Jewish Religious Responses to the Holocaust
Covering a spectrum from ultra-Orthodox interpretations of the Holocaust as a punishment for sin to contemporary critiques of its mythologization, Isabel Wollaston considers the evolution of Jewish religious responses to the Holocaust. Writers whose work she evaluates include Elchonon Wassermann, Richard Rubenstein, Elie Wiesel, and David Blumenthal. This well-argued and clearly set out book contributes to the ongoing academic discussion of these responses, while also being accessible to non-specialists.
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As interest in the Holocaust grows, the spectrum of Jewish religious responses to the Holocaust continues to broaden, to the extent that it is perhaps one of the most challenging and fastest-growing areas of intellectual concern in today's Jewish world. Understanding this important phenomenon, which for a large sector of modern Jewry constitutes a prime focus of interest, requires not only a description of the range of responses but also analysis of their pattern and structure to identify recurring themes. Isabel Wollaston offers a clear thematic treatment of the topic, based on several years of guiding undergraduate and graduate students-Jewish and non-Jewish-through this complicated terrain. Her well-argued and clearly set out book contributes to the ongoing academic discussion on the nature and coherence of these responses but is nevertheless accessible to those less familiar with the area.
Topics covered include traditional Orthodox approaches to the Holocaust, with a discussion of kiddush hashem as a case-study, as well as of such concepts as the Holocaust as punishment for sin; living in the age of the death of God; idolatry and sacred space; the State of Israel in relation to the Holocaust; the uniqueness of the Holocaust; post-Holocaust Jewish identity; the compulsion to remember; language and silence; the silence of God; and the abusive nature of God. These topics are covered through reference to the work of such writers as Eliezer Berkovits, David Blumenthal, Marc Ellis, Emil L. Fackenheim, Jacob Neusner, Richard L. Rubenstein, Jonathan Sacks, J. B. Soloveitchik, and Elie Wiesel.
About the author
Isabel Wollaston is Lecturer in Theology, University of Birmingham. She is the author of A War Against Memory? The Future of Holocaust Remembrance (1996), co-editor with Jon Davies of The Sociology of Sacred Texts (1993), and editor of the journal Reviews in Religion and Theology.
Contents
Introduction
Part I 'Nothing New Under the Sun': Traditional Responses to the Holocaust
1 The Holocaust and Halakhah
2 Traditional Religious Responses to the Holocaust
3 Kiddush Hashem
4 Liturgical Remembrance of the Holocaust
Part II 'For Thy Breach is Great Like the Sea, Who Can Heal Thee?' Holocaust
Theology
5 The Holocaust as Rupture
6 Living in the Age of the Death of God: Richard L. Rubenstein
7 Auschwitz as Revelation? Emil L. Fackenheim
8 Contending with God: Elie Wiesel
Part III Post-Holocaust Theologies and Counting the Cost
9 Beyond Survival and Mythologization
10 Ending Auschwitz?
11 The Return of the Repressed and Working Through
Bibliography
Index