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JEWISH REVIEW Number 2, Summer 2010 $6.95 OF BOOKS Ruth R. Wisse The Poet from Vilna Jews with Money: Yuval Levin on Capitalism Richard I. Cohen on Camondo Treasure David Sorkin on Steven J. Moses Zipperstein Montefiore The Spy who Came from the Shtetl Anita Shapira The Kibbutz and the State Robert Alter Yehuda Halevi Moshe Halbertal How Not to Pray Walter Russell Mead Christian Zionism Plus Summer Fiction, Crusaders Vanquished & More A Short History of the Jews Michael Brenner Editor Translated by Jeremiah Riemer Abraham Socher “Drawing on the best recent scholarship and wearing his formidable learning lightly, Michael Publisher Brenner has produced a remarkable synoptic survey of Jewish history. His book must be considered a standard against which all such efforts to master and make sense of the Jewish Eric Cohen past should be measured.” —Stephen J. Whitfield, Brandeis University Sr. Contributing Editor Cloth $29.95 978-0-691-14351-4 July Allan Arkush Editorial Board Robert Alter The Rebbe Shlomo Avineri The Life and Afterlife of Menachem Mendel Schneerson Leora Batnitzky Samuel Heilman & Menachem Friedman Ruth Gavison “Brilliant, well-researched, and sure to be controversial, The Rebbe is the most important Moshe Halbertal biography of Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson ever to appear. Samuel Heilman and Hillel Halkin Menachem Friedman, two of the world’s foremost sociologists of religion, have produced a Jon D. Levenson landmark study of Chabad, religious messianism, and one of the greatest spiritual figures of the twentieth century.” Anita Shapira —Jonathan D. Sarna, author of American Judaism: A History Michael Walzer Cloth $29.95 978-0-691-13888-6 J. H.H. Weiler Leon Wieseltier Ruth Wisse Early Modern Jewry Steven J. Zipperstein A New Cultural History David B. Ruderman Assistant Editor Philip Getz “This is an entirely original book that for the first time offers a sustained and persuasive argument for a distinct early modern period in Jewish history. Ruderman provides a Design and Production synthetic account of the period based on a masterful command of the primary and Betsy Klarfeld secondary scholarship.” —David Sorkin, University of Wisconsin–Madison Business Manager Cloth $35.00 978-0-691-14464-1 Lori Dorr Editorial Fellow Michael Moss Capitalism and the Jews Intern Jerry Z. Muller Kendell Pinkney “Jerry Z. Muller presents a provocative and accessible survey of how Jewish culture and historical accident ripened Jews for commercial success and why that success has earned them so much misfortune. While this book is ostensibly about ‘the Jews,’ Muller’s most chilling insights are about their enemies, and the creative, almost supernatural, malleability of anti- Semitism itself.” —Catherine Rampell, New York Times Book Review The Jewish Review of Books (Print ISSN 2153-1978, Cloth $24.95 978-0-691-14478-8 Online ISSN 2153-1994) is a quarterly publication of ideas and criticism published in Spring, Summer, Fall, and Winter, by Bee.Ideas, LLC., 745 Fifth Avenue, Suite 1400, New York, NY 10151. Winner of the 2009 National Jewish Book Award in the category of Women’s Studies For all subscriptions, please visit Mitzvah Girls www.jewishreviewofbooks.com or send $19.95 Bringing Up the Next Generation of Hasidic Jews in Brooklyn ($29.95 outside of the US) to: Jewish Review of Books, Ayala Fader PO Box 3000, Denville, NJ 07834. For customer service and subscription-related issues, please call “Mitzvah Girls is a rigorous ethnographic study of the education of Hasidic girls in Brooklyn. 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Please send all unsolicited reviews and manuscripts to the attention of the editors at Maimonides in His World [email protected], or to our editorial office.Advertising inquiries should be sent Portrait of a Mediterranean Thinker to [email protected] copies Sarah Stroumsa should be sent to the attention of the Assistant Editor “Stroumsa paints a richly documented, nuanced portrait of Maimonides as a bold, open at our editorial office. thinker whose sometimes revolutionary conception of Judaism draws freely from the multiple philosophical, theological, scientific, and ideological currents of his contemporary Mediterranean world. Stroumsa points scholars in new directions for future study of the greatest Jewish figure of the Middle Ages.” —Josef Stern, University of Chicago Cloth $39.50 978-0-691-13763-6 JEWISH REVIEW OF BOOKS 800.777.4726 press.princeton.edu JEWISH REVIEW Summer 2010 OF BOOKS LETTERS 4 Jewish Narnias, Slighting the Conservative Movement, Strong Coffee or Weak Tea? . and more FEATURES 5 Anita Shapira The Kibbutz and the State