Jewish Political Studies

ERSPECTIVESERSPECTIVES AJSPPTheThe MagazineMagazine ofof thethe AssociationAssociation forfor JewishJewish StudiesStudies In This Issue: AJS 38th JEWISH POLITICAL STUDIES . 8 Annual ALSO... Perspectives on Technology Conference Heidi Lerner . 24 December 17-19, 2006 The History of Nonsense Manchester Grand Hyatt Abe Socher . 32 San Diego, California Yiddish / Jewish Cultures: A Graduate Student Conference (see page 50-51 for details) Shiri Goren, Hannah Pressman, and Lara Rabinovitch. 38 FALL 2006 AJS Perspectives: The Magazine TABLE OF CONTENTS of the Association for Jewish Studies President Judith R. Baskin From the Editor. 3 University of Oregon From the President . 5 Editor Allan Arkush From the Executive Director . 6 Binghamton University Editorial Board Announcements . 6 Howard Adelman Hebrew College Jewish Political Studies Alanna Cooper A Founding Father University of Massachusetts Amherst Alan Mittleman . 8 Jonathan Karp Binghamton University Interview with Michael Walzer Heidi Lerner Michah Gottlieb. 10 Stanford University Frances Malino Contemporary Jewish Political Theory Wellesley College Daniel Frank . 14 Vanessa Ochs The Israel Democracy Institute: University of Virginia Pursuing Democracy in “The Jewish State” Riv-Ellen Prell University of Minnesota Randy L. Friedman . 16 Shmuel Shepkaru From “Azure” to “Hebraic Political Studies” University of Oklahoma Allan Arkush . 20 Abe Socher Oberlin College Perspectives on Technology: Shelly Tenenbaum Clark University Jewish Political Studies on the Internet Keith Weiser Heidi Lerner . 24 York University Steven Zipperstein The History of Nonsense AJS Vice President for Publications Abe Socher. 32 Stanford University Managing Editor Yiddish / Jewish Cultures: A Graduate Student Conference Karin Kugel Shiri Goren, Hannah Pressman, and Lara Rabinovitch . 38 Executive Director Rona Sheramy Remembering Our Colleagues Graphic Designer Matt Biscotti Isaac Einstein Barzilay (1915–2006) Wild 1 Graphics, Inc. Stanley Nash . 42 Arthur Hertzberg (1921–2006) Please direct correspondence to: David Starr . 43 Association for Jewish Studies David Patterson (1922–2005) Center for Jewish History 15 West 16th Street S. Ilan Troen . 45 New York, NY 10011 Voice: (917) 606-8249 AJS 38th Annual Conference Information. 50 Fax: (917) 606-8222 E-Mail: [email protected] Web Site: www.ajsnet.org AJS Perspectives is published AJS Perspectives encourages submissions of articles, announcements, and brief letters to the bi-annually by the Association editor related to the interests of our members. Materials submitted will be published at the for Jewish Studies. discretion of the editors. AJS Perspectives reserves the right to reject articles, announcements, letters, advertisements, and other items not consonant with the goals and purposes of the organization. Copy may be condensed or rejected because of length or style. © Copyright 2006 Association for Jewish Studies AJS Perspectives disclaims responsibility for statements made by contributors or advertisers. ISSN 1529-6423 been narrowly confined. Jewish As Daniel Frank points out, some of political studies is alive and well, the more noted contemporary FROM however infrequently it goes by that Jewish political theorists “tease out name. Just how extensive a field it normative considerations from THE can be understood to be depends traditional texts” in books that on how broadly the subjects listed “could in principle be action- EDITOR by Elazar are defined. They can guiding.” And the editors of many perhaps be carefully circumscribed, of the publications sponsored by Dear Colleagues, but they can also be construed in the Israel Democracy Institute and such a way as to encompass a very the Shalem Center (discussed later his issue of Perspectives is large percentage of Jewish studies. in this issue by Randy Friedman and largely devoted to Jewish myself) certainly intend their work Tpolitical studies. But what is In this issue we will not engage in to be of such use. that? There is no better place to what would undoubtedly prove to look for an answer to this question be a futile effort to demarcate the Today’s practitioners of Jewish than the writings of the late Daniel precise boundaries of Jewish political studies are not engaged in Elazar, the American-Israeli political political studies. We will instead an unprecedented activity. But they scientist who has as much a claim as mark out the terrain it covers in a cannot always obtain reassurance anyone to be considered the very general way, beginning with a from looking back on their founder of the field. In 1989, in the retrospective look at the pioneering predecessors. A recent publication inaugural issue of the Jewish project of Daniel Elazar and of the Israel Democracy Institute Political Studies