Tradition and Modernity in Jewish Thought and Literature

Undergraduate / Graduate

The concept of tradition often takes a back seat to modernity but what does it mean to be part of a tradition in the modern world? How does tradition challenge received views and stimulate creativity, against the modern view of tradition as the "dead hand of the past"? How have the concept; ideology; and cultural role of tradition changed in Jewish culture since the Enlightenment? This course explores those questions in three bodies of work: (1) late 18th- to mid-20th-century German-Jewish historians, critics, & theologians; (2) modern Hebrew & Yiddish writers; and (3) their shared biblical, rabbinic, and mystical inspirations. Through close readings of these writers' reflections on their own literary traditions, tradition emerges as both a resource and a problem for Jewish cultural creativity; one that calls for its own theoretical vocabulary and can be set in dialogue with the modern evolution of other traditional cultures.