Maimonides Centre for Advanced Studies
Maimonides Centre
for Advanced Studies
for Advanced Studies
18-19 June, Workshop "Questioning Authority"
9 May 2024
Photo: Credit: Hamburg, The Hamburg State and University Library Carl von Ossietzky, Cod. hebr. 280a, 1r
Kabbalah between Dialectical Disputes, Religious Dissent, and Proto-Academic Scholarship in Medieval and Early Modern Europe
Date
18-19 June 2024
Convenors
- Níels Eggerz (Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main)
- Margherita Mantovani (Alma Mater - Università di Bologna)
Abstract
In his autobiography, Ani ha-Mekhunneh, the erstwhile converso and later Sabbatian Kabbalist Avraham Miguel Cardozo (1626–1706) records the terms of a Jewish-Christian dispute on the nature of the Shekhinah. He relates that his beliefs were shattered to the core when a certain monk challenged the rabbis of Venice by asking whether the Shekhinah was eternal or created. Their inability to answer this question engulfed the young Cardozo in serious doubts: he became aware that behind the dilemma, which questioned the very notion of divine unity, lay the problem of the human ability to know God. From its emergence in the late Middle Ages and throughout the early modern period, kabbalistic literature was harnessed for controversy not only between Judaism and Christianity, but also within Judaism itself. Moreover, kabbalistic literature was often itself a matter of dispute, with its opponents frequently doubting the primordial antiquity of its texts and hence questioning their authority. As exemplified by the heterodox sceptic Cardozo, who was torn between kabbalistic Judaism, Sabbatian messianism, and Christianity, this workshop explores the role of controversies and religious dissent in the history of Kabbalah, both within Judaism and beyond.
Participants
- Emma Abate (Alma Mater - Università di Bologna)
- Saverio Campanini (Alma Mater - Università di Bologna)
- Matt Goldish (Ohio State University)
- Moshe Idel (Hebrew University of Jerusalem)
- Zvi Kunshtat (Johns Hopkins University)
- Efrat Lederfein-Gilboa (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev)
- Agata Paluch (Freie Universität Berlin)
- Leore Sachs-Shmueli (Bar Ilan University)
- Tzahi Weiss (The Open University)
Venue
MCAS
The event is open to the public. Please contact MCAS for further information and registration.
Contact
maimonides-centre"AT"uni-hamburg.de
