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The Ethiopian Jews of the Beta Israel community are unique in the annals of Jewish history. The community maintained its Jewish identity and devotedly upheld observance of the mitzvot, even in the face of grave physical and spiritual difficulties and unrelenting attempts to persuade them to abandon their religion. Yet, their traditions diverge significantly from the accepted Rabbinic halakhic tradition that is the norm in Israel. This paper examines Yom Kippur observances and describes key differences between the Beta Israel tradition, which reflects the centrality of atonement, and the Rabbinic tradition, which reflects the centrality of repentance. These distinctions stand as manifestations of a set of profound differences within the very consciousness that animates the two traditions. Discussion, using the works of thinkers like Rabbis Joseph B. Soloveitchik, his disciple, Prof. Rabbi David Hartman, and Ethiopian sages, will focus on the more theocentric Beta Israel tradition, in which individuals are perceived, and perceive themselves, as a part of a collective, in contrast to the Rabbinic tradition, which places a greater emphasis on the agency of the individual and human reason. We will highlight the difference between the concepts of "repentance" and "atonement" that are at the root of the two communities' theologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Studies since 2005 have raised doubts about the Assyrian King List's (AKL) intention and ability to measure absolute time. If telescoping of time occurred, it would be difficult to detect during periods when royal annals were scant. The best way to detect discontinuity in the AKL is by comparison with contemporary king lists, such as one constructed from 1–2 Kings regnal formulas. If the AKL conflates time, an assessment of the plausibility of historical scenarios resulting from different timeframes allows for discrimination between one timeline or another. Israel and Judah's interlocking chronological systems make a comparison with the Neo-Assyrian timeline possible but contain 44 more years than the timeline implied by the AKL and Assyrian Eponym Canon. By narrowing the window of time within which a deficit in the Neo-Assyrian canons may have occurred, possible reasons for missing years in the consensus chronology present themselves. This investigation concludes that Assyria sought to maintain the legitimacy of the institution of kingship during a protracted period of unacceptable or anomalous authority. Concerns surrounding the continuity of kingship would have dictated the final form of the Assyrian King List/Assyrian Eponym Canon. Using Divided Kingdom regnal data, a revision of the historical timeline is proposed that aligns archaeological, radiocarbon, biblical, and Assyrian data. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article deals with the way in which the "theological" as the question of the Biblical G-d's involvement in the world, as in the Talmuds, and in light of Heidegger's thought about forgetting and forgetfulness (Verborgenheit and Vergessenheit), becomes a political question about the attitude of the Jew and Israel toward the Heimat. In Heidegger, forgetting is about beings hiding from the view rather than about a psychological or "subjective" process to which forgetting has been reduced in modernity. The Heimat hides from the persons' life, no matter how strongly the persons strive for their Heimat "subjectively" or politically, Heidegger argues. The essay further detects a residual modernity and subjectivism in Heidegger's concession to forgetting as only a secondary operation, a loss, in comparison to the primary, "authentic" relationship to the Heimat, which, for him, one can and should hope for. That residual modern subjectivity in Heidegger enables and necessitates a comparison with the roles forgetting plays in relationships between G-d, Israel, and the Land in the two Talmuds as, similarly to Heidegger, dealing with and working against forgetting, if not Being, then the Law of the mutual obligations between G-d and Israel. The resulting analysis distills a conundrum in the Palestinian rabbis. Delivery on Israel's obligations towards G-d conditions Israel's arrival to the Land, that is to say Israel's fully successful exodus from Egypt. Yet, any clear memory of, and delivery on, these obligations, i.e., any humanly delivered testament to the law of G-d, constitutes an acute danger of forgetting masked as a would-be-certitude in the "memory" of the would-be-original law. Regaining the status of a full-fledged, never-tamed primordial power in relationships between G-d and Israel, forgetting, in the Palestinian rabbinic thought, undermines the deployment of logos as a way to formulate the Law fully. Letting the G-d in the world, logos however proves prone to reducing G-d to (a) theos, thus drawing the G-d into disappearance and forgetting. Such a counter-current to the copulation of theos with logos, the primordial power of forgetting operates even before any memory captured in words and images becomes possible. Arriving from antiquity to modernity, this counter-current continues to operate despite the currently prevalent demotion of forgetting to a subjective political act of a person or nation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article scrutinizes the intricacies surrounding defensive warfare aimed at reclaiming territories perceived by Muslims as under non-Muslim occupation through the lens of the four Sunni schools and Twelver Shia perspectives. In Shia jurisprudence, in the absence of the twelfth Imam, the concept of defensive war does not extend to reclaiming Islamic territories per se; rather, Muslims are not sanctioned to engage in warfare solely for territorial defense. Instead, the imperative for Muslim involvement in armed conflict arises only when the fundamental tenets of Islam face jeopardy. According to Shia's legal interpretation, jeopardizing the core principles of Islam implies a scenario where the erasure of Prophet Muhammad's legacy and the utter annihilation of Sharia law are imminent. Such a predicament is not contingent upon the occupation of Islamic lands. However, Sunni jurisprudence posits a prerequisite for Muslims to engage in warfare, even in defense, necessitating a certainty of prevailing in the conflict. Consequently, given the contemporary milieu, wherein the requisite conditions for assured victory remain unattainable and are likely unattainable, defensive warfare for territorial reclamation is deemed impermissible. The findings of this inquiry propose an Islamic legal framework that advocates abstention from resorting to warfare concerning the mentioned territories in current circumstances, absolving Muslims of any obligation in this regard. Closing the avenue of armed conflict thereby paves the way for alternative avenues such as negotiation, reconciliation, and peace-building. It underscores Islam's reverence for human life, prioritizing it over territorial concerns. