus, a sophisticated system was developed to indicate a melodic line and sometimes even intervals with cheironomy.
Following medieval texts, the melodic recitation of the Qur’ān asks for an inner attitude of grief (huzn) in order to perform from a humble disposition, but also for an emotional response (weeping). Recitation practices of Ashkenazi Jewish prayer are studied by Judit Frigyesi Niran in an ethnographic way.
Organiser
Centro de Estudos de Sociologia e Estética Musical (CESEM), Universidade Nova de Lisboa
Moderator
Institute for Medieval Studies, University of Leeds
Presentations
802-a – A Guiding Hand: Instruction and Performance in Medieval Liturgical Chant
Kristin Hoefener, Universidade Nova de Lisboa
802-b – A Hands-On Culture?: Chanting with the Help of Gestures in Byzantium
Nina-Maria Wanek, Universität Wien
Stephanie Schewe, Freie Universität Berlin
802-d – Recitation Practices of Ashkenazi Jewish Prayer
Judit Frigyesi Niran, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat Gan
825 – Crisis of Faith, II: Conversion, Apostasy, and Martyrdom in Jewish-Christian Interreligious Conflicts
Description
In the Middle Ages, Jews converted to Christianity for a variety of reasons: in some cases, a religious motivation can be assumed; many converted in order to obtain better living conditions or to be able to marry a Christian; for many, however, it was the only way to survive in the face of persecution. Thus, while conversion was often the result of, or the only way out of, a precarious or even life-threatening situation, the conversion itself and its consequences for the individual and their family can also be interpreted as a crisis, as can the challenges converts had to face as members of their new faith, where they were often met with suspicion and hostility. From a Christian perspective, Jewish converts were often interpreted as a threat, not only because they were seen to still hold to their old faith, but also because they were seen to be proselytising Christians. In this session (and its consecutive session), we aim to explore the multitude of crises that could cause (and force) Jews to convert, and the crises in their lives, both as individuals and a group, that resulted from this conversion. In this second session, the papers will explore the views of Christian and Jewish writers, the former giving evidence of the Christian fantasy (and fear) of Jewish missionary activity and its consequences, the latter discussing how the instruments of martyrdom – earth, water, and fire – each indelibly inscribe Jewish presence during a crisis (i.e. the persecutions during the first crusade) that is threatening Jewish existence. The third paper will discuss a particular case from England and its various interpretations in scholarly literature.
Organiser: Birgit Wiedl, Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
Moderator: Eveline Brugger, Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
Presentations
825-a – The London Thirteen, Revisited: Crises of Faith in the 1280s
Adrienne Williams Boyarin, University of Victoria, British Columbia
825-b – Forced Conversion and the Elements of Resistance Myth: Memory and the Rhineland Martyrs
Emilie Amar-Zifkin, University of Toronto
Irven Resnick, University of Tennessee, Chattanooga
1027 – Minor and Major Crises of Jewish-Christian Coexistence in Central Europe
Description
This section deals with the various types of personal, local or supra-regional crises that affected Jewish-Christian relations in the lands of the Bohemian Crown and southern Germany.
Such crises could be triggered by wartime events and natural disasters as well as by political or personal conflicts that transformed latent hostility towards the Jewish population into anti-Jewish violence.
Papers in this session will focus on the impact of these crises on Jewish-Christian relations, and on Jewish strategies for coping with them or for mitigating their effects.
Organiser: Eveline Brugger, Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
Moderator: Birgit Wiedl, Institut für jüdische Geschichte Österreichs, St Pölten
Presentations
Eva Doležalová, Akademie věd České republiky, Praha
1027-b – Unreliable Residents: Jews and the Defence of Towns during the Hussite Wars
Kajetán Holeček, Univerzita Karlova, Praha
1027-c – We Didn’t Start the Fire: Jewish-Christian Cooperation and Conflict in Times of Crisis
Sophia Schmitt, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
Astrid Riedler-Pohlers, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München
1036 – Beyond Crises in Jewish Medieval Studies
Description
The study of the Jewish past is deeply intertwined with various aspects that might be termed crises. On the one hand, these are crises faced by the historical communities being studied, such as persecutions, hate and discrimination, Jews as scapegoats in the context of larger crises or internal conflicts and cultural challenges. On the other, more contemporary feelings of crises have motivated scholars and the broader public to turn to investigating these historical frameworks. In earlier scholarship, crises, catastrophes and suffering have often been focal points of interest and served as influential explanatory paradigms.
As such, this year’s theme for IMC Leeds conference, ‘Crisis’, with all its various, seems both particularly relevant but also not new to those looking at premodern Jewish history and culture(s). This session builds on the special relationship Jewish Studies has with the theme, and going beyond crises seeks to reflect on challenges and prospects of such a framing. The three papers offer fresh explorations of this topic: modern historiography and Jewish history as crisis (Boyarin); Jewish marginalization in 15th c. Iberia as a crisis of public health and medical care (Caballero Navas); the appropriation of medical epistemic categories of ‘crisis’ and ‘danger’ in Talmudic-rabbinic literature (Lehmhaus).
