CIP Deputy Director Professor Daniel Weiss is in the USA for the 2024 annual joint meeting of the American Academy of Religion & the Society of Biblical Literature, alongside other Cambridge researchers.
Among activities on the bill is a panel discussion of Weiss’s monograph: Modern Jewish Philosophy and the Politics of Divine Violence (CUP, 2023).
On Sunday 24 November, at 1500 Pacific Standard Time, panellist Robert Gibbs (Toronto), Holger Zellentin (Tübingen), Olaoluwatoni Alimi, (Princeton) and Martha Reineke (Iowa) will gather for a roundtable. The session is co-sponsored by the Scriptural Reasoning Unit and the Colloquium on Violence and Religion. Daniel Weiss will be offering a response to the four panellists, with Ashleigh Elser chairing. Head to Convention Center-25B (Upper Level East) to join.
Also at SBLAAR
For those unfamiliar with Scriptural Reasoning, Daniel is also among those offering an introductory session on the theme of “Reading from the Margins” on Monday afternoon. See session A25-325 in the Program.
Among others attending SBL from the University of Cambridge are Professor Douglas Hedley, Dr Frederick Simmons, and Dr Sarah Dunlop (Divinity/Ridley Hall), plus Divinity PhD students Akeem Adagbada, Abraham Wu, Cole Bishop, FAMES PhD student Hershini Soneji. Those showing up to the Oxford and Cambridge joint reception on Sunday evening (1900 PST at the Marquis-Marriott Grand 8) can also hope to encounter Prof Andrew Davison, who recently migrated to the other place (i.e. Oxford) to take up a Regius chair.
Not at SBLAAR?
For those not in San Diego, Daniel Weiss’s book was recently reviewed by Jewish studies blogger Alan Brill (Kavvanah.blog), who writes:
“What is the role of the ethical principles in the Talmud in creating modern Jewish thought? Gerald (Yaakov) Blidstein, a former Professor at Ben Gurion University thought that these principles sat uneasily into the Talmud with its former system of Jewish law. They seemed to operate as their own dimension separate than the legal discussions. Blidstein extended this into the medieval and modern eras showing the range of their usages was not clear. Yet, modern Jewish religious thinkers make use of them regularly, rabbis of all denomination, cite that ‘all humans are in the image of God,’ ‘that one should be holy’ ‘to respect human dignity’ or establishing ‘God’s kingship.’ One sees these principles quotes often by Rabbis Samson Raphael Hirsch and Jonathan Sacks, as well as many other leaders.
“Daniel H. Weiss has provided us with a serious insightful discussion of the use of these principles in four pillars of Modern Jewish Philosophy . . .
“Currently, we have Jewish thinkers, theologians, and rabbis expound a highly politicized view of Judaism. Many today, even declare that our fallen unredeemed world is already somehow politically messianic. Along with a return to a legal approach of medieval texts. One recent popular book on Jewish views of war even went so far as to deny that Cohen, Buber, or Tameres are Jewish views. This book, by contrast, permits a window on other conceptions of Jewish political theology, one in which the Rabbinic maxims prevail.”