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article explores the formation and preservation of a distinctive "Moroccan Judaism" ethos, rooted in a connection to the homeland and an idealized Moroccan past. Through an examination of secularism, traditionalism, and modernity in Israel and France, alongside the resurgence of religiosity in secular societies, it assesses the impact of diasporic experiences on the religious practices of Moroccan-origin families in these countries. The argument posits that diasporic sentiments and the allure of Moroccan heritage significantly influence the negotiation and affirmation of religious identities within these families. Rituals and religious practices serve as expressions of this identity, undergoing adaptation and transformation both in Morocco and abroad. Consequently, "Israeli" and "French" approaches to Moroccan Jewish observance reflect distinct socio-political and historical contexts. The analysis draws from five family cases, illustrating a range of experiences within national and transnational frameworks, enriching our understanding of the dynamic interplay between personal narratives and broader social and historical landscapes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Anthropologists of religion are preoccupied with questions of identity, community, performance and representation. One way they cope with these concerns is through a reflexive examination of their ethnographic positionality in the field. This provides an opportunity to engage not only with "the other", but also to explore their own identities and background. This article presents an autoethnographic analysis of Pride Shabbat, a special service held in June to celebrate the intersection of Judaism and queerness. The service took place at Congregation Beit Simchat Torah (CBST) as part of their 50th-anniversary celebration. Since the 1970s, CBST has been known as the largest gay synagogue in the world and provided diverse religious and spiritual services to the Jewish LGBTQ+ community. Based on my participation in this specific event in June 2023, I draw distinct differences between the Israeli Jewish LGBTQ community and the American Jewish LGBTQ community, such as issues related to ageism and multigenerational perceptions within the gay community, the internal dynamic for gender dominance, as well as diverse trajectories of queerness, religiosity and nationality. Symbolically, contrary to the common perception that the diaspora looks to the state of Israel for symbolic and actual existence, this inquiry sheds light on the opposite perspective; the homeland (represented by the ethnographer) absorbs and learns from the queer Jewish practices and experiences taking place within the diaspora (the American Jewish LGBTQ community). This is an opposite movement which reveals the cracks in the perception of the gay community as a transnational community, as well as the tense power relations between Israel and American Jewry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article discusses Tzvi Avni's Second Piano Sonata, Epitaph, a sonic commentary on one of the inner tales in Rabbi Nachman's "The Seven Beggars". Written between 1974 and 1979, Epitaph not only marks the composer's act of translation (from words into music and from a textual tale into a wordless and semantically unmarked piano sonata) but also his very turn to ethnographic sources that defied their negative function in a national territorial culture that vilified otherness while separating art from ethnography. Avni's turn to Rabbi Nachman was part of a bigger shift that saw composers' dialectical returns to Jewish histories and cultures that were previously repressed from a national culture which dehistoricized the Diaspora to the point of rendering the times and cultures of diasporic Jews a single temporality—ahistorical, contextless, and outside the teleological time of Zionism. With the (re)introduction of diasporic temporalities, non-redemptive poetics became an affordance in the music of Avni or Andre Hajdu (who is also discussed here) while steadily muting the territorial tropes that constituted Hebrew culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While religious dogma and science are often viewed at odds, scientific knowledge is increasingly integrated into religious journalism. This challenges the epistemic tenets that underlie the worldviews of religious readers. In this study, we aim to investigate the role of religious journalists as science gatekeepers and, more specifically, uncover their ethos in advocating science communication to their audience, amid widespread ambivalence. To this end, we focus on the ethical gaze of ultra-Orthodox (Haredi) Jews in Israel. An enclaved religious group that has a history of challenging scientific precepts and has of late demonstrated various levels of ambivalence and resistance to scientifically inspired policies made during the COVID-19 pandemic. To this end, we conducted in-depth interviews with 20 Haredi editors, radio and print/online journalists, engaged with science reporting before and during the COVID-19 outbreak. The findings unveil several ethical facets employed by Haredi journalists: care, community, professionalism, and religion. The findings also outline the interaction between professional, religious, and communal codes of conduct, as they play out in bounded mediascapes. Accordingly, religious journalists' role breaches traditional boundaries as they respond and strive to integrate multiple sources of knowledge for what they see as the betterment of their devout readers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As part of this Special Issue devoted to research on the Jewish communities in Africa and their diaspora, we focus on the case of South African Jews who emigrated to Israel. First, we analyze the socio-religious and cultural context in which a Jewish diaspora developed and marked the ethno-religious identity of South African Jews both as individuals and as a collective. Second, we examine the role of ethno-religious identification as the main motive for migrating to Israel, and third, we show the role of ethno-religious identity in the integration of South African Jews into Israeli life. This study relies on data from a survey of South Africans and their descendants living in Israel in 2008, and in-depth interviews. The findings provide evidence for a strong Jewish community in South Africa that created a strong sense of belonging to the Jewish people and a strong attachment to Israel. As expected, two of the key reasons for the decision to move to Israel were ideology and religion. The immigrants wanted to live in a place where they could feel part of the majority that was culturally and religiously Jewish. Finally, ethno-religious identities (Jewish and Zionist) influenced not only the decision making of potential immigrants but also their process of integration into Israeli life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]