Organisers: Lennart Lehmhaus, Seminar für Religionswissenschaft und Judaistik / Institutum Judaicum, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen and Shamma Boyarin, Department of English, University of Victoria, British Columbia
Moderator: Claire Burridge, Department of History, University of Sheffield
Presentations
1036-a – Beyond Crises: The Jewish Middle Ages
Shamma Boyarin, University of Victoria, British Columbia
1036-b – Caring for the (Jewish) Community’s Health in Challenging Times
Carmen Caballero Navas, Universidad de Granada
1036-c – Avoiding Danger, Navigating Crisis: Rabbinic Approaches to Illness
Lennart Lehmhaus, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen
1202 – Collecting and Displaying Medieval Jewish Artefacts and Heritage, I
Description
The collecting and exhibiting of medieval artefacts by museums is never just about the objects in the display case. This is especially true when it comes to exhibiting medieval Jewish art, material culture, and heritage in places which were complicit in histories of oppression and intolerance or which may no longer have Jewish populations. Topics for discussion include:
Shifting paradigms of collecting and display: nationalist, ethnocentric, Eurocentric, transnational;
The invention of Jewish tradition and the Middle Ages;
The legacy of lachrymose history in the museum – from 1096 to the Holocaust;
The pressures of cultural tourism on heritage spaces and museum culture, and the practice of art history.
Organisers: Eva Frojmovic, School of Fine Art, History of Art & Cultural Studies, University of Leeds and William Diebold, Department of Art, Reed College, Oregon
Moderator: Eva Frojmovic, School of Fine Art, History of Art & Cultural Studies, University of Leeds
Presentations
1202-a – The Alienation of Medieval Jewish Manuscripts from German Public Collections, 1945-1960
William Diebold, Reed College, Oregon
1202-b – The Seder Plates that Weren’t
Julie Harris, Independent Scholar
1202-c – Magic, Medicine, Multilingualism, and War Machines in an Illustrated Jewish Miscellany
Diane Wolfthal, Rice University, Houston, Texas
1302 – Collecting and Displaying Medieval Jewish Artefacts and Heritage, II
Description
The collecting and exhibiting of medieval artefacts by museums is never just about the objects in the display case. This is especially true when it comes to exhibiting medieval Jewish art, material culture, and heritage in places which were complicit in histories of oppression and intolerance or which may no longer have Jewish populations. Topics for discussion include
Shifting paradigms of collecting and display: nationalist, ethnocentric, Eurocentric, transnational;
The invention of Jewish tradition and the Middle Ages;
The legacy of lachrymose history in the museum – from 1096 to the Holocaust;
The pressures of cultural tourism on heritage spaces and museum culture, and the practice of art history.
Organisers: Eva Frojmovic, School of Fine Art, History of Art & Cultural Studies, University of Leeds and Julie Harris, Independent Scholar
Moderator: Eva Frojmovic, School of Fine Art, History of Art & Cultural Studies, University of Leeds
Presentations
1302-a – The John Rylands Library’s Hebrew Manuscript Collection and Its Audiences
Zsofia Buda, University of Manchester
1302-b – The Art of Reframing the Narrative: Jewish Material Culture in an Encyclopedic Museum
Abigail H. Meyer, Touro University, New York
1302-c – Renewing the Middle Ages at the ANU Museum, Tel Aviv
Simona di Nepi, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Massachusetts
1528 – Bleeding Bodies in Crisis?, I: Medieval (Mis)Conceptions and Stigmatisation of Menstruation
Description
‘Medieval (Mis)conceptions and Stigmatisation of Menstruation’ is the first of three planned sessions of ‘Bleeding Bodies in Crisis?’ The three papers introduce different perspectives on menstruation, with a focus on Judaism and Hinduism in the Middle Ages. In medieval times, the bleeding female body was often perceived of as being in a state of crisis. Regulations of the female reproductive cycle in both religions so illustrate an overall negative perception of the female body, its functions and thus, the female gender in general. The papers in this session shed light on the origins of modern-day stigma. The panel serves as an introduction to the other two sessions, exploring medieval prejudice surrounding menstruation before delving into a re-appraisal of this bodily process.
