Abba Hillel Silver and American Zionism
Title | Abba Hillel Silver and American Zionism PDF eBook |
Author | Mark A. Raider |
Publisher | Routledge |
Total Pages | 138 |
Release | 2012-10-12 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 1136314954 |
The essays collected here investigate Rabbi Silver's Zionist political leadership, his impact on American Judaism, ideological orientation and relations with the leaders of the Palestine Jewish community, World Zionist Organization and the Jewish State.
The Downfall of Abba Hillel Silver and the Foundation of Israel
Title | The Downfall of Abba Hillel Silver and the Foundation of Israel PDF eBook |
Author | Ofer Shiff |
Publisher | Syracuse University Press |
Total Pages | 304 |
Release | 2014-05-27 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 0815652801 |
In early February 1949, American Jewry’s most popular and powerful leader, Abba Hillel Silver (1893–1963), had summarily resigned from all his official positions within the Zionist movement and had left New York for Cleveland, returning to his post as a Reform rabbi. During the second half of the 1940s, Silver was the most outspoken proponent of the founding of a sovereign Jewish state. He was the most instrumental American Jewish leader in the political struggle that led to the foundation of the State of Israel. Paradoxically, this historic victory also heralded Silver’s personal defeat. Soon after Israel’s declaration of independence, Silver and many of his American Zionist colleagues were relegated to the sidelines of the Zionist movement. Almost overnight, the influential leader—one who had been admired and feared by supporters and opponents—was stripped of his power within both the Zionist and the American Jewish arenas. Shiff’s book discerns the various aspects of the striking turnabout in Silver’s political fate, describing the personal tragic story of a leader who was defeated by his own victory and the much broader intra-Zionist battle that erupted in full force immediately after the founding of Israel. Drawing extensively on Silver’s own archival material, Shiff presents an enlightening portrait of a critical episode in Jewish history. This book is highly relevant for anyone who attempts to understand the complex homeland–diaspora relations between Israel and American Jewry.
Abba Hillel Silver
Title | Abba Hillel Silver PDF eBook |
Author | Jerome Bernard Polisky |
Publisher | |
Total Pages | 336 |
Release | 1959 |
Genre | |
ISBN |
Abba Hillel Silver
Title | Abba Hillel Silver PDF eBook |
Author | Marc Lee Raphael |
Publisher | Holmes & Meier Publishers |
Total Pages | 334 |
Release | 1989 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN |
Silver's writings and activities had a profound influence on American life, both religious and secular. Like William James, he believed the business of religion was to unlock people's inner resources. "Judaism's central and unique property" he wrote, "is the power to release faith and courage for living, to produce spiritual vitality and fruitfulness, and by that that it ultimately stands or falls." For Silver, this power functioned two ways-as a support during crises and as a stimulus to high endeavours. This, of course, raises the question of whether religion is purely psychology or also philosophy, whether it can distance itself from the supernatural and remain, in fact, religion. Raphael deals with these questions in this challenging and provocative study.
American Zionism
Title | American Zionism PDF eBook |
Author | Jeffrey S. Gurock |
Publisher | Taylor & Francis |
Total Pages | 516 |
Release | 1998 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 9780415919326 |
First Published in 1998. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Nazism, The Jews and American Zionism, 1933-1948
Title | Nazism, The Jews and American Zionism, 1933-1948 PDF eBook |
Author | Aaron Berman |
Publisher | Wayne State University Press |
Total Pages | 256 |
Release | 2018-02-05 |
Genre | Social Science |
ISBN | 0814344038 |
Aaron Berman takes a moderate and measured approach to one of the most emotional issues in American Jewish historiography, namely, the response of American Jews to Nazism and the extermination of European Jewry.In remarkably large numbers, American Jews joined the Zionist crusade to create a Jewish state that would finally end the problem of Jewish homelessness, which they believed was the basic cause not only of the Holocaust but of all anti-Semitism. Though American Zionists could justly claim credit for the successful establishment of Israel in 1948, this triumph was not without cost. Their insistence on including a demand for Jewish statehood in any proposal to aid European Jewry politicized the rescue issue and made it impossible to appeal for American aid on purely humanitarian grounds. The American Zionist response to Nazism also shaped he political turmoil in the Middle East which followed Israel’s creation. Concerned primarily with providing a home for Jewish refugees and fearing British betrayal, Zionists could not understand Arab protests in defense of their own national interests. Instead they responded to the Arab revolt with armed force and sought to insure their own claim to Palestine, Zionists came to link he Arabs with the Nazi and British forces that were opposed to the establishment of a Jewish state. In the thinking of American Zionists, the Arabs were steadily transformed from a people with whom an accommodation would have to be made into a mortal enemy to be defeated. Aaron Berman does not apologize for American Jews, but rather tries to understand the constraints within which they operated and what opportunities-if any-they had to respond to Hitler. In surveying the latest scholarship and responding o charges against American Jewry, Berman’s arguments are reasoned and reasonable.
American Zionism: Missions and Politics
Title | American Zionism: Missions and Politics PDF eBook |
Author | Jeffrey Gurock |
Publisher | Routledge |
Total Pages | 512 |
Release | 2014-02-04 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 1136675493 |
The final volume comprises articles which take a look at the political movement for the establishment of a national homeland for the Jewish people. The twenty one articles cover subjects such as the historical emergence of Zionism, attitudes towards the Zionist and Anti-Zionist movements in America, and the developments of trusteeship for the Palestine.