Review, he continuing with a variety of entitled Religion and State in identified it as “the study of Jewish perspectives on some of the most Twentieth-century Jewish Thought modes of self-government, political recent ventures in the field. (Aviezer Ravitzky, ed., 2005) perceptions, and exercise of political Without making any effort to be includes an article by Daniel Marom responsibilities.” He pinpointed the comprehensive, we will focus mostly on “Religion and State in the moment of the field’s birth as the on some of the more ambitious and Thought and Praxis of Ben-Zion date, two decades earlier, when the innovative work being done in Dinur.” Marom’s study of this first bibliographic essay on the Jewish political studies. eminent Jewish historian and subject had been published in the sometime Israeli politico discusses American Jewish Yearbook. After The most important endeavors in at some length his effort more than enumerating the growth areas in this area combine empirical and fifty years ago to integrate the Jewish political studies during the historical research, theoretical “Jewish political thought” that took twenty years following that essay’s inquiries, and an interest in the shape during the Jews’ centuries of publication, Elazar declared that the application of insights derived from life in exile into the process of time had come to establish a journal the Jewish political tradition to drafting a constitution for the new devoted to “further stimulation and present-day reality in very different State of Israel. Dinur’s ultimate lack dissemination of scholarship in the ways. As Alan Mittleman observes, of success in this area, Marom field, whether empirical research, Daniel Elazar not only traced the concludes, does not lessen the political thought, or systematic “employments of covenantal ideas contemporary relevance of his commentary on Jewish public both in Jewish political tradition thinking. But for those who wish to affairs.” and in the West” but did so as a pick up where he left off, it must be “political philosopher, concerned discouraging. Nearly two decades after Daniel about the eternal quest for liberty Elazar made these comments in the and order, for power and justice, for Our purpose here, of course, is Jewish Political Studies Review, it is Jews and non-Jews alike.” In his neither to encourage nor to curious to note the degree to which ongoing, multivolume collection disparage such people but simply to this journal, published in Jerusalem, entitled The Jewish Political call attention to their scholarly has retained something of a Tradition, Michael Walzer aspires efforts in a way that will be helpful monopoly on the rubric “to display the tradition in the style to our readers, especially if they incorporated in its title. A Google of the tradition,” that is, themselves are engaged in teaching search of “Jewish political studies” “argumentatively,” and he expresses or writing in the area of Jewish yields about one thousand hits, all the hope that the lively argument political studies. With that end in but a few of which point back to it. that he and his colleagues have view, we have concluded this But this should not be taken as engendered will “spill over into section of the current issue with a evidence that activity in the field has Israeli and diaspora political life.” guide to pertinent internet 3 resources. Heidi Lerner’s article on conference at New York University welcome your ideas or proposals. So this subject includes material and Abe Socher’s remarks please don’t hesitate to contact directly related to some of the concerning an unforgettable either Karin Kugel people, institutions, and utterance have few political ([email protected]) or me publications discussed in the ramifications. The obituaries of ([email protected]). We’ll previous articles as well as additional three recently departed giants of listen to criticism, too, and do our information relating to aspects of Judaic studies with which we best to eliminate any grounds for it. Jewish political studies that have conclude are focused on their not received detailed attention in cultural contributions, not their Allan Arkush this issue of Perspectives. political activities. Binghamton University Not everything in this issue is Our next issue will deal with political. Shiri Goren, Hannah questions relating to biography and Pressman, and Lara Rabinovitch’s autobiography. Beyond that, we account of a graduate student have few concrete plans. We The Association for Jewish Studies wishes to thank the Center for Jewish History and its constituent organizations–the American Jewish Historical Society, the American Sephardi Federation, the Leo Baeck Institute, the Yeshiva University Museum, and the YIVO Institute

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