Organisers: Rosalie Bernheim, School of Modern Languages, University of St Andrews and Kerstin Mayerhofer, Institut für Judaistik, Universität Wien
Moderator: Carmen Caballero Navas, Departamento de Estudios Semíticos, Universidad de Granada
Organisers
School of Modern Languages, University of St Andrews
Institut für Judaistik, Universität Wien
Moderator
Departamento de Estudios Semíticos, Universidad de Granada
Presentations
1528-a – Menstrual Myth, Rituals, Boundaries, and ‘Polluting’ Woman in Medieval India
Hari Priya Pathak, Kumaun University, Nainital
Kerstin Mayerhofer, Universität Wien
Nesya Batsheva Lebeau Nelkin, Columbia University
1532 – Crises of Everyday Life among Jews in the Eastern Mediterranean and West Asia: Insights from the Cairo Genizas and Other Documents
Description
While peoples, including Jews, faced a number of cataclysmic events such as earthquakes, drought, famine, plague and war in the medieval Mediterranean and West Asia, the Cairo Geniza(s) provides insights into other kinds of smaller, individual crises as well, namely those affecting daily life. These may include but are not exclusive to: enslavement; immigration; death or disappearance of family or business partner; strife with spouse or other family member; disability; religious or other cultural difference. Of course large-scale disasters, also caused personal crises for individuals. The papers for this session will explore questions of individual crisis and resilience among Jews in Byzantium, the Islamicate Mediterranean, and West Asia.
Organiser: Alexandra Cuffel, Centrum für Religionswissenschaftliche Studien, Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Moderator: Craig Perry, Department of Middle Eastern & South Asian Studies, Emory University, Georgia
Presentations
1532-a – A Crisis of Trust: Assessments of Reverting Jewish Apostates in the Medieval Islamic Period
Uriel Simonsohn, University of Haifa
1532-b – Unveiling Jewish and Zoroastrian Concerns in Medieval Iranian Society
Neda Darabian, Ruhr-Universität Bochum
1532-c – The Forgotten Jewish Chapter in Arabia: A Medieval Response to Crisis
Oded Zinger, Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Organiser
Centrum für Religionswissenschaftliche Studien, Ruhr-Universität Bochum
Moderator
Department of Middle Eastern & South Asian Studies, Emory University, Georgia
1632 – Between the Personal and the Public: Representations of Crisis in the Cairo Geniza Fragments
Description
This session investigates the themes of crisis, estrangement, and alienation in the Cairo Genizah fragments. It presents the findings of the Arabic Poetry in the Cairo Geniza project, a collaboration between Trinity College Dublin and the University of Cambridge that examines for the first time fragments of the Cairo Geniza written in Arabic and Judeo-Arabic. These fragments were produced by the Jewish community in medieval Cairo. They cover different aspects of life from personal letters, business letters, folktales, elegies, love poetry to petitions, among other aspects. Our session aims to explore the themes of alienation and crisis, whether in the personal sphere or in the public sphere, in some of those fragments. Our investigation of those themes places the fragments within a comparative context as we look at the cultural and literary borrowings that took place between the Jewish community in Egypt on the one hand and Muslim and Christian Arab culture on the other hand. Along with this comparative approach, there is a prominent global approach that situates the Jewish community within the larger Mediterranean network of connections and mobility. With this in mind, the session fills the gap in medieval scholarship that still, to some extent, focuses on Euro-centric history and culture. Rather than focus on a single culture, the panel explores the overlaps between different cultural and religious groups and puts them in conversation to rewrite the history of those groups with emphasis on the Jews of medieval Cairo.
Presentations
Mohammad Imran Khan, Trinity College Dublin
Ahmed Sheir, Trinity College Dublin
1632-c – Loss and Alienation in Arabic Poetry from the Cairo Genizah
Sally Hany Abed and Mohamed Ahmed, Trinity College Dublin
Organisers
Department of Near & Middle Eastern Studies, Trinity College Dublin
Department of Near & Middle Eastern Studies, Trinity College Dublin
Moderator
Genizah Research Unit, Cambridge University Library, University of Cambridge
1712 – Mediterranean Jewish Communities in Crisis
Description
That the manuscripts of the Cairo Genizah survived at all is testament to the resilient nature of the Egyptian Jewish community who preserved the synagogue in Old Cairo, with its precious Genizah storeroom, down to the present day. This session will examine the challenges faced by the Jewish communities of the eastern Mediterranean in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, and how the communities and their leaders dealt with them, drawing on the unique sources among the Genizah manuscripts. How did the bookish Qaraite community, whose liturgical year relied on the sighting of the ripening barley in Palestine, cope when access to the Holy Land was disrupted or restricted? What do contemporary Fatimid-era documents reveal about the facts behind the Mamluk historian al-Maqrizi’s reference to the execution of ‘the head of the Jews and his colleagues’? And how did the pre-eminent sage of his era, Moses Maimonides, tackle the personal, professional and communal crises that afflicted his life and career as he fled Al-Andalus to settle in Egypt at the time of the Crusades?
Presentations
1712-a – Maimonides: Navigating Personal and Political Crises in the Middle Ages
Zvi Stampfer, Herzog College, Jerusalem
1712-b – The Medieval Qaraite Calendar in Times of Crisis: Ideology versus Practice
Nadia Vidro, University College London
1712-c – The Execution of the Head of the Jews in Egypt: New Evidence from the Cairo Genizah
Amir Ashur, University of Haifa
Organiser
Genizah Research Unit, Cambridge University Library, University of Cambridge
Moderator
Genizah Research Unit, Cambridge University Library, University of Cambridge