Introduction
Published in Naharaim
“I Seek the Stars in the Daytime”: Citation, Recitation, and Leah Goldberg’s Hidden German Poem
Published in Naharaim
This article examines the German poem inserted in Leah Goldberg’s debut novel Mikhtavim minesi’ah medumah (Letters From an Imagined Journey 1936/37). I argue that the novel serves as a framework through which Goldberg can momentarily become a German poet, stretching the limits of her Jewish subjectivity and of the monolingual Hebrew literary sphere...
From Pariah to Baboon: Ludwig Robert’s Parody of Michael Beer’s Paria
Published in Naharaim
Michael Beer’s successful 1823 play Der Paria is famous as an early complaint against the status of Jews as second-rate citizens. As such, it is fundamental to the conception of Jews as pariahs, best known through the writings of Hannah Arendt. Its long reception history has overlooked an important source, that is now uncovered for the first time i...
DerPavianTrauerspiel in einem AktvonLudwig Robert
Published in Naharaim
The Absence of Redemption: A Twentieth-Century Jewish Political Theology
Published in Naharaim
This article argues that Leo Strauss gives voice to a twentieth-century Jewish theology of the absence of redemption. Using the term “political theology” to characterize Strauss’s thought is unexpected. But this is only surprising because the reception of Strauss remains ensnared with that of Carl Schmitt. The first and last task of this article is...
Contra Schmitt: Walter Benjamin, Leo Strauss and Carl Schmitt
Published in Naharaim
This joint essay puts Leo Strauss and Walter Benjamin into conversation regarding their respective relationship to Carl Schmitt. That such a dialogue between the political philosopher regarded as a precursor of neo-conservativism and the idiosyncratic Marxist who continues to inspire the contemporary left can benefit from a comparison of their resp...
Eastern European Perspectives on the Restitution of Nazi-Looted Jewish Cultural Property: Gershom Scholem in Prague, 194...
Published in Naharaim
This article offers a critical examination of the travel diaries written by Gershom Scholem (1897–1982), a well-known pioneer scholar of Jewish mysticism and a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. In 1946, Scholem was sent to Prague on behalf of the Hebrew University to retrieve the Nazi-looted Jewish libraries from Czechoslovakia to Pa...
Nazi Germany in the Viewfinder: On Space and Movement in German-Jewish Youth Culture
Published in Naharaim
This article analyzes instances of independent mobility of Jewish youngsters in Nazi Germany through the lens of photography. Photographs, taken by teenagers of their trips and sometimes assembled in albums or collages demonstrate that the category of mobility helps to uncover and define a particular kind of agency exclusive to Jewish youth, shaped...
“Crossing the Bridge, Facing the Problem”: The Problem of Transference in Avot Yeshurun’s Poetry
Published in Naharaim
The article offers a panoramic view of the tropes of “space” and “place” in the poetry of Avot Yeshurun, and explores the radical transformation they underwent throughout the years – from the early poems of the 1930s, to the last volume of poems published before the poet’s death in 1992. I contend that the shift in the nature of the Yeshurunian spa...
Better Use an Arrow: ‘I-Thou,’ ‘Relation,’ and Their Difference in Martin Buber’s I and Thou
Published in Naharaim
This paper corrects a pervasive mistake in readings of Buber’s iconic trope, “I-Thou” (Ich-Du; hereafter, I-You). The mistake lies in considering it synonymous to the principal concept of his dialogical thought, “relation” (Beziehung). A detailed reading of relevant passages in Buber’s I and Thou (hereafter, IAT) reveals their difference: While bot...