How the position of the kibbutz in Israeli society has changed, and why. 10 Ruth R. Wisse The Poet from Vilna Avrom Sutzkever and Max Weinreich, a memoir. REviews 15 Robert Alter All the Good Things of Spain Yehuda Halevi by Hillel Halkin 17 Yuval Levin With Interest Capitalism and the Jews by Jerry Z. Muller 19 Martin Kavka Old-New Sabbath The Sabbath World: Glimpses of a Different Order of Timeby Judith Shulevitz 21 Robert Chazan The Christian Road to Jerusalem God’s Battalions: The Case for the Crusadesby Rodney Stark 23 David Sorkin Montefiore and the Politics of Emancipation Moses Montefiore:Jewish Liberator, Imperial Hero by Abigail Greene 27 Walter Russell Mead Friends of Zion Zeal for Zion: Christians, Jews, and the Idea of the Promised Land by Shalom Goldman 28 Dara Horn Animal Foible Beatrice and Virgil by Yann Martel 29 Anne Trubek Going Public The Cookbook Collectorby Allegra Goodman 30 Ben Birnbaum Posthumous Prophecy The Prophet’s Wifeby Milton Steinberg 33 Margot Lurie I, Terrorist American Taliban by Pearl Abraham • A Week in December by Sebastian Faulks • Terrorist by John Updike 35 Gabriella Safran The Weaver Photographing the Jewish Nation: Pictures from S. An-sky’s Ethnographic Expeditions Edited by Eugene M. Avrutin, Valerii Dymshits, Alexander Ivanov, Alexander Lvov, Harriet Murav, Alla Sokolova REAdingS 38 Steven J. Zipperstein Underground Man: The Curious Case of Mark Zborowski and the Writing of a Modern Jewish Classic The Limits of Prayer: Two Talmudic Discussions 43 Moshe Halbertal The Arts 45 Richard I. Cohen The Rothschilds of the East The Splendor of the Camondos at the Musée d’art et d’histoire du Judaïsme in Paris 47 Ella Taylor Swept Up Leap of Faith Directed by Antony Benjamin and Stephen Friedman Lost AnD FoUnD 48 Matt Goldish Rashi and the Crusader: A Legend Last Words 49 Allan Arkush Moses Mendelssohn Street 51 Harvey Pekar and Gut Shabbes Tara Seibel On the cover: (from top): ‘Avrom Sutzkever,’ photo by Hertz Grossbard, courtesy of Ruth R. Wisse; ‘Moses Montefiore’ (1818) by Richard Dighton, Snark/Art Resource NY; ‘Mark Zborowski’ by Gary Dumm LETTERS To THE EDIToR Rosenfeld and the Jewish Review of Books The Prayers of Others From Left and Right ara Horn’s article on Isaac Rosenfeld is, by itself, n his review of the new Koren Sacks Siddur, Hillel hmuel Rosner claims that Zertal and Eldar Dan auspicious beginning for your new maga- IHalkin seems to gaze almost wistfully across the S“pretend to write history while engaging in zine. Lucid and wise, it’s a wonderful essay. It is easy street at the Catholics and the Protestants, with their raw politics.” He then recites the chapter titles of to despair of the careerism and problem solving that once-a-week church attendance, and the Muslims, the book to demonstrate how “angry” the authors really infuses today’s higher education, and for those of us with their frequent but brief services. He appears to are. He then moves on to analyze, in a more subtle and who do, Ms. Horn’s first-rate piece restores a sense of feel that our own lengthy liturgy is too clunky to fos- appreciative way, books about settlers’ personal lives. perspective. David Lebedoff, Minneapolis, MN ter feelings of devotion. But Halkin doesn’t seem to Lords of the Land is arguably the most compre- realize that even the ancients understood this, and hensive survey of the settlements published thus far. that is why the primary prayer was and remains the Rosner wishes to dismiss it as merely a polemic, but No Jewish Narnia amidah, the 18 blessings. All the rest is commentary, he does not engage a single argument in the book. enjoyed Michael Weingrad’s “Why There is No so to speak. If Halkin feels the other prayers detract Zertal and Eldar examine the corrupt relationship Jewish Narnia.” Rabbi Odeya Tzurieli has argued I from his concentration on the amidah, he should sim- between the Army and the settlement movement, in a recent essay that Israeli hyper-realism and com- ply omit those auxiliary passages. In any event, I see and also expose—in detail—the outrageous leniency plete lack of imagination stem from Zionism’s idea of no support for the idea that shorter services in other of Israel’s High Court of Justice when dealing with hagshama (realization), which strove to break with religions translate to better concentration. There is no settler, as opposed to Palestinian, crimes. To claim, the Jewish tradition of dreaming about and aspiring shortage of lapsed Catholics and Protestants who can as Rosner does, that a “mere glance at the titles of the for redemption and replace it with action and ini- disabuse Halkin of that fanciful notion. book’s chapters gives one a sufficient sense of what’s tiative.