The Diaspora Dimension

1. Front Matter

   Pages I-XII

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2. The Theory of Diaspora

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

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   2. The Diaspora: Origin and Meaning

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 3-19

   3. The Consequences of Diaspora

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 20-32

   4. The Diaspora and Jewish Character

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 33-41

3. The Emancipation

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 43-43

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   2. The French Experience Pre-Emancipation

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 45-55

   3. The Emancipation

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 56-66

   4. Dreyfus

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 67-79

   5. The Russian Diaspora: The Matrix

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 80-97

   6. The Russian Zion Alternative

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 98-113

4. The Modern Agony

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 115-115

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   2. The German-Jewish Synthesis

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 117-135

   3. Anti-Semitism, Nationalism, Self-Hate The Failure of Symbiosis

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 136-168

5. Epilogue

   1. The American Diaspora: Is it Different?

      • Arnold Ages

      Pages 169-172

6. Back Matter

   Pages 173-174

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Few questions have agitated thoughtful Jews as much as the one touching on identity. The problem arose originally from the situation of the Jews as a diaspora community. From the time of Philo and probably before, great energies have been expended by Jews in seeking to understand the meaning of the Jewish dispersion. In recent times the problem has been transformed from a largely academic and relig­ ious issue into a political one, to wit the furious debates in modern Israel over the citizenship quandary. For more than twenty years now the Jewish State has been rocked by violent and often acrimonious discussion over the who is a Jew controversy. The consequences of these exchanges have had reverberations all over the Jewish world since a final determination of this issue could not but have important bearing on present-day diaspora communities. For reasons that are natural and understandable Israeli historians such as Baer, Dinur and Kauffman have written extensively and brilliantly about the diaspora dimensionin Jewishhistory. Theirfocus, however, has been influenced strongly by the re-birth of Israel as a political entity in this century. This has predisposed them not unex­ pectedly to view the vast historical sweep of diaspora history aspart of a spectrum which reflects the return to Israel as a dominant shading in the analysis.

• Anti-Semitism
• Diaspora
• Jewish history
• Zionism
• communism

Policies and ethics