Responsa in a Historical Context: A View of Post-Expulsion Spanish-Portuguese Jewish Communities Through Sixteenth- And Seventeenth-Century Responsa
This book contains a collection of eight annotated translations of responsa, alongside the original Hebrew texts, focusing on the post-expulsion Spanish-Portuguese communities of the sixteenth to seventeenth centuries. This collection will acquaint the reader with Jews who, following their expulsion, settled in the Ottoman Empire, in Palestine under the Mamluks, in Amsterdam and in Brazil. The period of the expulsion of the Jews from the Iberian Peninsula was a tragic time in Jewish history, but the revitalization of the post-expulsion Spanish-Portuguese Jewish communities in new locales is testimony to the human spirit and determination.
The volume includes eight chapters, each built around one responsum from one of the great halakhic authorities of the time. Topics include excommunication in Amsterdam, ʻagunot, inheritance rights of a converso son, obligatory contracts and breach of agreement, heresy and humanist scholarship, informing on someone to the Venetian Inquisition, and more.
The volume includes eight chapters, each built around one responsum from one of the great halakhic authorities of the time. Topics include excommunication in Amsterdam, ʻagunot, inheritance rights of a converso son, obligatory contracts and breach of agreement, heresy and humanist scholarship, informing on someone to the Venetian Inquisition, and more.
Book Details
- Publisher: Academic Studies Press
- Publish Date: Nov 21st, 2023
- Pages: 200
- Language: English
- Dimensions: 0.00in - 0.00in - 0.00in - 0.00lb
- EAN: 9798887193595
- Categories: • Jewish Studies• Jewish - General• Comparative Religion
About the Author
Koren, Debby: - Debby Koren is an independent researcher in the fields of halakha and responsa literature. She has lectured and taught Talmud and halakha in informal and formal adult settings. She has a Ph.D. in mathematics from The City University of New York and an M.A. in Talmud and Halakha from the Schechter Institute in Jerusalem.
Praise for this book
"In Responsa in a Historical Context, Deborah Koren makes these fascinating yet extraordinarily difficult documents come alive. She succeeds admirably in overcoming the challenge that faces all who would write about responsa for an audience of non-specialists, namely to offer sufficient explanation of the historical and halakhic (Jewish legal) context behind each submitted question without allowing that explanation to overwhelm the text and to drown out the unique voice of the rabbinical author. The book is an indispensable source of information, both on the history of the period it covers and on the ways that rabbis think, how they utilize textual analysis, logic, and rhetoric to craft answers to the question that Jews ask." -- Mark E. Washofsky, Professor Emeritus of Jewish Law and Practice, Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion, Cincinnati