New history book explores Judaism, past and future

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What’s the future of Judaism? Will Orthodoxy in its various forms continue to grow and eventually dominate?  Will the liberal movements (Conservative, Reconstructionist, Reform, Renewal) regain momentum and develop in new ways?  Could an entirely new approach emerge?  Or will all of these forms of Judaism coexist in a diverse mix?

To understand the future, it helps to have a strong sense of the past.  That’s easier now with the publication of “A History of Judaism” (Princeton University Press, 2018), a detailed, yet still accessible, survey by the British historian Martin Goodman.

The book works more as an encyclopedia of the past than an integrated narrative.  But it has enough extended stories to help us think through the present and future. 

The most striking narrative comes after the destruction of the Second Temple, in 70 C.E.  Judaism as a coherent way of life was in crisis.  How could the people connect to God without a central temple for sacrifice?  How would they resist the inevitable pressure to give up their distinct practices and assimilate into the pagan or Christian majorities?

Our sources for the next few centuries are thin, but Goodman, who specializes in ancient Rome and Judaism, makes a provocative argument.  He starts with Rabbinic Judaism, which eventually became the dominant tradition.  After the temple fell, a group of learned men formed study groups, which developed into academies.  They converted the sacrificial laws into halakhah, a diverse and loose set of commandments for prayer, study, diet, household management and treating people with respect – all of which made people feel sanctified.

Most Jews, by contrast, especially outside the rabbinic centers in the lands of Israel and Babylonia, practiced what Goodman calls Greek, or Hellenistic, Judaism.  They left little mark on the historical record.  What evidence we have, mostly from synagogue excavations and philosophic writings, suggests that they integrated much of the outside culture into their practices.  Goodman points out that outside cultures affected the rabbis as well, but the Hellenists were more open to mixing with Gentiles.

Why did the Rabbinic approach win out over the Hellenistic alternative?  After all, it involved far more change.  The Hellenists, based in the Diaspora, were just continuing what they had been doing, minus the Jerusalem temple to which they had sent donations and sometimes pilgrims for the annual festivals.  How did the rabbis pull off their remarkable transformation of Judaism?

Goodman is too careful a historian to make a strong claim, but he suggests a lack of will among the Hellenists, compounded by inadequate investment in education: “It seems that Greek Jews, faced with the prestige of rabbis armed with such knowledge, felt unable to defend their own traditions.” 

When Christian Rome demanded that all religious groups set up a central authority, the Hellenized Jews allowed rabbinic leaders in the land of Israel to hold sway.  Hellenists were subsumed by “the intellectual vigor and self-confidence of the rabbinic interpreters,” who gradually replaced Greek with Hebrew as the religious language of the Diaspora.

The rabbis’ approach dominated for several centuries, but Goodman sees diversity returning by the 1500s.  First came Mysticism and Hasidism, and then, in the 19th and 20th centuries, the Reform and Renewal movements, as Jews grappled with modern challenges and opportunities. 

In reaction to these developments, the rabbinic approach developed into what we now know as Orthodoxy.  The Conservative movement arose in America as a way of preserving basic halakhah while fully participating in modern society. 

In his epilogue, however, Goodman vaguely predicts almost a kind of replay of the post-Temple period.  Assuming knowledge and self-confidence are the key to the future, he implies that the more liberal movements have faltered in these respects.  When Judaism “is based only on inherited habits, and unencumbered either by personal piety or by theological certainties,” it may “vanish in the face of secular temptations.”  He suggests that ultra-Orthodox groups, with greater zeal and education, along with strong communities, will eventually become a majority of practicing Jews. 

In effect, “A History of Judaism” presents us with a challenge: Rather than wonder about the future, it’s up to us to take the initiative for our preferred approach.  As the saying goes, the best way to predict the future is to invent it.

JOHN LANDRY lives in Providence, where he is an independent historian and writer.

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